Ask HN: Is it possible to change job from front-end to back-end? - <AUTHOR> Hi everyone, I am primarily a front-end developer doing React and React Native for 4+ years. However I recently discovered Elixir(Phoenix) and fell in love with the language. Unfortunately Elixir is a back-end language and all the jobs I search requires 3+ year experience in the back-end which I do not have.
Have any of you guys have experience in switching successfully? If yes how did you do it. <comment><USER2> Yes of course. Backend is a really deep concept, that goes from Database to Monitoring to deployment to API design. Pick an initial path (e.g. LAMP stack - Linux Apache MySQL PHP for instance, one of the most used on web, rich of resources and documentation) and try to design your DB Schema + API. Start without a framework just to learn the basics, then don't reinvent the wheel and stick to one of the existing Rapid Application Development Frameworks. It will go faster

</comment><comment><USER3> Doesn't hurt to apply. You can show off your side projects using the language you like. Just be hungry to learn and improve.</comment>


Facebook takes down Britain First ads - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-46746601 <comment><USER2> As always, this begs the question between hate speech and disfavored political speech. I think Britain First is doing their best to actively revert the UK back 50 years, but I struggle to see why it is they're simply hate speech and not a valid political movement.

<comment><USER3> > Ads for a Britain First petition to stop a mosque being built in Maidstone, > Kent, appeared on Facebook over the Christmas period, despite the group > being banned by the social network.

> The three ads and the page on which they originated have now been removed, > after BBC News contacted Facebook.

I think it's safe to say that the "to stop a mosque being built" is the important phrase here.

<comment><USER4> why is that hate speech? i don't want more churches built, is that hate speech?

<comment><USER5> It depends, why don't you want more churches built?

Because it's a Muslim church and you don't like them?

Because you're an anti-theist?

Because you don't like the noise?

Because you think their application for a zoning exception is shaky?

<comment><USER6> ..and this is the problem with hate speech - it involves perceived intent and thus the criminalisation of thought.

<comment><USER7> Wait until you find out that _mens rea_ exists.

<comment><USER6> Shallow comment. Suggest you read this: [http://barristerblogger.com/2018/03/18/the-met-has-a- problem...](http://barristerblogger.com/2018/03/18/the-met-has-a-problem-with- hate-crime-it-cant-explain-what-it-means/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The question is, how would Facebook treat reverse bigotry that aligns with their personal biases and values? Would it recieve the same hate speech designation, or does "hate speech" end where your own personal politics begin?

That's my issue with corporations and media playing speech cop. Free speech wasn't supposed to have carve outs. As long as you are not committing an actual crime, and not just a thought crime, put every vile idea out in the public and let people discuss it.

Censorship is never a sound policy, the scales slide, when old ideas are squashed, what happens when the victors of censorship disagree with eachother? Is their first impulse to actually debate or just continue designating more ideas as hate speech?

<comment><USER7> >Free speech wasn't supposed to have carve outs.

Sorry to be a stickler, but what exactly are you referring to here?

This statement is demonstrably false at the principle level, even in Mills' work, let alone in the enabling constitutional, legislative, or treaty-based implementations of Free Speech.

We can have a sound discussion about the optimal place a society should land upon on the more restrictions vs. less restrictions spectrum, but to pretend that the only way the system works is at precisely zero limits warps the conversation and prevents us from taking a deep look into the issue.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Anyone remembers how the internet was going to liberate the expression, instead we got two, three bottlenecks manned (or is it personed?) by censors actively supported by the MSM and virtually the entire university system.

<comment><USER10> That is absolutely not the fault of the Internet and entirely the fault of the people using the Internet. Every time I hear this complaint on a forum other than Facebook or Reddit or Twitter I laugh because if it was true, HN wouldn't exist. The millions of independent phpBB forums wouldn't exist. I wouldn't be allowed to write my own HTML and Javascript if this was true.

Some people willingly put themselves into buckets, yes. It's always been that, it will always be that way. But don't pretend for a second that this is the death of the Internet or a lack of free expression or censorship or any of that nonsense until you can't buy an IP address and host a web server on your own hardware. The web is free and open, and the existence of non-free and non- open parts of the Internet does not negate that in any way.

<comment><USER8> [https://www.google.com/amp/s/techcrunch.com/2017/08/13/godad...](https://www.google.com/amp/s/techcrunch.com/2017/08/13/godaddy- tells-white-supremacist-site-daily-stormer-to-find-a-new-domain-provider/amp/)

Domain providers are beginning to police content they deem as unacceptable speech or ideas. Are you going to remember IP addresses when the DNS system itself polices thought?

The problem is, tech companies are beginning to behave like a cartel when it comes to free expression. We don't just see it in Facebook, we see it across all facets of the digital economy, from payment providers to hosting providers to DNS services themselves.

If your solution for someone getting the scarlet letter is to say they are free to build their own network, then we are approaching a major problem.

<comment><USER10> The slope is not nearly as slippery as you're imagining it to be. I'm not sure _literal white supremecists_ are the shining beacon upon which you want to hang your argument (if I'm wrong on this, you don't need to read any further). We're not talking about a controversial political opinion, we're not talking about coastal liberals shutting down good American conservative free speech, we're talking about _white supremecists_ who refer to themselves as _genocidal_. People who want to murder (and have done so) non-white people just for the crime of having a different skin color.

But beyond that absolutely ridiculous argument, yes. The Internet is free-as- in-freedom as long as you have an IP address. If you want to start your own competitor to the World Wide Web because a few private companies exercise their right to not to business with you, you can do that. The Web and the Internet work without domain names, and if you really need your message out there and your followers really need to hear it, is typing in an IP address too much work? If it is, then your message might not be as convincing as you think it is. But even still, you can host your own website or Internet service regardless. And you can start your own registrar and host your own servers and make your own payment processor. That is entirely possible and at that point only the government can stop you (and even then, you can choose your own government like The Pirate Bay did). If your movement is stopped by a lack of _convenience_ , that's not Facebook's problem.

Saying "but Facebook banned me" as if Facebook was the entire Internet or even the entire Web doesn't fly. Only you can give them that power, and you can take that power from them whenever you want to. Being banned from Twitter/Facebook/YouTube is only a problem if you honestly believe that Twitter/Facebook/YouTube owns the entire Internet. But they don't. You're free to start a competitor any time you want.

<comment><USER8> Is the only food store in town, who is ran by a racist, allowed to starve black families by refusing them service because of their skin color?

Are tech companies across the board allowed to shut down, disenfranchise, silence, and marginalize people and businesses because they simply disagree with their lawful politics and ideas?

<comment><USER10> >Is a store allowed to refuse service to customers because of their skin color?

In the US, no. Title III of the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination based on race (among other things).

>Are tech companies allowed ban users because they disagree with their politics?

Yes. Political ideology is not a protected class the US. The government can't tell you what you can and can't say, but private businesses are completely free to moderate content hosted on their platforms.

But again, if you don't like the rules of Facebook/GoDaddy/Twitter/etc, of these private non-governmental for-profit businesses, you're free to start your own. You're making it sound like a global conspiracy when in reality it's more likely that Daily Stormer's talk of white supremacy and genocide is so distasteful across the board that major tech companies independently and simultaneously decided that these people were not welcome.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Does anyone else remember when, circa ±2009, Zuckerberg used to frame Facebook as (in his words) a utility? What has happened since? The company grew and became more "normalized" and thus inline with the "company activist" model so prevalent today?

<comment> vertex-four Among other things, they realised that being a utility would not be as profitable. Also, many of the people who work there legitimately don't want Facebook to be used as a tool to make the world a worse place.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> > The ads were first spotted and reported to Facebook as hate speech by user > [real name!] on 2 January and he received a standard response from Facebook > saying that the page in question did not "go against one of our specific > community standards".

They published the _real name_ of the person who made the complaint! That's just asking for him to get death threats. This is one of those moments where "normal journalism" covers things which would be banned from most forums, in this case as "doxxing".

> A day later, when the BBC got in touch, it had changed its mind.

This happens a lot. They'll routinely leave terrible violent rhetoric up while censoring anything that looks like a female-presenting nipple.

</comment><comment><USER13> Regardless of content I don't want to live in a world where corporate interests censor me.

<comment><USER14> So join us in building open source alternatives.

<comment><USER15> I am curious - which open source alternative to Facebook (and Google) has currently the most traction?

<comment><USER14> I am curious as well!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I feel like this corporate censorship is awful for free speech. Specifically, because dividing people by beliefs/demographics increases tribalistic behaviour and the spread of misinformation.

I foresee a situation where we have multiple social networks, each with radically different social/political slants. Similar to what we've seen with things like Reddit and Voat.

<comment><USER17> It seems like this is the first time non millennials had to deal with 'shitty mods'.

They are new and don't understand- Its time to move off facebook.

Same reason I'm here instead of reddit.

<comment><USER16> I think the fact that I've not encountered an "evergreen" community (i.e. one that doesn't go the way of Digg, Reddit eventually) gives me a lot of anxiety with regards to my day to day online community usage.

Online communities often feel ephemeral, but maybe that's healthy in the grand scheme of the internet?

I'm really thankful that we have good mods here on HN.

<comment><USER12> Metafilter has been around for almost 20 years with a small, stable, gatekept community.

I think a certain amount of churn is unavoidable in this accelerated 21st century life, sadly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Maybe it's time to realize that it's very hard to be objective and neutral. In this case, being objective and neutral is just giving the extremes a platform to promote themselves.

Maybe sites like Facebook should try taking a "no politics" policy, or a policy where a political ad is always placed next to a free ad from the opposing side?

<comment><USER12> > a political ad is always placed next to a free ad from the opposing side?

This is obviously a disaster, as it gives free rein to put lies on the same footing as truth. But adopting local rules on electoral advertising is a really good idea - UK print political adverts _must_ have an imprint saying who's paid for them, for example.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> It is concerning that Britain First exist and have the support they do.

It's also concerning that Facebook has the power to decide who is right and wrong when it comes to the most popular form of free speech we have in the world today.

These aren't mutually exclusive facts- they can both be true or false and you can agree or disagree with them to different levels. And I don't have an answer. I'm not even sure any answer the majority would agree with exists. This is the great problem our generation must answer as a society, or destroy everything great we have achieved for having not solved it.

<comment><USER20> Britain First have about as much support as Islam4UK which is to say not much.

The EDL was the real worry with membership peaking at 184,000 but today virtually none existent.

The majority of both groups appears to have merged into UKIP.

<comment><USER12> Which in turn has merged into the Conservative Party. Occasionally an MP or councillor is found posting in a hate group.

[https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/zm8zb3/tory-mp-with- histo...](https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/zm8zb3/tory-mp-with-history-of- islamophobia-was-a-member-of-racist-facebook-groups)

(Sometimes people claim they were added to the group without their knowledge or consent, which FB lets you do - this is a massive misfeature of the system!)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I've seen Britain First ads. While I disagree with their fearmongering, I think they went to great lengths to portray things in a nonviolent and "we Christians just want to make sure our children can still practice Christianity" way.

Really, though, this is beside the point. Just like whether the Internet should be regulated under Title I or Title II was beside the point. The point is that, when you're at a point where it's one or the other one-size-fits-all policy, it's a symptom of too much consolidation: the telcos / banks / platforms / whatever have become too big. It's a cartel.

Look, Facebook is becoming something much different than college social networks, or a "utility". Isn't it time for open source software that we can all move to, like the Web instead of AOL, or like Wordpress instead of Blogger.com ?

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZ1O_gmPneI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZ1O_gmPneI)

Why are we, in 2018, still relying on giant centralized corporations to connect us and "allow" us to have our own ( _shocker_ ) chatroom on their servers?

<comment><USER21> > Why are we, in 2018, still relying on giant centralized corporations to > connect us and "allow" us to have our own (shocker) chatroom on their > servers?

We're not though, but why are you posting this in a centralized, censored / managed comment section while you could go to one of the decentralized open source alternatives currently being worked on? It's not about options, it's about what everyone wants - engagement, being where the crowds are, being heard, reading other people's opinions. As long as they align enough with your own, of course.

<comment><USER14> Actually HN built their own software for their own forum, and I think even released it. They aren't hosted on some huge centralized site. This is exactly what I'm talking about.

Would you also say "it's not about options" in other areas like net neutrality, telcos or banking?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> OK so let's assume for a moment that those people neither have a problem with the religious part of Islam nor the fact that it's usually practiced by foreigners but only have a problem with the political part. Then let's apply it to something else to see how it feels:

"Facebook removes petition against Communist youth center"

It has a kind of 1950's ring to it and it still doesn't totally remove the smell of stupidity, but this once was a very common stance not only in the US but in most western countries.

"We want Britain to stay capitalist" is absolutely not a strange slogan.

I still think anybody should be able to be a Communist in a free society, as long as they don't plan a violent guerrilla or want to overthrow democracy with some kind of idealistic planned economy dictatorship.

</comment><comment><USER23> "Political groups have been spending increasing amounts of money on Facebook adverts"

That's because Cambridge Analytical was the instruction manual

All the hearings and dockets are better free content than any marketing guru's online course

<comment><USER24> give me a break, Obama's team was allowed to suck up Facebook's entire social graph and also used an app to get the data for all of the app users friends without consent

[https://www.fastcompany.com/40546816/obama-campaigns- targete...](https://www.fastcompany.com/40546816/obama-campaigns-targeted- share-app-also-used-facebook-data-from-millions-of-unknowing-users)

Zuckerberg and Sandberg hosted events to raise money for Obama

[https://www.cbsnews.com/news/obama-harnessing-facebooks- soci...](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/obama-harnessing-facebooks-social- graph/)

The media called it genius and a good thing when obama used data and social media to win. Those dumb dinosaur conservatives were being left behind by tech savvy democrats. Now it's portrayed as evil when the reverse happened. Pure propaganda

[https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/10/business/media/10carr.htm...](https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/10/business/media/10carr.html)

[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/feb/17/obama- digital-...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/feb/17/obama-digital-data- machine-facebook-election)

<comment><USER23> I dont think it matters? I didnt say it was evil, interestingly enough you did

Cambridge Analytica is still the instruction manual

Its almost like your response was on your clipboard for anytime you saw CA in a sentence

How would you expect me to respond to that.. sorry that Obama's team isnt getting credit?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> > "We thank the BBC.."

And why is BBC trying to portray that a canned email response is an official statement?

I don't doubt the matter at hand, but this is very sloppy journalism.

<comment><USER12> That _is_ the official statement Facebook gave to the BBC, and it's proper journalism to report what they said when asked.

<comment><USER25> It's not. And I actually feel insulted to have you counter my initial statement. Go read the article again and tell me how is it an official response.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I never think ads have been fair or 100% free speech. If I own a web site with ads I very much get to pick which organizations can use my platform for getting out their message. And they are free to start other web pages with their own content. Also if I am a billionarie I can make my voice heard a billion times louder than a poor person, how democratic is that? When Facebook bans actual accounts or pages, I think that is a bit different. You could still argue that they could start their own web page, but I think that is murkier territory when they limit non-paid free speech.

Edit: Would be great to get a reply on why I'm being downvoted?</comment>


How Goldman Sachs Helped Greece to Mask Its True Debt (2010) - <AUTHOR> http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/greek-debt-crisis-how-goldman-sachs-helped-greece-to-mask-its-true-debt-a-676634.html <comment><USER3> I hope that money will never be paid back, just to teach the people who accommodated this a lesson.

Of course Goldman Sachs themselves cashed in on the deal immediately, and they probably used their client's money, so for them this has been a "successful trade". Will they ever stop, will they ever be kept accountable for what they do? I fear nothing will happen to them, again.

<comment><USER4> > I hope that money will never be paid back, just to teach the people who > accommodated this a lesson.

Let's assume the money is never repaid; at this point it seems likely that at least most of it never will be especially given the enormous haircut private lenders already took. How does that teach GS a lesson? The article even quotes a German noting that CCSs are legal (not that following the law has done much for bankers over the last 10 years). More importantly, what makes you think GS has any net exposure to Greece at this time? The swap was sold on. There is very little Greek debt left in private hands and I doubt that GS would be so foolish as to have any material exposure to it, whether in the form of CCS or anything else. And the buyer of the swap, supposedly a Greek bank per the article, is already a total zombie regardless of this particular asset. Whether Greece defaults on it or not will not be material to its fate.

<comment><USER5> >How does that teach GS a lesson?

My earnest hope is that everyone learns not to trust GS at their word, or at all. And then GS can't find buyers.

Hey, I can dream, right?

<comment><USER6> People will continue to deal with GS, despite (maybe even because of) their ever worsening reputation, as long as they can convince themselves that they are the ones who are going to get rich while the other idiots are going to get ripped off. The incentive scheme is similar to that of a slot machine.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The whole story of Greece is not very nice.

Many sides have had their share in this. The Greek government of this time has made some severe errors. But I see an even bigger share in the EU (also German) politicians of that time (before the Euro was installed). It is a fact, that those politicians sold the Euro to the German population (I guess to others the same way) with the argument, that no country will ever have to pay for an other Euro country. They said, that there are so many security measures installed ...

But the weakest spot in those "security measures" where the politicians themselves. They _wanted_ Greece to be inside the Euro, so they turned a blind eye to any warning signs. Of course they also turned a blind eye to every other country, because according to the "security measures" that where announced, nearly no country would have got the Euro ... (even Germany violated the terms)

So, I see the biggest failure in the politicians, that just wanted to have this adventure -- without really managing the risks ....

It is really an ugly business, and we will see, where all this disaster (the Euro) leads us to. In now 5 years of so-called crisis-management, they even did not manage to "rescue" Greece ... (they just prolonged the pain) and other countries can still become in trouble soon. With a bigger country, the troubles will be proliferated.

For me, the whole case is a (n other) portent of the incapacity of today's politicians.

<comment><USER8> If it weren't possible to impose obligations on taxpayers, this adventure would never have happened.

By the way, using a common currency does not require that the debts of those using it should be the responsibility of all who are using that currency. California's debts are California's problem and the problem of those who buy its bonds. Other states aren't obligated to bail it out.

<comment><USER9> > _California 's debts are California's problem and the problem of those who > buy its bonds._

French and German banks had bough Greek bonds. France and Germany didn't want their banks to default, even though the banks had made these bad investments.

<comment><USER8> And they SHOULD let their banks suffer the consequences of bad decisions.

That's the only way a bank will learn to properly weigh benefits versus risks. If they get bailed out whenever a bad risk blows up, they won't learn to avoid or charge rates appropriate to the level of risk.

And depositors should also think twice about where they put their money.

If we want banks that don't default, we should have banks that only issue mortgages for less than 80% of a home's pre-bubble price. Let the buyer or another lender be on the hook for the risky part of the loan.

And if this bank fails, let its assets be turned over to a corporation owned by all the depositors, whose shares they can buy and sell. There's no reason to make the taxpayers pay to recapitalize the bank and keep the unwise bankers in business.

If there's a demand for that level of risk and the low rates it pays, that will solve the problem who want that level of security.

But we want to be insulated from risks and have them spread around to other people when dumb investments blow up. So even wise investors are stuck paying the costs. And we DO eventually have to face these costs despite all the borrowing and money creation we do to paper them over.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> "This credit disguised as a swap didn't show up in the Greek debt statistics. Eurostat's reporting rules don't comprehensively record transactions involving financial derivatives."

Sounds like Eurostat needs to hire some smarter people.

<comment><USER11> They almost certainly knew - it wasn't exactly a secret at the time - <USER2> just didn't care for political reasons. All the political momentum was for further European integration.

<comment><USER12> I lived in the UK during 1996-97 and there were plenty of stories in the news about the "poorer" countries being allowed to join the EU. Greece being the chief among them.

You're right, they knew but they didn't care.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> it's funny how few people on this comment board fail to realize we in the west are all greece soon.

too much leverage leads to an insolvent society, just as too much debt leads to an insolvent individual.

the history of the world is largely intertwined with stories of debt</comment><comment>who is under the control of whom else?

the answer to too much monetary debt is always monetary debasement. as the money supply is turned to toilet paper, as we have seen in the 20th century with zimbabwe and other countries</comment><comment></comment><comment>the answer is that societies reform themselves.

the result is other types of debt and relationships arise to fill the gap, while poverty sweeps over the nation.

no financial trickery can solve this problem, at best one can hope to mitigate it.

firms like goldman sachs seek to exaccerbate it as financialization is rooted in crisis capitalism, generating and encouraging crisis in order to take advantage of it.

the entire wall street edifice has transititoned over the years from semi responsible stewards of financial wealth, to a parasitic casino that is built upon the practice of crisis capitalism, bribery and price manipualtion.

</comment><comment><USER14> Where there is unconscionable conduct by a bank, Goldman Sachs are there. Where there is large scale fraud, Goldmans are there. Where politicians buy themselves a year of office at the expense of many years of misery for the people - Goldman's advising.

Why do these guys have a banking license in the EU?

<comment><USER15> When Gordon Brown launched the PPP scheme to essentially finance infrastructure development off the balance sheet, it was not an investment bank to blame - but a politician looking to fiddle the books to look good.

GS are a symptom, not a cause. They have a license is because they did and do what the people in power wanted, and until you can come up with a way to change the people in power and the incentives they have to stay there...

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Goldman Sachs: the gift that keeps on taking and taking and...

</comment><comment><USER17> [http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/germany-faces- bi...](http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/germany-faces-billions-in- losses-if-greece-goes-bust-a-1041369.html)

<comment><USER18> As described in the different scenarios Germany would face only very few billions of liabilities in any given year. In total the numbers are high, but for the actual yearly budget, these amounts are peanuts. Even small German city-states are used to waste amounts of this size to build shiny concert halls [0] or airports that have crazy ventilation systems hidden below the floors.

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

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Lots of comments trashing GS. I generally agree with all of them, but in an effort to be critical, I end up thinking that GS just executes what their customers don't have the guts/knowledge to do by themselves. Not that they are not legally/morally liable, but GS is not the only one to blame. As with everything in life, nothing is black or white.

</comment><comment><USER20> [http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/anil.kashyap/research/papers...](http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/anil.kashyap/research/papers/A-Primer- on-the-Greek-Crisis_june29.pdf) this recent summary is the best I have seen in the last couple of days.

</comment><comment><USER21> Does anyone know of any reference that covers the actual trade that was done? This implies a seriously off-market x-cry swap. I would be interested in the terms esp notional and rate.

This article doesn't really explain much (other than that GS has savvy bankers which is nice to know)

<comment><USER21> @ShinyThings. Thank you. Exactly what I was looking for. BTW your account is coming up as dead. In case you weren't aware.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Honest question: Can someone explain, in plain english, why it would be a bad idea to just kick Greece out of the EU? What's wrong with some good old anarchy and lynching a few dozen former politicians who led the Greeks to this abyss in the first place?

As an outsider, I am shocked by the hullaballoo going on to keep Greece in the EU. Why not let them reap what they sowed, as a nation?

<comment><USER23> First, there's the __currency __(the euro), and the political and economic __union __(the EU). There 's a lot of overlap, but they're not the same.

There's a lot of debate about Greece and the euro, and while the current Greek government was elected on a platform of staying in the Euro, right now Greece is rapidly heading towards being ejected from it. But there's no real prospect (for now, anyhow) of them leaving the EU.

> why it would be a bad idea to just kick Greece out of the EU?

If you mean the EU, well, nobody really wants them to exit the Euro, but __nobody __wants them to exit the EU. It would also be ridiculously illegal; there 's literally no process by which a country might be ejected.

If you mean the Euro, well, that's an interesting question. The general consensus is that Greek exit would hurt the remaining members and Greece fairly severely; a real case of cutting off your nose to spite your face. Some have suggested (and I agree) that a Greek exit would be worse for the remaining Euro-members than it would be for Greece.

> What's wrong with some good old anarchy

We're talking about people lives; pensions, savings, jobs, dreams. I don't think your flippancy is really appropriate. In any case the victims of a Greek exit won't be politicians and bankers; it will be ordinary people, in and outside of Greece.

> lynching a few dozen former politicians who led the Greeks to this abyss

I don't think you understand politics.

> Why not let them reap what they sowed

For EU leaders, this isn't about Greece, it's about the Euro and the greater project of European integration. They don't want Greece out of the Euro, and they sure as hell don't want them out of the EU. What they want is to keep Greece in the EU, without pissing off their voters too much. It looks like, at the moment, Greece will exit the EU despite what people want.

<comment><USER22> Thanks for the detailed reply! You are quite right about the part where I don't understand politics. I like revolutions better! Especially, where the guilty heads roll, figuratively at least.

However, this looks like a terrible mess that will, more likely than not, result in a humanitarian crisis of mythological scale, visited upon the poorest and weakest members of Greek society. So why don't EU states let Greece have that much needed meltdown, but use their money to aid those most in need during the ensuing crisis? I mean, by your analysis, no one culpable takes the fall. And who is culpable, if not the politicians in power over the past decade?

<comment><USER23> > I like revolutions better! Especially, where the guilty heads roll, > figuratively at least.

The average Greek in the streets is more likely to blame German politicians than their own, so no revolution is likely. (And I'm not sure they'd be wrong either.)

> result in a humanitarian crisis of mythological scale, visited upon the > poorest and weakest members of Greek society.

Honestly, I'm not sure it'll be much worse than what's already happened. The "internal devaluation" Greece has been forced to weather has been brutal, to the point that default and a "real" devaluation offers real hope of improvement.

> So why don't EU states let Greece have that much needed meltdown, but use > their money to aid those most in need during the ensuing crisis?

The entire issue is that the rest of the EU (including some parts which are actually poorer than Greece, and have zero moral obligation to be sympathetic) really has no interest in spending their money to continue aiding Greece. Their voters, especially, do not. If they did, Greece wouldn't be heading towards default and exit of the Euro. But they don't, and as such, I don't think there's any good solution here.

In retrospect, Greece should never have joined the Euro.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> (2010)

<comment><AUTHOR> Edited, thanks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> all the guys at the top know that if you want to cook the books, you use Goldman Sachs and PriceWaterhouseCoopers to keep you afloat.</comment>


The ultra-violent origins of gold - <AUTHOR> http://www.theguardian.com/science/life-and-physics/2016/jan/16/the-ultra-violent-origins-of-gold <comment><USER2> The physics is amazing, the idea astounding.

But given the history of the universe isn't this just wildly improbable as a story? I mean, 12bn years is very long, but is it enough time for neutron stars colliding to make my wedding ring?

<comment><USER3> The article doesn't go so far as to say so explicitly, but it implies we're seeing spectra of gold, platinum, and uranium, among others, in gamma ray bursts. If that's the case, I don't think the _a priori_ improbability of the story much matters.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Well, if you got baited by expectations of a historical-anthropological account of gold, this ain't it.

<comment><USER5> I totally was, being fascinated by the social aspects of metals, I couldn't resist. But a good physics story is still ... wait for it .. gold.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: need IP advice - <AUTHOR>

This might not fit under "hacker" label specifically, but thought there would be people here that would know:
I currently own 100+ domain names under a few businesses and personal name. I plan to increase that to 1000+ this year.  I'd like to create an asset holding company and transfer all of the domains there, and maybe other intellectual property.
What states are the best for creating such a company? and what are the pro/cons of each.
Things that are taken into consideration: privacy, easy of creation/management of legal entity with the state government. what other factors should I consider?
Once this business entity is created, how do I handle the transfers and usage of this intellectual property? is it best to create some kind of a lease/rent agreement?
If nobody has any advice here, anybody know who is the best person to approach with this question? Is there an attorney that is recommended for this? I figure a local attorney wouldn't know about national business laws. <comment><USER2> Delaware tends to be the overall preferred state for incorporation.

However, I can't tell from just the details of your post if you are over- complicating things or not. A cache of domain names is really not anything too significant and I don't think you require too much formality there corporation-wise. Start an LLC, transfer all the domains to that and then file your annual business paperwork.

Ultimately, your question is best answered by a business attorney. If you really have a need for this sort of setup, then the couple of hundred dollars in consulting fees (plus some personal time spent researching things and your own and then asking targeted questions here and elsewhere) should be a small investment to make. Having a good relationship with a business and tax consultant can be very valuable. Again, hard to tell from just your post here, but I don't think the "national" aspect of what you're looking for is anything so extreme that a decent local business attorney couldn't help you out.</comment>


Jan. 8, 1942: Happy Birthday Stephen Hawking - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/thisdayintech/2010/01/jan-8-1942-birthday-of-a-first-rate-mind-and-a-medical-marvel?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+wired/index+(Wired:+Index+3+(Top+Stories+2))&utm_content=Google+Reader

<comment><USER2> From space.com today: [http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/100106-aas-black- hole-...](http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/100106-aas-black-hole-eating- disorder.html)

They could have at least given him some props.

</comment><comment><USER3> It's also Elvis' birthday.</comment>


Cool web app to show nearby events - <AUTHOR>

Works all over the USA - type in your location at the top left and specify the event type or date at the bottom left.<p>http://www.goingto.events <comment><USER2> Where are you pulling your events from?

meetup.com?</comment>


Instacart Customers and Workers Are Revolting Against the App - <AUTHOR> https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/zmj938/instacart-customers-and-workers-are-revolting-against-the-app <comment><USER2> The obvious solution here is for shoppers and their best customers to hook up off-platform and cut out the middleman altogether.</comment>


I Tried to Block Amazon from My Life. It Was Impossible - <AUTHOR> https://gizmodo.com/i-tried-to-block-amazon-from-my-life-it-was-impossible-1830565336 <comment><USER2> I think it's unfair to judge Amazon as a monopoly. They have plenty of competition in their two primary businesses. Retail wise they have razor thin margins with traditional grocers on one end and identical copycat tech platforms on the other. And with AWS, Google Cloud is dominating along with Azure.

People are always so quick to call out monopolies when it patently isn't true.

</comment><comment><USER3> > Like millions of other Americans, we use a lot of Amazon products in our > house. We have an Echo, an Echo Dot, two Kindles, two Amazon Prime Chase > credit cards, Amazon Prime Video on our TV, and two Prime accounts. (Note to > self: Why are my husband and I each paying Amazon $119/year?)

> I barely know where else to go online to buy things.

I feel like the article's conclusion basically stems from this -- good lord that's a lot of platform buy-in. Not surprised at all that it's difficult to leave. I have an Amazon account for an occasional purchase and an AWS account for playing around. I don't feel like I'm missing out by not jumping into the rest of their ecosystem but maybe I'm just blissfully ignorant.

Also is is really fair to conflate their B2B and B2C business? They might as well be separate companies as far as this article is concerned. I feel like this challenge would be a lot more meaningful if getting Amazon's consumer products out of your life wasn't combined with dropping every business that uses cloud hosting.

> Having to run to a physical store rather than opening my Amazon app every > time the house runs out of paper towels is annoying

I can't say this experience is super relatable. Don't get me wrong, it's super cool for groceries and home goods to just show up on a regular schedule but this is basically arguing that someone who has been living with a team of servants is finding life more difficult without them. Amazon's service provides real tangible value and suddenly changing the balance from time to money is going to be felt. You can meet in the middle and order your groceries online and pick them up on the way home once a week.

> I would usually immediately order a weird doodad, probably within two > minutes of realizing I needed it, using the Amazon app on my phone, but not > this week. I ultimately order it from eBay.

Woah, the author needs to chill on the instant gratification. If your hard requirement for shopping is impulse then of course Amazon is going to scratch that itch but eBay is just the same wagon pulled by a different horse. It seems like the author needs to learn how to shop. The problem of course is that purchasing is work.

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

[https://www.scosche.com/magic-mount-cell-phone-holder- tablet...](https://www.scosche.com/magic-mount-cell-phone-holder-tablet-mount)

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

[https://www.iottie.com/Product/List?Category=SmartphoneMount](https://www.iottie.com/Product/List?Category=SmartphoneMount)

</comment><comment><USER4> Nothing is impossible. Move to the Netherlands. Amazon has almost no precense here (yet) :)

<comment><USER5> Did you read the article? A huge chunk of it was focused on AWS and how most of the internet is basically inaccessible if you block it.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Shapefly|Must Have Free Software Online About Diagram,Flowcharts&Shapes - <AUTHOR> http://shapefly.com/ <comment><AUTHOR> Hi!!! I made this. Would love to answer questions, ect.</comment>


Show HN: Knot News (or Google News for wedding inspiration) - <AUTHOR> http://news.knotist.com

<comment><USER2> Interesting! I added my blog, <http://blog.weddinglovely.com>

Your name is very close to The Knot, which I'm sure has a trademark on the name, and might not like that "Knot News" looks like you could be saying it's news from The Knot. Just FYI.

Right now there is too much information overload for me to use it, but man, if you added categories (DIY/Inspiration/Real Weddings/etc), I'd probably use it _all the time_. I hate looking for DIY posts, and having to check 5 different wedding blogs to find the right one.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I would love to hear any feedback you have on the site-- thanks!</comment>


Walking Truck - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walking_truck <comment><USER4> > _The stepping of the robot was controlled by a human operator through foot > and hand movements coupled to hydraulic valves._

> _The walking truck was one of the first technological hardware design > applications to incorporate force feed-back to give the operator a feel of > what was happening._

This might sound primitive in today's autonomy-driven mindset, but in contrast to autonomous robots, this is a technology that could be delivered today (or was already delivered in 1965, according to the article).

So if infantry really does need hardware to move stuff from A to B, the 1965 approach -- primitive as it is -- might be the simplest solution.

<comment><USER5> I'm sure that approach is simpler, but from what I can tell, the (semi?) autonomous technology can also be delivered today: [https://www.bostondynamics.com/ls3](https://www.bostondynamics.com/ls3)

<comment><USER4> I thought of that example, too, but thought that it had been cancelled as unsuccessful.

Turns out it was cancelled for mainly other reasons. Quoting [1]: "By late 2015, the Marines had put the LS3 into storage because of limitations with the robot including loud noise, challenges in repairing it if it breaks, and how to integrate it into a traditional Marine patrol"

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

<comment><USER6> Turns out the marines don't really need a loud, expensive, fragile machine to haul their gear when they can just use a quad bike.

Robots are awesome but integrating practical robotics with mission critical operations is really _really_ hard, especially because you're automatically competing with battle-tested best in class solutions.

<comment><USER7> Actually turns out Boston Dynamics had a good idea and over-engineered it. LM built a cheaper, wheeled, semi-autonomous troop support vehicle that ended up selling pretty well.

[https://defense-update.com/20070529_smss.html](https://defense- update.com/20070529_smss.html)

<comment><USER6> That thing looks an awful lot like a quad bike with two extra wheels.

<comment><USER8> AKA a "6 Wheeler". At least that's what we called them when I was kid. They use differential steering, which makes them a good fit for automation. Don't have to worry about turning a steering column, just shift the power around which the off the shelf ATV already handles.

<comment><USER6> Yep, there were ads for them in the back of Popular Science magazine. They were fully amphibious too and could float.

Don't get me wrong, I love my fellow kinematically-complicated meatbags but I do kind of think wheels win this round.

<comment><USER9> There are still a couple of companies that sell 6WD (and 8WD) vehicles like these - Argo is one of them (and that machine up-thread looks like they just strapped some stuff to one of those):

[https://argoxtv.com/](https://argoxtv.com/)

The other kind of "extreme off-road differential steered" ATV that people both want (and then seemingly want to sell soon after - almost like a boat) is the Russian Sherp:

[https://sherpatv.com/](https://sherpatv.com/)

I'd love to have one of those - but they are a bit out of my budget (and my wife would probably divorce me if I brought one home, even if I could afford it).

<comment><USER6> I love the Sherp! Also the roughly-equivalent bike version: [https://canadamotoguide.com/2016/08/03/russian-2wd-bike- is-a...](https://canadamotoguide.com/2016/08/03/russian-2wd-bike-is- apparently-now-on-the-market-and-its-not-a-ural/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Video: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMGCFLEYakM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMGCFLEYakM)

The thing looks a little top heavy to me. I wonder if there are airbags :)

Also - external hydraulics seems like quite a limitation.

<comment><USER11> Between the old footage (minus the basic color), music, and narration this feels like it could be a scene from the twilight zone or a doctor who episode

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Interesting, perhaps the inspiration behind the walking battle machines[0] in my favourite table top board game "Scythe"[1].

Interesting to see a real life Mech!

[0] - [http://www.heavymetal.com/news/these-amazing-paintings- raise...](http://www.heavymetal.com/news/these-amazing-paintings- raised-1-8-million-for-a-board-game/) [1] - [https://stonemaiergames.com/games/scythe/](https://stonemaiergames.com/games/scythe/)

</comment><comment><USER13> > It alternatively bore the name of "CAM", an acronym for "cybernetic > anthropomorphous machine"

now that's a seriously cool name!

The pic makes me think of Strandbeests and derivatives: [https://www.strandbeest.com/](https://www.strandbeest.com/)

<comment><USER14> It's the opposite of cool name. Anthropomorphous means resembling human being, this was nothing like human, it was quadruped.

<comment><USER15> That just makes it an incorrect name but not necessarily not a cool one.

The Death Star isn't a star but the name is cool.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> They look vulnerable to snowspeeders.

<comment><USER17> That armor's too strong for blasters.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> The reminds me of this video [1] where the guy builds these out of wood and paper and powers them with wind. Increadible.

[1] [https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LewVEF2B_pM](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LewVEF2B_pM)

</comment><comment><USER19> That thing looks amazing! A similar concept was these walking harvesters [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pJwDZXasKU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pJwDZXasKU)

<comment><USER20> That was an interesting idea. Deere acquired them, and built a prototype.[1] But Ponsse's approach[2] was more practical. The dual chassis articulated 8-wheel system is unusual but very effective.

A big problem with those heavy legged machines is very low road speed. The Ponsse machine is much faster when you aren't in difficult terrain, so you can get it to the job under its own power. Deere copied that and now makes those, too.

[1] [https://agmetalminer.com/mmwp/wp- content/uploads/2012/04/wal...](https://agmetalminer.com/mmwp/wp- content/uploads/2012/04/walking_harvester_large.jpeg)

[2] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PE1f1GydafQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PE1f1GydafQ)

<comment><USER21> The Ponsse machine: it would be cool if they could recover the gravitational potential energy of the tree for the cutting operations, say by storing the energy in a flywheel

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> There was a walking logging machine developed by Finnish company Plustech Oy in the mid-nineties and later bought by John Deere who tried to commercialize it but it didn't meet much success.

"[It] was designed with sensitive or by other means harder to reach terrain with minimum impact on the environment in mind."

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pJwDZXasKU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pJwDZXasKU)

[http://www.theoldrobots.com/Walking- Robot2.html](http://www.theoldrobots.com/Walking-Robot2.html)

[http://www.unusuallocomotion.com/pages/museums/museum-of- lus...](http://www.unusuallocomotion.com/pages/museums/museum-of-lusto-in- finland-forest-machinery.html) (Near the bottom)

<comment><USER9> The was also the OSU Adaptive Suspension Vehicle:

[http://cyberneticzoo.com/walking-machines/1984-osu-asv- adapt...](http://cyberneticzoo.com/walking-machines/1984-osu-asv-adaptive- suspension-vehicle-mcghee-american/)

[https://library.osu.edu/documents/university- archives/subjec...](https://library.osu.edu/documents/university- archives/subject_files/Adaptive%20Suspension%20Vehicle.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I've always wondered how much money consultants made off the "cybernetics" buzzword in the 60s and 70s.

<comment><USER24> Was it a buzzword at the time? Stuff like this is actually closer to the original definition--very roughly, a system that uses continuous feedback loops to keep itself in a stable, functioning state--than to the way we use the word now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Why are these walking machines always so slow? I think Neal Stephenson described a skateboard with hundreds of tiny feet, moving faster than wheels on any surface. I want to see that.

<comment><USER26> Progress takes time, and ambulatory motion is a finicky, delicate nightmare that only seems simple in humans and animals thanks to millions of years of evolution. CAM was created in the 1960s[0], but BigDog[1] and other recent Boston Dynamics quadrupeds that aren't designed for human passengers are much faster[2], but still awkward.

Also remember these are expensive prototypes designed to test things other than speed. Making them faster only guarantees that they break themselves harder when they run into a wall or trip over a cliff or something.

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

[1][https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1czBcnX1Ww](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1czBcnX1Ww)

[2][https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OKZ_n8QW4w](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OKZ_n8QW4w)

>I think Neal Stephenson described a skateboard with hundreds of tiny feet, moving faster than wheels on any surface. I want to see that.

I am neither Neal Stephenson nor a physicist but I'm pretty sure the friction caused by the increased surface contact of "hundreds of tiny feet" versus wheels would still make the wheels faster and more efficient. Geckos and things can stick to vertical surfaces and move quickly because they're lightweight. Anything capable of sticking to an arbitrary surface _and_ supporting human weight is going to be slow. And if moving downhill, wheels don't really need to do work - gravity does the work. Something with "hundreds of tiny feet" either has to slide or "walk."

<comment><USER25> I disagree. Centipedes and other many-legged critters can move very fast. Every leg is just a tiny lightweight thing with its own balanced dynamics, just a part of a wheel basically. First thing that came to my mind is a plastic brush with flexible back. If you move a rollers along the back the bristles extend downwards and move backwards in a walking motion, just like a sea urchin does. Scale that and you have a walking machine moving amazingly fast. Tiny bristles yield and conform to any surface.

<comment><USER27> CWU's "whegs" are much in this vein: [http://biorobots.case.edu/projects/whegs/](http://biorobots.case.edu/projects/whegs/)

<comment><USER9> I could also see Brook's Genghis platform being extended to "centipede" multiples of legs and probably working well.

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

EDIT: fixed mistake - put "Dante" but meant Genghis...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> It had force feedback. Did it have any sort of protection in the case of rapid movement of tge legs?

<comment><USER9> I personally don't know if it did - I've never seen any information on operator safety of this machine, though I have read a lot about it and Ralph Mosher over the years.

He's also the guy behind the GE Hardiman exoskeleton:

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

...which was another system much like this truck. For that one - and I don't know how true it was - it was said that it could get into a feedback loop that could cause injuries to the user, but it wasn't clear if that was for the entire "suit" or for the mounted arm test assembly (they had built a single arm up to the shoulder and mounted it on a stand to test it separately from the "suit").

GE was heavily into this field of what they called "man amplifiers" \- several of the later ones spearheaded by Mosher:

[http://cyberneticzoo.com/man-amplifiers/1953-g-e-o-man- manip...](http://cyberneticzoo.com/man-amplifiers/1953-g-e-o-man-manipulator- american/)

[http://cyberneticzoo.com/man-amplifiers/1958-9-ge- handyman-r...](http://cyberneticzoo.com/man-amplifiers/1958-9-ge-handyman- ralph-mosher-american/)

[http://cyberneticzoo.com/walking-machines/1962-64-ge- pedipul...](http://cyberneticzoo.com/walking-machines/1962-64-ge-pedipulator- ralph-mosher-american/)

[http://cyberneticzoo.com/man-amplifiers/1965-g-e-lifting- boo...](http://cyberneticzoo.com/man-amplifiers/1965-g-e-lifting-boom-edwin-e- ziegler-ralph-mosher-american/)

[http://cyberneticzoo.com/teleoperators/1969-g-e-man-mate- ind...](http://cyberneticzoo.com/teleoperators/1969-g-e-man-mate-industrial- manipulators-ralph-mosher-american/)

This was also the same time period as Hughes Aircraft's MOBOT systems - <USER2> were meant as remote manipulators for working in nuclear research, underwater repaid, and similar harsh environments:

[http://cyberneticzoo.com/teleoperators/1959-mobot-1-hughes-a...](http://cyberneticzoo.com/teleoperators/1959-mobot-1-hughes- aircraft-american/)

[http://cyberneticzoo.com/teleoperators/1962-underwater- mobot...](http://cyberneticzoo.com/teleoperators/1962-underwater-mobot-hughes- aircraft-american/)

[http://cyberneticzoo.com/teleoperators/1963c-mobot-hughes- ai...](http://cyberneticzoo.com/teleoperators/1963c-mobot-hughes-aircraft- american/)

[http://cyberneticzoo.com/teleoperators/1964-%e2%80%93-mobot-...](http://cyberneticzoo.com/teleoperators/1964-%e2%80%93-mobot- mark-ii-%e2%80%93-hughes-aircraft-american/)

What we now know as "ROVs" (and UAVs, UGVs, and other names) all stem from a lot of this research back then (and earlier). Hughes' system was actually kind of innovative; there is a paper you can dig up (in fact, I think it's linked on one of the above articles) that detail how these systems were controlled:

They needed to control a lot of various servo and other actuators, but they couldn't use a long cable with tons of wires - they needed the cable to be flexible and not weigh a ton (which is still an issue today). But they didn't have the modern electronics we have today to accomplish it. What they ended up doing was using a synchronized motor-switching system that had two rotary switches driven by synchronous motors on both ends. There was a mechanism in place to keep them "in sync" so that the switch connected on one end would be the same as on the other end. The controller at the transmitter would thus be connected to the proper motor or actuator at the other end, many times a second, and the umbilical only needed a few wires (plus wires for power - which IIRC was AC and served as part of the sync system - plus wires for video feeds). In a way, it was an early form of electro-mechanical multiplexing.

It quickly gave way to more electronic methods (likely things more closely resembling serial PPM, used in hobby radio control systems - once reliable transistors became common; while such a thing could have been done with vacuum tubes, it wouldn't have been reliable on such machines and environments) - <USER3> reading that paper was an interesting insight on how to do things differently! In fact, it's similar in scope to how Westinghouse did something similar for telemetry monitoring and control back in the 1920s and 30s - and showcased in their "robot" Electro - by using sounds and tuning forks, in a similar was to electrical coherer systems - they could control relays remotely using tones sent down telephone lines. Why Hughes didn't use a similar approach is a mystery - could have been patent reasons, or reliability issues or something of that nature.

It's a fascinating period of history in robotics, control theory, computation, and more in my opinion (also at this time, you have a large interest going on in artificial intelligence - such as it was in those years - and deep behind the scenes, there was certain interest in so-called "artificial neurons" \- hardware implementations of the McCulloch-Pitts neuron model. At one time, around 1956 IIRC, RCA even made a "frog's retina" model using similar models - when you look at it and how it was wired and works - it really looks like a CNN made of hardware for image recognition...

<comment><USER28> Hey, that's very cool. Thank you!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Discontinued when they realized the enemy could just fly around it's feet with a tripwire. ;) Inspiration for the AT-AT?

</comment><comment><USER30> Is this better than a Driving Truck?

</comment><comment><USER31> Metal Gear? : )</comment>


Speed up docker pull with local registry image mirroring - <AUTHOR> http://jacksoncage.se/posts/2015/02/22/speed-up-docker-pull-with-local-registry-image-mirroring/

<comment><USER2> The article doesn't really do much more than restate Docker's own guide: > [https://github.com/docker/docker/blob/master/docs/sources/ar...](https://github.com/docker/docker/blob/master/docs/sources/articles/registry_mirror.md)

(Linked in the article)

At the very least, you could add value: \- How to keep this daemon running between reboots \- How to use this tip with boot2docker \- Is this the equivalent to how vagrant caches base images? \- etc.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the feedback! As stated in the blog post the idea was not new and more a kick to get more people informed about registry mirroring. Also the biggest advantage as I see it is as described in post if you have a fleet of docker hosts.

I'm almost always using salt for orchestration to keeping containers running, there will be more posts about that later.</comment></comment>


What Makes a Good Developer? - <AUTHOR> https://blog.usejournal.com/what-makes-a-good-developer-80330712e22 <comment><USER2> Good developers develop. Good pipers pipe, good swans 'a swim, and a partridge in a pear tree.</comment>


The rough transcript is devastating. How could Trump not know that? - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/09/25/rough-transcript-is-devastating-how-could-trump-not-know-that/ <comment><USER2> So dishonest..

"I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it. I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say Crowdstrike … I guess you have one of your wealthy people … The server, they say Ukraine has it. There are a lot of things that went on, the whole situation. I think you're surrounding yourself with some of the same people. I would like to have the Attorney General call you or your people and I would like you to get to the bottom of it. As you saw yesterday, that whole nonsense ended with a very poor performance by a man named Robert Mueller, an incompetent performance, but they say a lot of it started with Ukraine. Whatever you can do, it's very important that you do it if that's possible."</comment>


Why China Silenced a Clickbait Queen in Its Battle for Information Control - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/16/world/asia/china-bloggers-internet.html <comment><USER2> > But late last month, Ma Ling, a blogger who commanded an audience of more > than 16 million people, went conspicuously silent.

> In the battle for control of the Chinese internet, the authorities had > designated Ms. Ma a threat to social stability, pointing to an article she > published about a young man with cancer whose talent and virtue were not > enough to overcome problems like corruption and inequality.

<comment><USER3> > Soon, however, internet users pointed to factual errors and said the piece > had been invented.

> Ms. Ma had to apologize.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I feel sorry for the Chinese people. Xi Jinping wants to suppress all discourse doesn't praise him and the government's policies. That might have worked in ancient China, but it simply doesn't work in the modern industrial era. Society is too complicated and so you need free discourse to find out what is going on and discuss policy alternatives. Xi's policies may work for a while, but in the long term they are going to make things more and more dysfunctional.

<comment><USER5> Ancient China _does_ have a pretty interesting interpretation of its occasional revolutions...

<comment><USER4> Quite true. Confucianism was a remarkably successful political philosophy, and it even included a positive place for revolutions. The problem with Confucianism today is that it was designed for an earlier technological era.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Is there any discussion on HN about how to handle these kinds of for-profit fake news factories?

Edit: I found one here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16774129](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16774129)

<comment><USER7> Please don't do this: criticism and false information are different things.

> But the government did not relent. People's Daily, the flagship newspaper of > the Communist Party, accused Ms. Ma of manipulating public opinion. Her > social accounts were deleted on Feb. 21.

The overlapping of the concepts of misinformation and false news are already quite worrying without censorship being confused with "policing the internet".

<comment><USER8> Can you elaborate? This seems like a fake news operation: you make up a story and people share it because it resonates with some truism they believe in.

> The article was widely circulated online and prompted debate about China's > wealth gap, surging medical costs and the value of education — common > complaints of China's middle class. Soon, however, internet users pointed to > factual errors and said the piece had been invented.

I remember awhile ago someone got criticized for doing the same thing, getting people riled up over some fake immigrant violence or something.

<comment><USER7> see answer to the OP</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Best Linux Apps for Advanced Users and Hackers - <AUTHOR> https://rockiger.com/en/blog-en/best-linux-apps/ <comment><USER2> I would recommend keepassxc instead of keepassx, mpv for videos/multimedia.

Those are no advanced users / hackers apps, rather entry level.

<comment><USER3> I use KeePassX on Ubuntu (I liked v1.x's multi-window interface better than v2.x's single window). What are the advantages of KeePassXC over KeePassX?

<comment><USER2> There was a Hackernews thread a while ago [1]

Basically, KeePassX is maintained by one person and hasn't seen activity in quite a while. keepassxc is a community fork, they continue development, and merged various bugfixes as well as new features.

Additional Features according to project page: [2]

* Auto-Type on all three major platforms (Linux, Windows, macOS)

* Twofish encryption

* YubiKey challenge-response support

* TOTP generation

* CSV import

* Command line interface

* DEP and ASLR hardening

* Stand-alone password and passphrase generator

* Password strength meter

* Using website favicons as entry icons

* Merging of databases

* Automatic reload when the database was changed externally

* KeePassHTTP support for use with PassIFox in Mozilla Firefox, chromeIPass in Google Chrome and Chromium and passafari in Safari.

* Many bug fixes

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13468261](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13468261) [2] [https://keepassxc.org/project](https://keepassxc.org/project)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is low-level spam.

</comment><comment><USER5> Missing Sublime Text as an editor, and Terminator as a terminal. Maybe the title should go to "31 Linux Apps used by an Advanced User", or the page title "31 Linux Apps you will love" ?

<comment><USER6> Gave up on Terminator for Tilix: less crashes, can save panel placements, and other goodies.

<comment><USER5> I honestly would love an iTerm2 port to Linux. Having the panel splits being actual tmux panes is amazing

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Just my 2 cents, but I would - once again - recommend the Dillo web browser. I has its drawbacks, there is no Javascript, and CSS support is ... not awesome.

But on the upside, you can have dozens of tabs open and still use less RAM than a freshly started instance of Firefox or Chrome.

Due to the Javascript/CSS situation, many web sites look broken or just remain blank, but it's great for reading documentation where you can easily have dozens of tabs open at a time.

(There is a Windows port, too, but last time I checked it was very unstable.)

<comment><USER8> While we're on the subject of esoteric browsers. I'd recommend qutebrowser. It's WebKit based and has a few quirks (YouTube full screen doesn't work) but it's by far the most complete browser with vim keybinds.

If you love Firefox for vimperator I implore you to try qutebrowser.

<comment><USER2> > It's WebKit based

They will soon make the switch to webenginge as default [1]

I can also highly recommend qutebrowser, especially with vimperator/pentadactyl in firefox becoming deprecated once version 57 is out.

[1] [https://github.com/qutebrowser/qutebrowser/issues/2335](https://github.com/qutebrowser/qutebrowser/issues/2335)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Entry level app at best, hackers? Unlikely.

<comment><USER10> Agreed. The site actually says "Starting with Linux on your laptop and want to know which apps you should use?"

It's great tips for beginner users, but advanced users and "hackers" waste their time scrolling through a list of apps like Firefox, VLC and Gimp.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Nice advertorial

<comment><USER12> What is being advertised?

<comment><USER13> > This is a shameless plug; I am the author of Akiee, but I really think Akiee > is one of the best task managers out there.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> A list of apps for advanced user without command line tools like pass ([https://www.passwordstore.org/](https://www.passwordstore.org/)), vim, git... Seriously?

</comment><comment><USER15> how are these for advanced users and hackers? A REAL advanced/hacker entry setup would be: Internet: -Lynx -w3m Office, text editors, TODO list, note keeping: -Vim -Emacs Dev tools: -vagrant (headless) -git -language setup of choice (gcc, python javac ....) Security: -GPG -pass -openssl clu Multimedia: -mplayer Graphics: -imagemagic Games: -nethack Productivity: -i3 -xclip -xterm

</comment><comment><USER16> Freemind was superseeded by Freemind years ago...

Hacker tools: ssh, vi, tmux, git, gpg, nc, battleOfWesnoth, ...

</comment><comment><USER17> atom for 'advanced users and hackers'? check that again ;)

<comment><USER18> I'm a 10 years emacs user and considering move to atom. Why do you think it is not suitable for advanced users and hackers?

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> This post is worth reading if only for the Typora suggestion. Finally, I have a WYSIWYG replacement for Haroopad!

Granted, most of these apps probably aren't for advanced users and hackers, but there's still some damned good app suggestions here.

</comment><comment><USER17> i'd suggest vim and sublime text 3 as editors. atom is really a poor choice if you do serious work in an editor

</comment><comment><USER20> This is missing Visual Studio Code and MPV.</comment>


Pluto Mail – Unsend Emails - <AUTHOR> https://www.sendpluto.com/about <comment><USER2> The linked article claims that an e-mail can be deleted from the recipient's email in-box, regardless of whether the recipient is running a Pluto client.

Earth to Pluto ... assuming the received e-mail is a classic plain-text e-mail, that's impossible. Either the recipient is running a Pluto-compliant client, in which case the claim is true, or the recipient is not running a Pluto-compliant client, in which case the claim is false.

The only way this could work is if the received e-mail has content linked to Pluto's site (example would be an HTML e-mail containing an iframe with hosted content), where the real e-mail is located. So ... they should be honest and say that.

<comment><USER3> I just tested this service with gmail and it did in fact work. Pluto sends an image that contains the body of the message. After about 30 seconds the image is replaced with another that says "this message has expired."

A very remarkable hack! Especially since Gmail caches images on their own proxy servers. I wonder how long until Google finds a way to prevent this?

Here's some background information about the founders. One is a CS grad from Stanford, and former Google employee-- [http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2014/4/2/law-school- email-...](http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2014/4/2/law-school-email- startup/)

<comment><USER4> > A very remarkable hack! Especially since Gmail caches images on their own > proxy servers. I wonder how long until Google finds a way to prevent this?

I don't think they cache. It's more an issue of privacy, HTTPS assets, malware checking, etc.

[http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2013/12/images-now- showing.htm...](http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2013/12/images-now-showing.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Worth bearing in mind that this is effectively DRM for email, with all the negative connotations that DRM brings.

<comment><USER6> It's already bad enough that people put dropbox links in their e-mails, negating the value of long-term e-mail archiving.

It's extremely useful to be able to go back in time and have full conversation history, including associated resources.

<comment><USER7> While I agree with this, I find it equally annoying when people send 3MB attachments as emails (and then keep resending them for every email in the conversation!).

It would be nice if a Dropbox link included a hash of the file, functioning more as a magnet link than a URL (emphasis on the "L - Locator" in "URL").

<comment><USER6> > _While I agree with this, I find it equally annoying when people send 3MB > attachments as emails (and then keep resending them for every email in the > conversation!)._

Why? I don't think I've deleted a non-spam e-mail since ~2001; e-mail-scale storage is cheap.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The only way all claimed features can work is if the email body remains on their servers at all times. I.e. they send some sort of wrapper that either iframes the content or talks to the Pluto backend in some other form or fashion. Needless to say - good luck with that!

<comment><USER9> No iframes in email. I bet it's rendered as an image.

Either way, you're trusting them with the contents of a message that, by definition, you kinda wanted to keep private.

<comment><USER10> I guess so, but that's the same situation as it is with any other email provider (yahoo, gmail, etc). The difference here is that you are only trusting Pluto. With other providers, you are trusting the provider and all recipients, whether they are an intended recipient or not.

In short, there is no free lunch, but this seems like a decent solution as you only have to trust one entity. Its up to us (potential users) to decide to trust them or not.

<comment><USER11> Indeed there is no free lunch and until email end-to-end encryption is widely supported, the unencrypted content is going to be stored somewhere. Pluto has an easily accessible eliminate option that deletes all copies of the email from our servers (and given the way Pluto works, also the recipient's access to the content). You can click "Eliminate all emails" on the top right signed- in home page to eliminate all emails or you can do it on a per-email basis by clicking "Eliminate Completely" in the top left of an email details page. We also support an auto-eliminate setting that eliminates an email from our servers upon unsend or auto-expire.

David Gobaud, Co-Founder @ Pluto Mail

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Well, at least I'll know why I can't see certain people's emails. ;)

</comment><comment><USER13> If people decide that this is a good idea, I will have to an add automatic reply with something like

" You use this crappy service either because:

\- You didn't spend enough time thinking about that email because you either want to edit it later, or delete it from my mail box

\- You expect me to answer by some specific date, which implies you want me to be on your schedule.

\- You want to violate my privacy by tracking if and when I read your email.

You also require me to use a third-party service to read your email as a text. That's unacceptable.

Remember you're trying to contact me, no the other way around. Send it plain text or don't send it at all. "

</comment><comment><USER14> There are a number of fundamental issues with this service.

1\. As a recipient my privacy is violated: a signal is sent automatically to the sender _without my consent_ to signal when I open the message. A co- founder argues "the feature exists with other systems already": the difference is, these other systems are opt-in: as a recipient, I agree explicitly to read acknowledgements when I choose to download the alternative messaging client. As an e-mail recipient, I do not agree to this "service" and it is unethical to force it upon me.

2\. The "expire" feature breaks the workflow of most e-mail users I know, including myself. Most users will first open an e-mail, quickly scan it, then mark it for later in-depth processing. If the expire timer starts at the first open, chances are the e-mail will have disappeared by the time the recipient re-opens it later.

3\. The service breaks search: with Pluto mail stored at Pluto's servers, it is not possible to search across both Pluto and non-Pluto e-mails in one query.

4\. The strategy to "provide e-mail client plugins" is not scalable obviously, due to the wide diversity of clients actually used. (Did the founders make a market study of which clients are actually used? On mobile, my own analysis shows there are at least 6 different apps in wide use. On desktop, at least 4. The development overhead of providing plugins to all is huge.)

<comment><USER11> Thanks for your comments.

1\. Most email open tracking services do not alert the recipient (or require opt-in). Tracking email opens is basically standard practice these days. We don't have numbers but I bet the majority of marketing emails track opens. Also, many new services such as Streak, Yesware, and ToutApp track opens without opt-out ability or downloads. The only similar service that we know of that has a time-limited opt-out option is Boomerang.

2/3\. Pluto's goal is to change the way people think about email. If an email is going to expire in a few minutes/hours does search matter? Pluto may not make sense for your business emails and that is ok. We are providing an option for people to use for emails that they don't want to follow them for the rest of their life.

4\. It is a big task and we're working on ways to make Pluto as accessible and easy to use as possible.

David Gobaud Co-Founder @ Pluto Mail

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Thanks for the comments everyone. Given the low cost of storage, today the default assumption is that email and anything you post online is permanent. The grand vision of Pluto is to grant people more control over their online footprint, starting with email. We realize Pluto is not a complete solution to "email privacy." However, Pluto is an improvement over how email works by default.

David and I hate the fact that, as soon as we hit send, we lose control of who can access the content and for how long the content can be accessed. We know that Pluto may not make sense for all emails but we believe there is a large set of emails for which it does. We also know there is a niche of users (like ourselves) who want most of our emails to expire.

If you all have any more questions, please email me @ email@example.com. Thanks :)

Lindsay, Co-Founder @ Pluto Mail

</comment><comment><USER4> Interesting approach, but the image approach means if they go down, your email all disappears.

<comment><USER16> also, you can't search, copy&paste, reply inline. That's not email, it's like sending someone a fax.

<comment><USER11> Pluto allows you to select, copy, and paste from the text version accessible via the link, though it does have search limitations. For our active users, the inconvenience is an acceptable tradeoff for being able to limit their email footprint. Search is also much less important if the email will soon be expired.

However, we are working on email client plugins that will enable inline reply/copy/paste and search to improve the Pluto experience.

David Gobaud, Co-Founder @ Pluto Mail

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Good effort. But the idea is kinda broken to me. Very much like snapchat is never going to actually work like it is advertised.

</comment><comment><USER18> This is constructive criticism, but your landing page is like really wordy, to the point the average user would not take the time to read it all. I wonder if it could be improved by putting more pictures & less words?

<comment><USER15> Thanks for the feedback! I agree that it is a bit wordy -- we will look into redesigning the landing page.

Lindsay, Co-Founder @ Pluto Mail

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> This sounds great. Maybe 2014 will be the (attempted) return of privacy. Anonymous messaging, expiring emails, pseudonymous payments, etc.

<comment><USER13> Privacy? If you want to track when I read your email, your violating my privacy.

<comment><USER15> Thanks for voicing your concern. Several applications out there (e.g. Mailtracker, Streak, etc.) provide tracking capabilities that include details on the recipient's location, device, and number of opens. We at Pluto decided to only track the time that the email was first opened because we calculate some expiration times based on when the message was opened (e.g. email expires 1 hour after open). If we did not display this information, the user could always calculate it anyway from the email's time of expiration.

David and I are both concerned about privacy, however, so we may implement an option to obscure tracking details in the future.

Lindsay, Co-Founder @ Pluto Mail

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> This reminds me of priv.ly which allows you to always retain full control of your content</comment>


Why Google Wants to Buy Hulu - <AUTHOR> http://www.gettingmoreawesome.com/2011/09/12/hulu-is-inventing-the-future-of-tv-ads/

<comment><USER2> Hulu's a very dangerous commodity for whoever buys them. Once sold away by NBC, Fox, and Disney, they'll also lose the exclusive contracts they have with those networks, in which case the only real service they're providing is ad- sourcing. Fox et al were trying to hike up Hulu's content licensing rates dramatically before selling them was even a discussion. No way Hulu will keep the same advantaged deals after a split.

Makes sense for Google just like DoubleClick did, but Hulu's platform is in jeopardy.

</comment><comment><USER3> Hulu needs a new revenue, and subscription model. I canceled my paid subscription because I got tired of looking at ad's (constantly interrupting) in stream. What's the point of a paid subscription?

If I'm going to put myself through a scheduled annoyance I might as well go to cable/Dish. At least with them I'm not stuck with limited content.

Possible solution: They can just go Justin.tv on everyone and start encouraging (I mean discouraging :p) copyrighted material.

<comment><USER4> > Possible solution: They can just go Justin.tv on everyone and start > encouraging (I mean discouraging :p) copyrighted material.

Just about everything (if not everything) on Hulu is copyrighted. There is no user generated content aside from comments and ratings.

<comment><USER3> Yes but their copyrights are shrinking by the day. Most of the good programs have already been taken off Hulu because Networks like Fox, CBS, HBO have realized they can stream the content themselves. What do they need Hulu for?

<comment><USER4> I would argue that the program offered by Hulu are still growing. Probably rapidly too. Hulu is owned by NBC, Fox, and Disney after all so will have a much easier time acquiring rights to stream then Google ever will. If the rumor that Google is trying to lock in 10 year access rights is correct then Google will significantly increase the available shows offered on YouTube.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Let me get this straight. Hulu's breakthrough here is _providing choice to the user?_ Online advertising has been out for over a decade, and the killer app here is enabled by giving the user an option of which commercial to suffer through? Do marketers never think about the user experience?</comment>


Firefox 3 - Good PR, Poor Execution  - <AUTHOR> http://ostatic.com/165362-blog/firefox-3-good-pr-poor-execution <comment><USER2> Agree. This was really disappointing - I mean, obviously the vast majority of us have already known for a long time FF 3 was coming, and we would have upgraded to it when it was available. The only reason to try to push for a huge "record setting" download day is to get the word out to _new_ users.

Now whatever new users were drawn in by it only know that on the day they specifically hyped up as "the day to get FF 3", Mozilla failed to even keep their own servers up. That might speak well of the idea's popularity, but it certainly doesn't speak well of their planning.

In short (too late), don't throw a party if you're not equipped to handle the guests.

</comment><comment><USER3> I know I was dumb found to find that they hadn't pushed distribution through bit torrent.</comment>


Browser Fingerprinting: A Survey - <AUTHOR> https://arxiv.org/abs/1905.01051 <comment><USER2> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalking](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalking)

Stalking is unwanted and/or repeated surveillance by an individual or group towards another person.[1] Stalking behaviors are interrelated to harassment and intimidation and may include following the victim in person or monitoring them. The term stalking is used with some differing definitions in psychiatry and psychology, as well as in some legal jurisdictions as a term for a criminal offense.

This should also apply in the digital world. Doesn't it?

<comment><USER3> Noticing and remembering people's faces, clothes, tics, etc. when they walk up to you and interact is not stalking.

<comment><USER4> That is a fair point, for sure. But I don't think it's the whole story.

What about this: Noticing and remembering people's faces, clothes, tics, etc. when they walk up to you. Also you have blanketed the planet in cameras that all feed back to a giant database that builds a detailed dossier on almost everyone, based on faces, clothes, tics, etc.

The way you put it sounds almost accidental, like no effort was made, with no real goal in mind. That's not a faithful analogy of the pervasiveness of Google Analytics, Facebook buttons, etc.

<comment><USER5> Stalking is toward another person, that person is specific and it's voluntarily towards that person.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> According to the paper the most useful attributes for browser fingerprinting are:

\- User agent

\- List of Plugins

\- Screen resolution and color depth

\- Canvas

\- WebGL Renderer (~GPU Model)

Maybe Canvas can be fixed to a degree, but the others feel like things that will inherently be different. Firefox with the privacy.resistfingerprinting setting solves all of these at least partially (and more), but not without some usability tradeoffs.

<comment><USER7> Browser plugins really need to go away. If it's not implementable normally then it shouldn't be on the web. In my opinion at least.

GPU models also should not be given, browsers need to abstract features and performance into something else. Like if I'm writing a WebGL app, I should just be able to test a few baselines configs.

User agent is a tricky one, Chrome on Android gives too much info because it's built by an advertising company.

<comment><USER8> Is there any reason why we couldn't have all browsers on all platforms use the same user agent header? I realize some sites use the user agent as a crude form of feature detection, but it's my understanding that that's generally considered to be bad practice.

<comment><USER9> Sometimes there are browser bugs that are impossible to do feature detection for, in which case have no better option than looking at the user agent.

For instance, several versions of Firefox had a serious bug in shared workers, which appeared intermittently when users opened your site in multiple tabs [https://stackoverflow.com/questions/51092596/feature- detecti...](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/51092596/feature-detection- for-firefox-57-shared-worker-bug) \- I had to use the user agent to work around this.

<comment><USER10> Sure, this is a fair use case. But then can't the browser tell the end user that someone wants to read this browser data so the user has a chance to say "no"?

<comment><USER11> Changing user-agent is virtually always possible, though a vanishingly small fraction of users will do so.

Bundling into adblockers or browsers directly would help.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I've given up on technological solutions to this. We need a "do not track" bit for browsers and it needs to carry the weight of law behind it. Violators need to be named, shamed, and fined.

<comment><USER13> Ironically, the do not track setting itself can be used in browser fingerprinting.

<comment><USER14> In fact, it is _primarily_ used as a point of entropy for tracking, and does almost nothing to prevent tracking, so all-in-all it's a huge net negative. And because it's mostly turned off, turning it on to be tracked less actually causes you to be tracked more.

<comment><USER12> Exactly, this is why it needs the force of law behind it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Can the major browser vendors not get together and implement a set of standard values and defaults that can be activated to reduce one's fingerprint, at least enough to make it non-unique? Something like what Tor Browser does but expanded to include all the major browsers. The way is open, the question is if there is will.

<comment><USER6> You can have what Tof browser does by using Firefox and setting privacy.resistfingerprinting in about:config. But be prepared to solve a lot of recaptchas, and don't hold your breath on Google implementing something similar in Chrome. Google is still an adtech company. They didn't spend millions (if not billions) on making and promoting Chrome only to support fingerprint resistance.

<comment><USER16> Maybe minor nuisance (probably major for some): with privacy.resistfingerprinting, Wastsapp web does not even allow authentication.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Out of curiosity, how are you guys handling anonymous user actions without fingerprinting? For example if you want to setup a user poll, without requiring a user account? Storing it in a cookie can just be deleted, which the agent can just clear and resubmit.

<comment><USER18> Fingerprinting is not an effective deterrent either, as you can just open a different browser. The user could also have multiple devices with internet access.

You could use IP address, although that only works if the user isn't on a public / shared network. It's also easily bypassed by spinning up a VM on a cloud service provider and using an SSH tunnel.

Since you used polls as an example: StrawPoll.me [0] is an online poll site which lets you select different duplication checks based on your requirements. The choices are: IP, browser cookie, none, or require user sign in. They also give you an option to add a CAPTCHA.

[0] [https://www.strawpoll.me/](https://www.strawpoll.me/)

<comment><USER19> I can change my semi-static IP address whenever I want by spoofing my router's MAC address (Comcast)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> If you're on a phone, here's a web version: [https://www.arxiv- vanity.com/papers/1905.01051/](https://www.arxiv- vanity.com/papers/1905.01051/) (now with linked citations!)

</comment><comment><USER21> It looks like the prevalence is low and it can easily be blocked with blocking the scripts in question.

Nevertheless, what needs to happen is that all major browser makers come together and simply create a set of standard API values that do not harm daily browsing and make it possible for users to blend in with the masses, if they opt-in to activate

It would be sufficient to create a couple of uniform user agents, list of fonts, list of plugins, canvas hash, platform and webgl data to bring the uniqueness down.

<comment><USER22> There are SaSS companies that have their entire business model around creating databases of fingerprints - for example determining bots. These scripts track you over multiple websites and are very well concealed, so you won't find them on any ad blocker blacklist.

Also, living in the EU won't protect you from getting fingerprinted.

<comment><USER21> why do the studies referenced in the above study only show a very low <1% prevalence? Do they omitt the "good fingerprinters"?

<comment><USER22> I don't think so. A good fingerprinter will use a honeypot - an easy to detect fingerpriting script in addition to the real one.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Is anyone aware of fingerprinting mitigation (extensions?) for Safari on macOS? I'd rather not abandon Safari.

</comment><comment><USER24> Well a nice initiative i would say

</comment><comment><USER25> Can anyone with a legal background explain to me why I can't file a restraining order that prevents companies from stalking me online?

Primarily for companies that develop shadow profiles of users but also companies like google and cloudflare where their tracking is a result of an opt-in by the site operator.

Would it be difficult to prove I am in fear (rational) as a result of their stalking?

<comment><USER26> I don't believe you can get a restraining order against a company (just an actual person). You would ask for injunctive relief, which is basically the court telling the company not to do something, in this case, tracking you online.

I'm not aware of the law in this area. I'm a lawyer, and I could at least see a plausible argument, but the only way to know for sure would be to try to sue them, or find other cases where someone has successfully done so.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> Can't we give penalties to companies that use fingerprinting scripts (or include them by third parties)?

I'd like to see an organization that checks for this, and gives fines, and perhaps even withdraws the right to use a domain name. And I'd like to see more responsibility with site owners for using third party code.

By the way, I think a withdrawal of the right to use a name (brand) is a very appropriate way to penalize a serious privacy violations. Brands are all about customer trust, and if that trust is violated, then it seems to me only fair that the right to use a name is taken away.

<comment><USER21> One of the referenced studies (1-million study withOpenWPM, the most recent from 2016) notes that the usual fingerprinting scripts have basically disappeared since a public outcry and media attention following a lawsuit.

Prevalence:

\- 1.4% for canvasfingerprinting

\- 0.325% for canvasfont probing

\- 0.0715% for WebRTC

\- 0.0067% forAudioContext

The above were found only on the most shady of all websites, and good content blockers block all those scripts.

My bet is GDPR was the death blow for this kind of scripts. For small companies without a room full of lawyers data has become a liability.

So fingerprinting is now basically in the hands of google, amazon, etc.

<comment><USER28> Browser fingerprinting has been overhyped and is not a reliable method of tracking.

If it was useful, it would be much more prevalent but too many people have the same fingerprint.

IP address is a better method of tracking for comparison.

<comment><USER21> It is not in use because it's basically illegal, and due to relieance on JavaScrip, a simple script blocker can take down your entire business.

The industry used fingerprinters, but for one it didn't really help them make more money (because you want to track users, not systems), and there was a big backlash.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


A Minimalist Coffee Shop Website - <AUTHOR> https://www.bardocoffee.com/ <comment><USER2> Minimalisme isn't about making things hard to read.

Just adding a single inline style makes things easier on the eye (IMHO):

        style="width: 40em; padding-top: 1em; margin: auto"

<comment><USER3> I'm of the opinion they should just bolden the hours. That's really the only thing I go to a real-world location representing website for that I usually don't want to take a long time looking for. Not to say I don't enjoy a really well done website, because I do.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > text-only minimalist website

> still has js for google analytics

</comment><comment><USER5> Here we see an example of people who discovered the web long after high speed internet was commonplace, and they think it's "hip" to force everyone back into the dark ages when visiting their site.

That isn't a website, it's a text file. What's worse, it's not served as a plain text file.

A real minimalist coffee shop website would be something like a single column with a few photos of the interior of the cafe (which is what customers are going to care about), maybe a photo of a fancy latte in a mug, and some decent sized and centered text with the address. Lots of white space between elements, and responsive for all screen sizes.

"Sorry we're not interested in website design services", it says at the bottom of their "website". Well I hate to break it to you guys but you seriously need it. If I were comparing two coffee shops on google maps, I would pick one that shows me photos of the shop over that Too Cool For The Web nonsense.

</comment><comment> munk-a Minimalist doesn't mean you can't use paragraph tags! And they seem to have wrapped some of the lines but not others, and did so manually.

This makes me sad.

</comment><comment><USER6> I dig the minimal HTML, wish they'd drop the Google Analytics but I can understand why they went with it.

I do wish though that they would update to spec-compliant HTML. A character encoding and doctype would make me feel better, paragraph tags would probably go a long way.

Still, I strongly dig it.

<comment><USER7> They could use <noscript> version of Google Analytics.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> > We're scheduled to open in October or November, 2016.

Insert "under construction" gif here.

</comment><comment><USER9> OK. It's okay for you think the another world's Minimalist website has no value to your coffee shop. It's okay for local people. But if I'm travelling and unluckily see this website in Google result. I'd think it's a scam.

<comment><USER10> They are selling coffee in an analog medium (cups) offline only.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> So the real web page is on Facebook. I'm not even going to ask why this is on HN; I'm going to ask, "who the hell cares?"

<comment><USER5> Unfortunately there's a large number of business owners who think it's better to just have a facebook page. They think they're using facebook to promote their business, when really they're using their business to promote facebook.

A sucker is born every day.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Why the 7th line contains 3 sentences? Minimalism requires consistency.

</comment><comment><USER13> I would change the font to sans-serif

</comment><comment><USER14> ha! try hugging _this_ to death!

if I'm ever in denver, i'm getting all of my coffee here.</comment>