Locals rediscover resorts absent of foreign tourists - Pete-Codes https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/28/europe-holiday-resorts-foreign-tourists-magaluf-staycationers <comment><AUTHOR> I wonder if this is the beginning of the end of AirBnB (in its current form). They are directly hit by the pandemic but even once it is over, residents of tourist locations will remember this experience - and this might bring more support for more restrictive regulation in tourism.</comment>


In which a compiler gets its wings - <AUTHOR> https://technomancy.us/186 <comment><USER2> For those who don't know, the guy is the original author of the most important build tool for Clojure

[https://github.com/technomancy/leiningen](https://github.com/technomancy/leiningen)

</comment><comment><USER3> If there was a link to the project in the blog I missed it. Here it is:

[https://github.com/bakpakin/Fennel](https://github.com/bakpakin/Fennel)

<comment><USER4> The moment it's introduced is a link: "Then a few weeks ago I found Fennel (at the time called "fnl"), and it really resonated with me."

(The word Fennel is an obvious hyperlink)</comment></comment>


Google Plans New, Smarter Messaging App - <AUTHOR> http://www.wsj.com/article_email/google-plans-new-smarter-messaging-app-1450816899-lMyQjAxMTA1OTI5MjUyMDI5Wj <comment><USER2> "WeChat, for instance, lets users shop, pay bills and book appointments."

Does anyone have experience with it? Is it actually useful, or just a gimmick?

And I have to point out that there is a protocol which is open, supports both users and services with registration, supports federation, and supports arbitrary payloads, making it a great solution for a chat bot platform... But of course everyone dropped xmpp and now will have to reinvent it.

<comment><USER3> An excellent read about WeChat from a16z: [http://a16z.com/2015/08/06/wechat- china-mobile-first/](http://a16z.com/2015/08/06/wechat-china-mobile-first/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "Google is building a new mobile-messaging service that taps its artificial intelligence know-how and so-called chatbot technology to try to catch up with rivals..."

Or they could, you know, fix notifications in Android's Hangouts app.

<comment><USER5> Or, you know, bring back off the record conversations. The ability to delete individual messages/pictures out of conversations. Encrypt conversations by default, and stop requiring chrome for the desktop apps to work.

<comment><USER6> Or, you know, make video calls in HangOuts not suck.

<comment><USER7> It's hilarious because everyone in this sub-thread is correct. Its why I moved to an iPhone 6 and use iMessages and Facetime for all of my messaging/communications needs.

No fan boy, just someone who likes things to work when I need it. Its like Google _doesn 't care at all_ that the experience sucks.

<comment><USER8> The biggest problem of that is that it only works if you can assume everyone in your contact list uses iOS. How do you deal with that problem? (I'm just curious...)

<comment><USER7> Everyone in my immediate family, as well as my colleagues and my immediate friends have iPhones. Network effects I guess.

I only have two or three friends without iPhones. We simply text or call back and forth.

<comment><USER9> This -- I recently switched to Android thinking "iPhones are luxury phones. Surely a bunch of my friends use Android." Was immediately known as "Green Bubbles" guys for a few weeks by family and friends.

<comment><USER10> But even the green bubble solution is "perfect". One app. One experience. I want to message this person, through the internet for free if possible and if not - just send it as a text. I don't want 4 apps on my phone to do the same thing, and that's why I don't see the point in being an also-ran

<comment><USER8> Hah, I didn't even get "green bubbles" reference until I came back here just now :-) (I'm not an iOS user.)

Some of the downside about text is that it often shows unpredictable behavior, especially when it involves going over carrier's gateway to other networks, or involving some non-ordinary systems like Google Voice. Though, it seems to be improving now, but I used to see anything from garbled messages to complete silence, and it often exhibited different behavior between combinations of different sender and receiver. (For instance A, and B in same network might have worked OK, but A to some user in another network being able to receive, or sometimes being able to receive one way, but corrupts for the other way around, etc.)

Google Voice until recently (maybe a year ago?) or so, couldn't do any group MMS at all, and would simply get ignored. One blamed would be one who deviates from standards, but my most pet peeve of SMS/MMS is that it offers very little to no error indications when something goes wrong.

I actually manage a volunteer team of 30 or so with varying types of devices, where one to many communication is highly needed, and I find messaging solution very complicated problem to solve. (And yes, I'm likely resort to having like 2 to 3 apps to get it done...)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> "Users will be able to text friends or a chatbot, which will scour the Web and other sources for information to answer a question"

So instead of typing this in google, you would send a message to a chatbot? I always found chat bots gimmicky, just like Siri. It's great as a novelty, nothing else..

<comment><USER12> > So instead of typing this in google, you would send a message to a chatbot?

How is typing something in Google different than sending it to a bot, other than currently you use different input boxes to do it? To me, this sounds like just unifying the messaging and search interfaces into one DWIM interface, and isn't really surprising given how much Google has been trying to merge _everything_ into a shared DWIM interface.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I was surprised to read that "Google has struggled to create such network effects with both Hangouts and Messenger." At my university, all the student groups that I have worked on use Google docs, Messenger, and Hangouts to coordinate. We don't use Messenger a lot, only when we are online working on a document together, but we do use Hangouts weekly. For us, Google is for group productivity (sort of like Slack), but I couldn't see using Google Messenger for communicating with friends or asking questions to a chat bot. I wonder who their target audience is for this new product. Any ideas?

<comment><USER8> From the standpoint of someone who had to ask people to use common messenger among a team of people with varying team in the field operation at an event, biggest issue I have seen with Google Hangouts (I guess this also applies to Facebook in that respect as well) is that there seems to be a bit of reluctance from people when they are required signing up to more "blanket" service, in this case, Google.

I guess for some who do not use other Google services (especially when they don't use Gmail, YouTube, etc.) either don't want set up or show high resistance in setting up a new account with Google.

Some privacy concern aside, many of those integrated services works great especially when they are used effectively, but I think the flip side is that those services tend to be "too heavy" for some people who just want to use it as a messenger and nothing else. (Actually, I wish they had an option like that.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I remember when Google Talk was a thing and actually worked well.

</comment><comment><USER9> When I first read this, I thought "Are they building a Slack competitor?" And then I got excited over having the power of Google and my gmail within a Slack-like tool and interface.

Then I was disappointed that it's an app that is just an IRC bot that makes Google searches.

</comment><comment><USER15> Who'd use it? They'll just kill it off in 2 years anyway.</comment>


How Elite Firms Hire (2011) - <AUTHOR> http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2011/11/how_elite_firms.html <comment><USER2> So "Elite Firms" basically have horrible hiring processes?</comment>


Why Are All "Star Wars" Movies the Same? - <AUTHOR> https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/why-are-all-star-wars-movies-the-same <comment><USER2> OTOH, when you produce 8 movies for the same franchise, how is it not the expected result?

I think Star Wars fans should just make peace with it, look at each trilogy as a separate unit, and not as a never ending recycling of a concept designed to squeeze out as much cash as possible.

<comment><USER3> _a concept designed to squeeze out as much cash as possible._

The films are merely advertising for the merchandising. That's where the real cash is.

<comment><USER2> Good clarification, that's what I meant of course. Thanks for making it more explicit.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Nuesbyte v2 - <AUTHOR> http://nuesbyte.com?

<comment><AUTHOR> A month or so ago 7hundredand77 posted nuesbyte here, and many of you liked it but it had some significant problems. I offered to help him with it, and today we'd like to show it to you all again.

Since then we've rewritten the entire thing in client side js with a nodejs REST API backend, added google reader imports, kb shortcuts, ssl, and a whole bunch of other features.

Let us know what you think of the updated site.

Here's the original post: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5471928>

Thanks, Ryan

<comment><USER2> At first glance, it looks great. UI is slightly confusing at first, but nothing I can't get past. Most importantly, it has the primary feature I want in a reader: I can open it up on my phone and read articles in slap-spacebar- to-continue mode until I fall asleep. One-finger operation FTW. Haven't seen this from anyone besides Google Reader yet. Also love the vi-style keyboard nav (j/k for next/prev).

One slight complaint: on the desktop, I'd kill the article-expanding animation for navigating through a feed. Instead of a nice clean i'm-scrolling-through- articles feeling, you get this weird jittery i'm-scrolling-through-articles- that-are-expanding-and-collapsing thing where the unexpanded portion of the feed below your current article dances up and down. Even on a feed like HN where the expansion/contraction is fairly minimal (or perhaps particularly on a feed like that), the list ends up doing this strange up-and-down convulsion that's very unpolished-looking and distracting.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I vehemently dislike how they don't inform you that this is a paid service until after you've signed up. I signed up, but was unwilling to pay for the service (it doesn't seem novel enough to warrant use over like HN and Feedly, which constitute the bulk of my reading; and also I have no money).

Due to their disingenuousness, they have my email despite the fact that this is a product which I have no intention of using.

Transparency is important, and this sort of obfuscatory bullshit is not ok. Tell people what the product is before taking their information.

<comment><USER2> This is a paid site? I've signed up for it and it seems great, but so far I haven't seen any indication that there is anything to pay for.

<comment><USER4> I think it was free, and then it became paid, and now it's free again.

Freemium might be better. Or suggested article advertizement on the right? They pretty much do that already.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Some bugs & gotchas for me:

* Select Layout -> Small. But it is not remembered across all feeds. I have to change it for each.

* Click RSS on menu bar. Then under "My Feeds", click the '+' icon on one of the feeds. Doesn't do anything.

* Select one of the feeds, say "Digg Top Stories". Select Layout -> Small. Now why is that text in orange (Digg Top Stories) shown below title of _every_ feed? I already know that from the top menu bar. Similarly, the time "10 hours ago". I would prefer to hide these two things until I expand the article. It feels like too much text-noise. Just let me glance the headlines in one line.

* How can I move feeds to a different folder? Drag-n-drop doesn't seem to work.

* The UI is mobile-unfriendly. Open the site on Firefox for mobile and just pinch-zoom to see what happens.

That said, sincere thanks for all the effort you guys have put in!

<comment><AUTHOR> sorry, let me respond to your points item by item.

layout will save if you create an account.

I guess we overlooked the + icon. Create an account, goto "RSS" and you can select groups and then select feeds to go into each group just by selecting feeds.

Point 3 is great. The small layout doesnt need that feed link on every item.

to move a feed into a folder, goto RSS, select or create the folder, then select the feed. Or, assuming you've created an account, click on the feed on the left bar, then hover over options in the header, groups, and select the group or create a new one.

We're away that its mobile unfriendly; creating a mobile site is our next initiative.

<comment><USER6> You might want to display some kind of prompt to the user, when they change a setting, to tell them they should create an account. Probably would also help your conversion rates too.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The quick add feed functionality is annoying because it requires that my cursor stay in the box horizontally until I hit "Add Feed" after the "Add Feed url" textbox pops up. So I have to play maze to get there. (I don't mind, just pointing this out).

Also the "add feed" button in "discover" and "my feeds" doesn't seem to like me, I click it and nothing happens. However the "quick add" bar up top does (with the maze caveat, see prev. paragraph).

Edited to Add: Also does it not play nice with some FeedBurner RSS? I am attempting to add (I made an account, this seems nice guys!) "<http://feeds.feedburner.com/schneier/fulltext>, but it won't take it.

<comment><AUTHOR> good feedback, thank you. I'll look into the feedburner issue. We're using the feender library in nodejs which doesnt seem to recognize that as a valid feed, but clearly it is...

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I needed a replacement for GR and this one is nice. subscribed for now (you have my $2).

You need to give me an option to scroll down automatically when I press (n)ext, instead of sliding. It's frustrating because I have a lot of things to read and I don't need to wait around for it to slide down.

EDIT: Maybe a good idea to add an inline "report bug" feature. You guys have a lot of squirmy things happening on your page and I would be more inclined to list them directly.

<comment><USER9> we can definitely get that sorted out for you!

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> The guest account is quite basic. To see/test all features, I would highly recommend creating a trail account:

* Arrange by new / arrange by old

* View all items / view only unseen items

* Quick add feeds

* Create feed groups, discover feeds

* Like/visited tracking

* Remembered layout settings

* Google Reader Import

Hotkeys include:

* O: Open

* J: Next

* K: Previous

* U: Wide Layout

</comment><comment><USER10> Great. I was checking nuesbyte regularly for changes and now, i can finally import my gr feeds. Since google announced the shutdown, this looked like the only alternative to me. I'm excited how the reading flow will be and i hope i will not have to code further on my own bash rss backend fetcher + php frontend (which btw works :D)

</comment><comment><USER11> Very nice, very clean. I like it a lot.

Could use a mobile site though, pretty problematic via Chrome on Android 4.2.2

I immediately noticed that it positively snaps - instantly responsive. I'd love to read something about what all is going on behind the scenes.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'll write up an article on the backend in a few days. I put a lot of thought and time into making it as fast as possible.

We're working on a mobile site and app. Both should be out in a few weeks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> So now that you have my email you want money?

How about you make that more clear, eh...

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, sorry about that. We've gotten some feedback that we need to make the subscription model more clear up front. Please do check out the full set of features though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Are there any plans to reach out to any app developers (e.g., Reeder) to work out an integration? I think that's a pretty key requirement: solid integration with high quality cross platform feed reading applications.

</comment><comment><USER14> <http://hostr.co/file/Yw8IN8koio5t/01.png>

What am I doing wrong?

<comment><USER9> Not sure, I added reddit.com/r/livesound and it seemed to work. I will look into why the direct path doesn't capture.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Is there a way to export my feeds should this service ever go the way of google reader (or I decide I want to use a different one)?

<comment><AUTHOR> if this service ever goes the way of google reader, I promise you I will create a way to export your feeds. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> It's the simplest, yet it's a powerful candidate for my Google Reader migration IMO. :)

<comment><AUTHOR> Glad to hear it! We're definitely open to suggestions if you have any.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> The name makes me OCD so hard.

<comment><USER18> i'm missing it.

<comment><USER17> The "nues", it just looks so wrong in English.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> How do you remove a feed from the listing?

<comment><AUTHOR> register a new account and you'll be able to customize your feeds from an options dropdown on the header.

</comment></comment><comment><USER2> You really need some basic landing pages that give people the impression that this is a legitimate service. I forwarded info to a feed provider that's blocking your feed requests (they're a bit aggressive about abuse and want to whitelist), and I'm sure the webmaster's next step is going to be to look at your homepage, decide there's no way to contact you, shrug, and write you off.

This is very unfortunate, because I think nuesbyte is the best GR substitute I've seen yet (for my desired feature set). There is just no information about whether anything is happening with the site, who made it, future plans, status, or anything. Each time I go looking for information I wonder if the project has simply been abandoned.</comment>


Kindergarten Quantum Mechanics - <AUTHOR> https://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0510032 <comment><USER2> Apparently there is an actual experiment on six-year-olds taking place [1,2]:

"Experiment. Consider ten children of ages between six and ten and consider ten high-school teachers of physics and mathematics. The high-school teachers of physics and mathematics will have all the time they require to refresh their quantum mechanics background, and also to update it with regard to recent developments in quantum information. The children on the other hand will have quantum theory explained in terms of the graphical formalism. Both teams will be given a certain set of questions, for the children formulated in diagrammatic language, and for the teachers in the usual quantum mechanical formalism. Whoever solves the most problems and solves them in the fastest time wins. If the diagrammatic language is much more intuitive, it should in principle be possible for the children to win."

[1] [https://twitter.com/coecke/status/1285531026270367744](https://twitter.com/coecke/status/1285531026270367744) [2] [https://arxiv.org/abs/0908.1787](https://arxiv.org/abs/0908.1787)

</comment><comment><USER3> Kindergarten? They just took bra/kets, Feynman diagrams and substituted block- looking shapes. The underlying logic is hardly changed to kindergarten level. The kid better have a masters in physics to follow this.

"...i.e. we need to conjugate the first Hilbert space (although this gives an isomorphic copy). In the above argument establishing the bijection we used the matrix representation of Hilbert spaces and hence essentially the whole vector space structure, but in fact we need none of this, and we will show that in any picture calculus we always have..."

<comment><USER4> I don't know if you are joking, but the text is not aimed at kindergarteners regardless of the title.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Kindergarten Quantum Mechanics: if you ask mom for something, she will say "yes" or "no" (even if she wasn't sure before you asked). Asking her again won't change her answer. At this point, to try to get a different answer to the same question, you have to ask dad.

</comment><comment><USER6> Does this paper describes an early form of Coecke's ZX calculus? What is the relationship between the two systems?

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

<comment><USER2> Yes, very closely related. ZX is a specific set of tensors within this diagrammatic framework.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> As meta, I suggest most everyone is vastly underestimating the magnitude of potentially transformative improvement being left on the table by current science education. But that's a discussion for another time.

<comment><USER8> Imagine putting all of science on a common (diagrammatic) footing, implemented down to the level of types so you can immediately perform calculations...mouthwatering.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> "Of course we do not expect you to know about category theory, nor do we want to encourage you here to do so." Ugh. Well, _I_ can encourage you to do so, with some Baez [0][1].

[0] [http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/rosetta.pdf](http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/rosetta.pdf)

[1] [https://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0404040](https://arxiv.org/abs/quant- ph/0404040)

<comment><USER10> Man everyone seems to be talking about category theory lately and I still have no idea what it is except some general sense in which different types of mathematical objects can operate on each other (which is probably wrong). Looks like I should probably actually put the effort in and learn about it.

<comment><USER7> Just a cautionary note - category theory has seemingly been at "There's tremendous potential here! We just need to find a big win to make that clear to everyone else..." for quite a few years now.

<comment><USER9> I'm obliged, I suppose, to list off a few big wins. From the 50s and 60s, we have classic theorems which use abstract nonsense to generalize big statements about entire classes of objects, like Freyd's adjoint functor theorem [0], Yoneda's lemma [1], and Lawvere's fixed-point theorem [2]. Yoneda's lemma is the slogan that "an object is equivalent to the arrows coming/leaving it", but formal. Lawvere's theorem is a deep and permanent generalization of Gödel, Tarski, Turing, et al. on incompleteness and undecideability.

Starting in the 60s and continuing to the present, there's been a theme of exploring category theory as a prime foundation for maths. There's been complete foundations like the Elementary Theory of the Category of Categories (ETCC) [3], and also much smaller but pointed presentations that focus on just simplifying set theory. I like [4] in particular.

On a deeper level, in terms of structure and philosophy, the entire existence of homotopy type theory (HoTT) relies on categorical presentations and memes. HoTT is, more than any other type theory, an investigation into what equivalence means, and it dovetails wonderfully with 2-category theory and the understanding that algebraic laws can be transformed into transformations.

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

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

[2] [http://tac.mta.ca/tac/reprints/articles/15/tr15.pdf](http://tac.mta.ca/tac/reprints/articles/15/tr15.pdf)

[3] [https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/ETCC](https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/ETCC)

[4] [https://arxiv.org/abs/1212.6543](https://arxiv.org/abs/1212.6543)

<comment><USER11> Those aren't really "big wins" though. To most mathematicians, generalizations and abstraction are only interesting insofar as they are useful, and I don't see any results there someone working in mainstream mathematics would or should care about. (Obviously the Yoneda lemma is used in algebraic topology and geometry, but that's the odd one out on your list, and you don't really need categorical language to state the interesting examples.)

Also, EETC/HoTT are basically junk, as explained in detail by Harvey Friedman in various postings on the foundations of math mailing list. We already have a perfectly good foundation for mathematics and EETC/HoTT don't improve on it in any way (and in fact are worse in many respects).

<comment><USER9> Friedman and Simpson are, unfortunately, dinosaurs who don't grok categorical concepts. This became clear on the FOM list when Pratt and other abstract algebraists who _know_ category theory but do not _depend_ on it were able to pry apart the problem. Friedman and Simpson _deny_ that certain mathematical objects exist and are equivalent to each other, and while I won't begrudge them their nearsight due to spending so much time with weak/reverse maths, I won't excuse the mistakes.

I had to go find a blow-by-blow of the drama because it's good. Simpson cannot imagine topoi which don't implement standard set theory [3]. Friedman demonstrates a total misunderstanding of sets vs. categories [4]. McLarty and Feferman claim that categorical FOM make sense once one is used to categories [1]. Finally, the truth is laid bare: Friedman and Simpson simply don't agree with us on whether categorical logic is philosophically valid [2].

For more on this perspective, check out Pratt's take on Yoneda's lemma [0].

(An interesting aside: Simpson is an Objectivist who hates postmodernism! I wonder if this is part of what causes them to reject topos theory, where there are many different logics and collections, with a single barren plain Boolean set theory?)

[0] [http://boole.stanford.edu/pub/yon.pdf](http://boole.stanford.edu/pub/yon.pdf)

[1] [https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-March/001309.html](https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-March/001309.html)

[2] [https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-March/001467.html](https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-March/001467.html)

[3] [https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-January/000782.html](https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-January/000782.html)

[4] [https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-January/000835.html](https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-January/000835.html)

<comment><USER11> I read the links you provided (except [0], which I do not have time for at the moment). I do not think Awodey and McLarty come across as well as you think they do, and I do not think Friedman misunderstands anything.

Moreover, you omit some of Friedman's best postings on this topic. The challenge is to show what advantages this proposed theory has over the standard foundations, or to demonstrate some interesting problem or conceptual issue that it resolves. I did not see any serious replies to this.

(Incidentally, the same challenge is my reply to the other comment to my previous post, about the ZX-calculus.)

Here's an analogy. Why do mathematicians consider groups interesting, but general Moufang loops not interesting? I propose the answer is that the additional generality provided by Moufang loops doesn't aid in addressing any interesting questions external to their theory. On the other hand, the utility of the group concept is obvious to anyone who studies a subject with connections to algebra.

This reasoning is roughly why the vast majority of mathematicians don't give two hoots about category theory, beyond picking up the few tricks like Yoneda's lemma that are actually useful. You can – as certain members of the category theory community have shown – take any mathematical concept, consider some generalization, and play various definition pushing games. But that's pointless without a good motivation (e.g. a concrete problem).

The previous two paragraphs concern "actual" mathematics, but similar remarks apply to foundations of mathematics. Friedman is pointing out that we already have a perfectly good foundational theory of mathematics and asking what gain we get by introducing categorical concepts.

<comment><USER9> In ten words or less: Sets are just 0-categories [7][8]. With more words: Set theory is just 0-category theory. This is obvious today, but two decades ago, Friedman couldn't just go to nCat [0] and educate himself.

Friedman repeatedly demonstrates [1][2] that he isn't interested in grokking _why_ category theory is even a thing; he doesn't see e.g. Pratt's careful explanation that category theory is motivated by studying (natural) transformations. Simpson comes across as a spoiled brat [3] and Friedman comes across as a narcissist who needs to fuel himself by being the bastion of FOM [4]. Seriously, in [5], he has the audacity to simultaneously claim that Lawvere's foundations are the same as Friedman's set-theoretic foundations, _and also_ to ask what a Lawvere theory/sketch is! Unbelievably rude.

I read the entire three-month slapfight again, just to double-check that I hadn't mis-remembered the general outline. Simpson wastes message after message being wrong about Boolean algebras vs. Boolean rings (they're the same picture) and doesn't understand how categorical dualities like Stone duality lead to equivalences. At no point do either of them manage to fully grok a 2-category or how ETCC could be a practical foundations. Tragesser says it well in [5] when he analogizes the entire affair to the sheep and their shop [6], going around and around and always changing the framing but never actually getting to the philosophical meat of the inquiry.

[0] [https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/periodic+table](https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/periodic+table)

[1] [https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-February/001182.html](https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-February/001182.html)

[2] [https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-March/001303.html](https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-March/001303.html)

[3] [https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-February/001228.html](https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-February/001228.html)

[4] [https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-February/001234.html](https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-February/001234.html)

[5] [https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-February/001210.html](https://cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/1998-February/001210.html)

[6] Edit: I can link directly to the text! [https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Through_the_Looking- Glass,_an...](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Through_the_Looking- Glass,_and_What_Alice_Found_There/Chapter_V)

[7] [https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/0-category](https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/0-category)

[8] [https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/negative%20thinking](https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/negative%20thinking)

<comment><USER11> Again, what I see is Friedman and Simpson asking for fairly specific and concrete things, and those things not being provided.

More to the point, what I asked for in my previous comment has also not been provided! What does the knowledge that Sets are "just 0-categories" buy me in concrete terms? Does it facilitate the proof of any theorems in set theory?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> From [0] 2018: "In [1] we present an entirely diagrammatic presentation of quantum the-ory with applications in quantum foundations and quantum information.This was the result of many years of work by many, and started of as acategory-theoretic axiomatisation motivated by computer science as well asaxiomatic physics. However, I have always felt that the diagrammatic pre- sentation is of great use in its own right, be it to bridge disciplines, makequantum theory more easy to grasp, or, for educational purposes, in [2] wemade the bolt claim that using diagrams high-school kids could even out- perform their teachers, or university students. Now, we will put this claimto the test. To do so, we have written two tutorials [3,4], covering exactlythe same material, but one only using diagrams, while the other containsthe standard Hilbert space presentation. There are corresponding sets ofexamples too."

[0] Quantum Theory for Kids [https://repositorio.usp.br/directbitstream/95d90813-2c2f-4cc...](https://repositorio.usp.br/directbitstream/95d90813-2c2f-4cc6-b513-6a8c9bf5082c/2890851.pdf#page=141) [1] Picturing Quantum Processes [https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316219317](https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316219317) ; slides [https://www.cs.ox.ac.uk/ss2014/programme/Bob.pdf](https://www.cs.ox.ac.uk/ss2014/programme/Bob.pdf) ; talk [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Fvjpjhimic](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Fvjpjhimic) [2] Quantum Picturalism [https://arxiv.org/abs/0908.1787](https://arxiv.org/abs/0908.1787) [3] Quantum theory in Pictures ... "Top Secret"... I didn't quickly find.

A recent talk: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOLoyx6EHq8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOLoyx6EHq8)

</comment><comment><USER12> If you want to see the author riff on density matrices, check out this recent video: [https://youtu.be/wP_Jsxn7BA4?t=1020](https://youtu.be/wP_Jsxn7BA4?t=1020)

And by riff I mean with an actual electric guitar

</comment><comment><USER13> I have only skimmed this paper, but the diagrams look somewhat similar to Penrose graphical notation. Is there any connection there?

<comment><USER2> Yes, they are pretty much the same thing. There are some particular quantum-y elements though, such as the cup & cap. In general relativity these would (i think?) correspond to index raising and lowering operators.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Yeah, kids are bosons...</comment>


CronusPaaS, opensource PaaS framework for the cloud - <AUTHOR> http://www.cronuspaas.com

<comment><USER2> Deploy sample application in 10 seconds. Manage Java, Python, Node, or ANY Languages or Stacks. Deploy to Hundreds of Machines in Seconds. No Vendor Lock In, run on GCP, AWS, Azure. Light Weight, Setup in 2 Minute. Scale Simply and Predictably. Intuitive UI, RESTful APIs. 100% Open Source.</comment>


Don't tell me about your product - <AUTHOR> http://jeffcroft.com/blog/2009/oct/19/dont-tell-me-about-your-product/ <comment><USER2> I bet you good money you wont forget the company or its product for the next few years though, and every time you see a similar product you can't help but compare them.

It was a friken cold call and it worked. You went through the trouble to blog about it. The salesguy has the wisdom to seek you as an influential web persona, and if he "failed" with you today it doesn't mean it's the end of his campaign, specially if he has a well-researched prospect list.

Instead of being cranky at him, if you had a shred of business sense you would have talked with the guy and possibly "flipped" him to promote your ventures and services; you can see he is already working at a very detailed nano-level; most software promoters go straight after big fish, write long boring articles and waste good money advertising with shell "industry" websites that are nothing more than a press-release dump; instead of harnessing visible personalities to be their word of mouth. BUUUUUT, you're _designer_ , move along, select message and click "trash".

Business is give and take, rub my back I rub yours. You could have asked for a promotion offer, exchange contact details, added him on Skype/LinkedIn/Facebook, and got yourself a reseller deal with his firm and possibly a lead-generation fee for his own sales/marketing services you share with your network.

Annoying sales guy 1

Annoyed web socialite 0.

<comment><USER3> This is needlessly hostile. It's like you're assuming everyone should want the same things as you. Not everyone cares about being good at business.

The author was just trying to understand a reaction he had to something that happened to him. I didn't get the impression he was "cranky" at all.

<comment><USER2> It's hostility but not "needless":

1) The blogger is a "freelancer", by his own admission, and someone out there rightfully thought the man's services where available to the market and wanted to establish a business relationship. I guess the blogger is not a businessman.

But wait ..

2) The blogger goes to write an article about how to market your products and services.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm going to go with, "this is the worst piece of advice I have ever read on Hacker News". The #1 rule of sales, all sales, everywhere: ASK FOR THE SALE.

What went wrong for this PR guy was the 1-2 punch he tried. He was clumsy about how he timed his pitch, and he was superficial in how he tried to connect to his prospect. But the blogger's response, "wait until I ask you about your product", is exactly the wrong lesson to take from this.

</comment><comment><USER5> It's hard to generalize one person's reaction as a rule. Getting a conversion rate of 10% is often good for a campaign, but remember: that means 90% said no.

That being said, Don't burn your market! Don't be deceptive, because there are two conversion rates to worry about. The percent who said no and the percent who now hate you--and you can normally only track the one.

<comment><USER6> How many people have MS, Apple and Google burned? I think as a percentage it's quite low but does Bill G or Steve J give a crap about the few who hate them?

Just like meeting girls, the assholes usually win that battle and while 'taking the high ground' might mean you sleep better or have better karma, it also means you'll have to make due with a lot less (which for some is okay, we all have our threshold).

It's a balance between being that asshole sales/marketing guy who lands the project/sale/client and the guy who actually cares about the customer and their needs after the sale.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> But, damn, I'd Love This Product Even If I Weren't A Stealth Marketer

<http://www.theonion.com/content/node/43456>

</comment><comment><USER8> Does Nestle ask for your friendship before selling you some Oreo's?

<comment><USER6> No, you're hungry, they sell cookies .. done deal.

I commented on this dude's blog but basically he's turned off by a rather soft sales technique. If he ever had to survive in a sales world .. he wouldn't.

People in business want .. more business. Just like people who are hungry want food. If you make a product that serves a need, you gotta get over that whole "I don't want to offend anyone" and get to it. Otherwise your competitor will.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: How to get an edge in traditional business using technology? - <AUTHOR>

Hi guys, first of all i would like to introduce myself. I'm a business student (19 year old) from Chile looking forward to start a new business. I'm sorry if my english isn't perfect, it's something i'm constantly working on.
So basically i'm starting a specialty food store - wholesaler, focusing mainly on Caviar and Truffles (at least at first), a pretty small niche traditional kind of business.
I know i'm probably lacking funds in comparison to my competition, but i think i can probably outperform them in everything related to web and internet (i'm not exactly a hacker, but i think i'm pretty proficient with technology), as the take of the competition here is pretty much "brick and mortar", with little or no taking advantage of new technologies.
So, how could i leverage this technical advantage to get an edge in this business? Good SEO and a nice e-commerce page comes to mind, but i'm pretty sure there are other areas and tactics i haven't thought of.
Thanks a lot. <comment><USER2> B&M or Internet focused(warehouse shipping)?

<comment><AUTHOR> (I'll assume you're asking about my business) I don't really know what you mean with warehouse shipping, but i don't really have a Store, only a little showroom, if that's what you're asking for. I'll be shipping everything from my own warehouse once i enter the products to Chile.

Anyways, i don't think Internet can be the core of my business (because of client profiles and the type of products). I still think most of my time will go to direct sales, but it would be nice to get a little edge using Internet.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Which .NET applications might be (better) on Mac/Linux soon? - <AUTHOR>

When I read about Microsoft open-sourcing .NET, my first thought were: Cool, finally Pain.NET might run on Mac OS X soon.
I'm not sure, whether my hopes are justified, but I bet there are quite a few nice applications out there that are on .NET and are either not at all available on Mac/Linux (Pain.NET) or with limited native support on Mono (e.g. KeePass).
Which .NET applications do you hope will get run (better) on Mac/Linux soon? <comment><AUTHOR> Rick Brewster, the creator of Paint.NET, damped my hopes already:

"This affects nothing for Paint.NET at this time."

Source: [http://forums.getpaint.net/index.php?/topic/30284-microsoft-...](http://forums.getpaint.net/index.php?/topic/30284-microsoft- open-sources-net-does-this-mean-paintnet-on-linux-is-possible/?p=418807)

<comment><USER2> Have you tried gimp and inkscape??

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I'd love to have Fiddler in linux!

Btw, does any one know of Fiddler alternatives for linux in the meantime?

<comment><USER4> There has been an alpha of fiddler on mono for some time now: [http://fiddler.wikidot.com/mono](http://fiddler.wikidot.com/mono), rejoice!</comment></comment>


A $45 Android tablet - <AUTHOR> http://www.walmart.com/ip/XELIO-7-Tablet-With-4GB-Memory/23709345 <comment><USER2> I got one similar to this using points from my credit card, I checked online, many similar ones for around $50 these days. The one I got was a profound piece of crap, I fooled around with it a little, then disassembled it for fun. Honestly, destroying it was the most enjoyment I got from it.

<comment><USER3> To be fair, if you're an engineer, this could be true of many of your possessions :).

<comment><USER4> You don't even have to be an engineer for that to be true...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I wonder if devices like that are good for Android, or bad. One the one hand they can bring Android who otherwise wouldn't have had the money to afford a device, but on the other hand the default browsing experience is apparently quite slow and it doesn't support the Google Play Store[1].

[1] [http://rodmc.com/?p=494](http://rodmc.com/?p=494)

<comment><USER6> I'm not sure whether or not devices like this are good for Android in and of themselves, but they're an inevitable consequence of something that is great fit Android: that people can take the Android source and run with it in a variety of ways, whether Google wants them to or not.

For example, the first Android tablets pre-date the iPad by months and the first Google Android tablets by about a year. Or you could look at the variety of activity in the Android STB space, which has been substantially more interesting and successful than Google's official efforts, so far

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I understand why there are a bunch of these devices, but I don't understand why the manfs don't release more information about them.

I'm finding it hard to work out exactly what processor is used in this device.

Setting up a wiki with minimal information, and then seeding the hacker community with a few devices, would probably make one brand stand out over all the other minimal Android tablets there are.

A device that could be rooted, could have a Linux installed, or could have a different Android version installed, would be interesting for hackers. The manfs don't have to offer any support.

<comment><USER8> Nearly all, if not all, of these are based on the "china special" which is an Android tablet built on top of the Allwinner CPUs (the A13 is popular in the cheap ones) Ars reviewed a $99 tablet[1] which was pretty funny. If you go to Alibaba.com and search for 'android tablet' you will find a bunch of these. And if you can navigate the Chinese there is a reference design on the Allwinner site which is pretty much exactly what you get.

Put a capacitive touch screen on an Raspberry Pi and boot Android on it and you'll have a better tablet than this I suspect. If someone does a definitive teardown of the specific Walmart model that would let us know exactly which reference design they used.

[1] [http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2010/11/worst-gadget-ever- ars...](http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2010/11/worst-gadget-ever-ars- reviews-a-99-android-tablet/)

<comment><USER9> The A13 and A10 are substantially newer and faster than the Raspberry Pi. Video decode acceleration on them sucks though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The $45 tablet is a non-Google Play device. So not that impressive.

This one is $59, and shows a screen shot with Google Play, GMail, etc. on it: [http://www.walmart.com/ip/Ematic-7-Tablet-with-4GB-Memory- an...](http://www.walmart.com/ip/Ematic-7-Tablet-with-4GB-Memory-and-Google- Mobile-Services/23350692)

A real Google logo device for $59 would be pretty astounding.

<comment><USER7> The $45 tablet has a FAQ on the manf website apologising for having screen shots of the Google Play Store; and saying that these are an error that they're correcting.

The $59 device has a PDF for installing an alternative store so maybe they've made a similar error? ([http://www.ematic.us/sites/default/files/Installing1MobileMa...](http://www.ematic.us/sites/default/files/Installing1MobileMarket_8.pdf)) The quickstart guide shows some other app store. ([http://www.ematic.us/sites/default/files/EGL26BL_QSG.pdf](http://www.ematic.us/sites/default/files/EGL26BL_QSG.pdf))

EDIT: the manf website for the cheaper device is horrible. Here it is ([http://xeliotablet.com/](http://xeliotablet.com/)) they have a faq about the play store on there somewhere.

<comment><USER10> It would be great to see that 3rd tier OEMs can access the Google Play store. I have long wondered why Google would shun inexpensive tablets. Android can accommodate lo-rez screens and slower CPUs pretty well, and existing automated tests can verify compatibility.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Seems useless. From one of the reviews: _" Advertised on Walmart.com as a "Google" Android product, but Google play store and Google apps will not run on it."_

For ~$100 on ebay, the (old) HP TouchPad seems a better option of a cheap tablet. You can install ICS with little effort, and run pretty much everything.

<comment><USER12> If it comes rooted / can be rooted, then an android device can install Google Play and everything by mimicking a Galaxy Nexus (or any common device) by editing build.prop. There are lots of tutorials online about this topic.

[http://highonandroid.com/android-apps/how-to-install- google-...](http://highonandroid.com/android-apps/how-to-install-google- wallet-on-any-rooted-android-smartphone-or-tablet/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I bought one such tablet couple of years back( Velocity Micro Cruz T301) for $69 on woot. The tablet was pretty much useless for daily use. Flashed AOSP and installed play store. Still useless, as most apps don't show up for that device. However, works okay as a cloud connected photoframe.

</comment><comment><USER14> I think it's more interesting to look at the range of prices from a company you've actually heard of. Take ASUS for example.

ASUS makes the current nexus 7 ($199) : [http://www.google.com/nexus/7/](http://www.google.com/nexus/7/) But they will also sell you another 16GB, 7" tablet for $99 ASUS MeMo Pad : [http://www.amazon.com/ASUS-MeMO-ME172V-A1-GR-7-0-Inch- Tablet...](http://www.amazon.com/ASUS-MeMO-ME172V-A1-GR-7-0-Inch- Tablet/dp/B00BDS25VA/)

Perhaps the lesson here is, by going back a generation, you can halve the price of a tablet. As we've hit the $199 mark for 7" tablets for some time now, $99 tablets from brands you actually know should be no surprise. As the price of these tablets fall to 150 and lower, one generation older tablets for 75, 60 or even 50 will become the norm.

</comment><comment><USER15> If you don't have a smartphone and want a cheap "tablet," then look into buying a used smartphone. Doing so is super cheap because you don't have to buy a data plan. Besides, phones tend to be more portable. I got a Droid2 for $30 on Amazon.

<comment><USER10> The value sweet spot is almost certainly at a higher price than these products, but even a 7" tablet with a crummy screen has a better UX for browsing and Google Drive apps than a handset. The pricing of these devices could be the reason lots more poor kids get a real Internet experience, and that could be revolutionary.

<comment><USER7> > The pricing of these devices could be the reason lots more poor kids get a > real Internet experience, and that could be revolutionary.

I really hope they remember the lousy experience and remember to code for low- spec devices in future. I love the nice whizz-bang websites, but it's frustrating when they use weird features for no real purpose and thus slow the page load down.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I refuse to do business with walmart... their buisness ethics are just horrible.

<comment><USER17> You shouldn't get your news from unions. Unions don't like walmart because it's not a union shop, and it's large so make a nice target.

Walmart itself is no different from any other large retailer.

<comment><USER18> Except for Costco, which manages to pay it's employees a decent wage and still keep prices low.

<comment><USER17> Costco is not in the same business as WalMart. They have an order of magnitude fewer SKU's. They deal with a completely different clientèle, and the profit for each item is much higher, so their labor costs are lower.

You can not compare WalMart and Costco.

<comment><USER19> Except that, if you have both a WalMart and a CostCo in your town, you'll still make a cost-comparison, between:

        cost of set of things found at WalMart A
        + cost of a few extra things not found at WalMart B
        + travel time T

and

        cost of set of things found at CostCo A'
        + cost of a few extra things not found at CostCo B'
        + travel time T'

In other words, you might not be able to find all the same things at WalMart and CostCo, or for the same prices, but if you're in the price-range of both stores and trying to optimize your purchasing, you'll still be deciding which one to shop at.

<comment><USER17> First that's a comparison for the shopper, not the retailer (and we are discussing the retailer here).

And second, you can only buy at Costco if you need the quantities they sell. Everything you can get at Costco you can also get at WalMart, but the reverse is not the case - it's not "a few extra thing" \- Costco doesn't carry a huge amount of stuff you can get at WalMart.

So for the consumer buying at Costco is exclusively about what quantity they need. (Or if they have a lot of storage space + budget to store extra.) And then they also have to go to WalMart to fill in the rest.

Or in other words they complement each other - they are only partially competitors.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Honey Boo Boo wanted an iPad, I said no, it's too 'spensive. But I saw these down at the Wal-Mart, and they's just as good and only fo'ty-five bucks!

Honey Boo Boo! Don't tell me you broke that thang already! I tole you not to drop sketti on it!

<comment><USER21> Very poignant and witty. Better contender for Mark Twain than Sam can ever do.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Eventually, tablets will be free and will make money from services & advertising.

</comment><comment><USER23> The Race to the Bottom!</comment>


Imagination Technologies put up for sale amid Apple dispute - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-40364662 <comment><USER2> I feel like Imagination Tech can't die fast enough. These guys _aggressively_ created patent clouds around anything and everything 3D graphic. It wasn't until a lot of the base patents on 3D acceleration started expiring that anyone would even consider the move Apple made. I hope that in 5 years we've got SoC's with fully open GPUs that are at least as powerful as the old 3Dfx Voodoo and Nvidia TNT series from the 90s.

<comment><USER3> Nvidia and AMD are doing the same thing. Outside of X86 GPUs are probably the most walled off market, you literally cannot make a GPU today without violating a patent.

<comment><USER4> > Outside of X86 GPUs are probably the most walled off market

I think FPGAs are more walled off.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> 2017 was the year Apple decided they don't feel like paying for IP anymore.

I can't wait to see how the Qualcomm case plays out. I'm not a lawyer, but the recent Supreme Court decision on Lexmark seems like a huge threat to Qualcomm's business model.

</comment><comment><USER6> My cynical take: Imagination Tech's legitimate business is vulnerable to an Apple counter-suit. Without that legitimate business weighing it down it would be much more valuable as a patent troll.

<comment><USER7> > it would be much more valuable as a patent troll

Or the threat of a counter-suit is low but they want to weaponize the company out of spite and the low chance of recovering as a producer of new IP. My recollection might be off but didn't Apple want to purchase Imagination but Imagination wanted to remain an independent company, so Apple hired away their talent instead? Or am I confusing this with what they did to Nuance?

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Wonder if Apple's inhouse GPUs will turn out as well as their CPUs. It's gotta be a hell of a gig to land to work on either.

</comment><comment><USER9> My bet: Apple will buy Imagination Technologies.

<comment><USER10> It would be illegal after the announcement that they would stop buying Imagination's GPUs. Imagination's value tanked after, they wouldn't be allowed to buy it.

<comment><USER9> Not necessarily, e.g. if the takeover has a prime high enough for matching previous stock price. Or buying IT for cheap, without using any of their chips, just for having their patents.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Google seems to be interested in hardware, hiring an ex Apple chip designer. Maybe they would be interested in this sale.

<comment><USER12> For 500 mil it should be a no brainier. Its like a rounding error for google.

<comment><USER13> ImgTech has been a bit of a basket case for a long time. Why did they buy MIPS for $100m? Why have they just (last year) built a huge posh new HQ when they were losing money? I don't think it's something Google would want.

<comment><USER14> As a former employee of PowerVR, work began around the start of 2011, and was done in (at least) 3 phases. They finished the 2nd phase around the start of 2014, but I'm not sure when the final phase was completed. Plans were definitely made during the golden-years.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Edit: I misspoke, I had the wrong company in my sights. Sorry folks.

<comment><USER16> Got a source on that? As far as I'm aware Imagination have never been in the controller/haptic feedback market.

EDIT: Are you thinking of "Immersion" [1]? Completely different company.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immersion_v._Sony](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immersion_v._Sony)</comment></comment>


Show HN: Notational Velocity-inspired web app built with Vue.js - <AUTHOR> https://notational.co/ <comment><AUTHOR> Happy to answer questions. All the code is on GitHub ([https://github.com/tmm/notational](https://github.com/tmm/notational)).</comment>


CPSC bans sale of BuckyBalls - <AUTHOR> http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/07/25/us-usa-buckyballs-idUSBRE86O1LN20120725

<comment><USER2> It sucks to see BuckyBalls go the way of lawn darts, but as a parent of a very active and impulsive 5yo I can totally understand why they were banned.

(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawn_darts#Safety_and_bans>)

<comment><AUTHOR> I guess they should ban hot stoves, grills, harmful toxins, and everything else a child can come into contact with. This falls on the parents. If you have a product your child can get injured by, don't leave it in plain sight and don't let your child play with it.

<comment><USER3> "Buckyballs are small, powerful round rare earth magnets that are sold as toys and desktop accessories."

Hot stoves, grills and harmful toxins aren't toys and there isn't a normal use case where a child would use those. It can happen, but it's not intended.

A toy's use case is playing with it. This particular toy is causing problems, where other toys aren't. I see no problem in banning them. We aren't a full-on libertarian society, we make choices, not always to everyone's liking.

<comment><USER4> And you conveniently omitted the part where it says "[...] marketed the magnets to adults and teenagers" to focus on the word toy. It's as dishonest as calling for a ban on Ben Wa Balls if a child choked on one. Because you know... they're balls, they're "toys" and they're a hazard.

<comment><USER3> No dishonesty intended, and not done conveniently. They look like toys (or chocolate, from the article), and kids are getting hurt. We disagree.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


The pocket spy: Will your smartphone rat you out?  - <AUTHOR> http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20427301.100-the-pocket-spy-will-your-smartphone-rat-you-out.html

<comment><USER4> XKCD gives a nice glimpse of one possible problem <http://xkcd.com/596/>

<comment><USER5> That's a classic.

But seriously this article does make me think about netbooks and other portable devices. If a stolen cell phone could yield so much information how about a stolen computer?

It seems to me that when you keep so much of your life on an electronic device you are naturally going to be vulnerable in multiple ways.

<comment><USER4> I agree with you. Right now, the notebook / netbook would cause a lot more damage, but I think that might be shifting with all these apps we put on our cellphones. We really have no idea how secure the data in each of these apps are, and standard stuff like encrypted file systems are not a user option.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I do not think this is a "puff piece." I think there is a legitimate concern here that falls - aside from phishing scams and obvious privacy implications - into the province of:

       * Crooked cops and unscrupulous prosecutors - <USER2>
       * Defendant - <USER3>

If even SMS messages can be recovered despite having been deleted, that's a lot of forensic trail nobody should have. Law enforcement investigating a person who is not currently accused of a crime and for whom an arrest warrant is not issued should be entitled to examine communications occurring from the moment they are granted (by a court order) a tap request and it is implemented, NOT communications having occurred prior to that point.

This dangerously changes the balance of power.

</comment><comment><USER7> obvious puff piece on being afraid of your cool new tech... clearly all tech should come with a surgeon general's warning proclaiming:

"warning: entrusting this device with your personal information may be hazardous to your health"

I couldn't really tell but it looked to me like none of these phones were 'locked' with a password that wipes your phone after so and so many incorrect log in attempts. Also, the guys are professional data recovery guys who work with the police and they had physical access to the devices which means they could have bypassed the soft lock entirely.

q: what kind of 'wipe' does the iphone and bb do when you hit the lock reset limit? is it like a multi-write to the 'disk', which is obviously ram based and not platter based. does the multi-write work for such devices?</comment>


Open Source Misfeasance [video] - <AUTHOR> http://zachholman.com/talk/open-source-misfeasance/

<comment><AUTHOR> Keep in mind that there are slides of the presentation on the page. Not quite too sure why the mods added "[video]" in the title.

<comment><USER2> The video below the slides is the main content. Slides by themselves don't do anything.

It's a great talk, by the way.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> _"All too often we get sucked into thinking open source is like enterprise and Oracle and stuff like that"_

wtf?</comment>


Ask HN: Master of Science in Computer Science at Georgia Tech - <AUTHOR> I've been wondering for a while whether it's worth enrolling in [the OMS CS program](https://www.omscs.gatech.edu/program-info/specializations) and after thinking for some weeks I came to the conclusion that it's a good opportunity to take. I decided that I'll try to enrol in the next possible semester.
From the four specializations they offer I'm only interested in Computing Systems or Machine Learning. I believe Computing Systems is the way to go but Machine Learning seems pretty nice with a good future in innovation meanwhile Computing Systems looks like too theoretical - not in a bad way.
To put it in other words, Computing Systems sounds like academic oriented and Machine Learning looks more oriented to technology development. So I'm asking for your opinions or experiences if you have already taken these courses. Were they good? Do you recommend them?
Also, more in specific I'm having problems understanding how I'm supposed to chose the courses I want to take. I'm not familiar with the US college system.
I understand I have to take 30 hours (10 courses), which are divided in core and elective. However, for the [Specialization in Computing Systems](https://www.omscs.gatech.edu/specialization-computing-systems) it says it's 18 hours, 3 core courses and 3 elective and for [Machine Learning](https://www.omscs.gatech.edu/specialization-machine-learning) are 15 hours, 2 core courses and 3 elective. Where are the other remaining hours?
Some background, I'm Mexican with a bachelor degree in Computer Systems Engineering. <comment><USER2> I completed my OMSCS last Spring, specializing in Machine Learning. My advice to you would be to not worry about any specialization as you can change it later on. Focus on taking courses that interest you. You need to complete 10 courses for completing the program. With 2-3 mandatory courses + 3 electives, you have room for at least 4 other courses not in your specialization.

There are some interesting courses on the Computing System track. FWIW, my undergrad was in a different engineering field. So I really enjoyed the Network Security and Intro to Operating Systems. The Algorithms course reshaped my perspective on formal methods and correctness. The HCI course is also very good.

As mentioned by @bewestphal , check out [https://omscentral.com/](https://omscentral.com/) for reviews to get an idea about the popularity, difficulty and time investment for the courses.

<comment><USER3> Any chance you could post a list of the textbooks you used?

<comment><USER2> Sure.

1\. Introduction to the Theory of Computation - Sipser and Introduction to Algorithms - CLRS (for the Algorithms course)

2\. Machine Learning - Tom Mitchell

3\. Artificial Intelligence - A Modern Approach - Russell and Norvig

4\. Design of Everyday Things - Norman (for HCI)

5\. Operating Systems in Three Easy Pieces [0]

Most of the courses had their own notes, slides and suggested research papers as primary reading and the textbooks were mostly used as a secondary reference.

[0] - [http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~remzi/OSTEP/](http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~remzi/OSTEP/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm in it right now, starting my third term in May. It's been very valuable for me. However, I think I'm like most of the students: coming from a math, engineering, or science background, transitioning into a more software development-oriented career. The value of the OMSCS degree is very clear for us: the degree as a qualification, and exposure to knowledge/skills we don't already have.I'm not sure if it would be as valuable for someone who already has some sort of computer science/systems background. I'm not really sure what a computer systems engineering degree entails so I may be way off here.

Some other thoughts:

The time investment and effort to do the courses is serious. Not only are the courses very time-consuming (10 - 30 hours per week), but you're also expected to do research and study up on material on your own in certain classes. You can't just be a passive consumer of the material. It can be very rewarding and/or very painful depending on what you're getting out of the course.

Your choices are constrained by class capacity. It is very difficult to get into the more popular courses (i.e the ML ones in particular) and so be prepared to take non-ML courses until you have enough seniority to get better registration preference. Don't even bother trying to plan out your courses in advance, a lot of it will just be determined by when you are permitted to register for classes! To be fair, based on recent emails from GT, it seems like they're aware of this problem and looking to open up other classes (possibly taking advantage of more courses going online during the pandemic). They also seem to be opening up courses that were formerly restricted to the OMSA degree (the more math-heavy analytics equivalent) which I'm really excited about.

<comment><AUTHOR> How many courses are you taking per term? Do you spend 10-30 hour/week with only one course?

<comment><USER4> Yes, that's with one course. Huge variance in time per class, so you can do two courses for the same amount of time if you are strategic about your choices.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> UT Austin's program is also worth considering. It's newer but there is supposedly more consistent quality and rigor to the courses. Of course nobody has taken both so it is speculation from students at both schools, but that is the general consensus I could pick up from the respective subreddits for both programs. You also have to take the GRE for UT Austin.

As for your question about remaining hours, they are classes you choose. Anything not explicitly required or part of your specialization gets filled by electives of your choosing. You can also see rankings by students of all the courses here: [https://omscentral.com/](https://omscentral.com/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for the information, I just quickly checked the page and I think it has less elective courses to choose from compared to the Georgia Tech program.

Another thing to take into consideration is that UT Austin's program is more expensive.

[MASTER OF COMPUTER SCIENCE ONLINE]([https://www.cs.utexas.edu/graduate- program/masters-program/o...](https://www.cs.utexas.edu/graduate- program/masters-program/online-option))

<comment><USER5> It has less electives because it is newer, but most people are choosing it due to increased rigor. The OMSCS program has more watered down classes supposedly. One of the things that irritates me about the georgia tech program is that they hardly have most of the classes in a program available. I'm most interested in computer vision courses and they have one class on computational photography and nothing else. On campus students get things like multi view geometry and all kinds of courses I think are essential to computer vision researchers, but not online students.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The remaining units are free electives if your choice. More than enough to touch all topics you're interested in.

Definitely check out the reviews here [https://omscentral.com/](https://omscentral.com/)

Personally I recommend Computer Vision, Reinforcement Learning and AI Techniques for Robotics. Skip classes that emphasize writing essays over coding.

</comment><comment><USER7> Anyone complete or accepted to OMSCS without a background in Computer Science?

Any recommended ways to fulfill their requirements for the basic CS without paying $$$ to take courses?

Was denied for not having the CS background before joining a FAANG.

<comment><USER8> University of the People has a free-ish CS program. You might look into that. It's zero tuition, but you have to pay $100/exam (or at least that's what it was when I was looking at it).

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Have you checked the subreddit dedicated to this program?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, I posted the same questions there

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> > I'm Mexican

Sure but why is this relevant to your question

<comment><USER11> Where a person and their previous degree are from might provide a different background for needing/wanting a further degree, or for understanding what kind of existing education and credentials they have. There might e.g. be differences in substance or reputation between degrees from different countries.

It might be a small detail, but I can see how it could be relevant. At least I might find myself asking what kind of prior education and from where a person asking about a program has if that information weren't included.

Also, it's a small human detail. Maybe not important, but not a huge waste of mental bandwidth either.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> May want to try GradCafe for nuanced responses. Not sure if you're talking about MS or MEng, but if it's MS then finding a good match with your advisor and research group is more important than anything else.

<comment><USER13> What do research groups have to do with GaTech's online Master of Computer Science offering?</comment></comment>


U.S. considers erecting fences along Canadian border - <AUTHOR> http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/1061690--u-s-considers-erecting-fences-along-canadian-border?bn=1#article <comment><USER2> Don't want to go all tin hat here, but its worth remembering that big fences, lots of cameras and a bunch of seismic sensors in the ground are just as useful for keeping people _in_ as for keeping people out.

Edit: I'm not implying an impending "soviet socialist state of america" or anything quite so slashdot, just remembering that there is precedent for Americans seeking asylum in Canada against what they felt were unjust laws at home.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada_and_the_Vietnam_War></comment>


Reports: Apple AirPower still overheating, may be "doomed to failure" - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/?p=1376807 <comment><USER2> Meanwhile Ikea is wirelessly charging 3 devices on 1 mat [1]

[1] [https://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/10308315/](https://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/10308315/)

<comment><USER3> Aren't both devices different ?

The Ikea product is 3 wireless chargers that are connected to each other. The apple mat however, seems to be attempting a system where you can place the product anywhere on the mat and it just works. This does seem significantly more difficult to me.

Isn't there a clear distinction between both products ?

<comment><USER2> maybe from an engineering point.

But looking at the pictures of the apple mat, they line up line up devices pretty neatly, just liked you'd have to do on a normal mat.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Does anyone else know about an announced Apple product that never came to market? This feels like a first and pretty crazy they would announce it before ironing out the bugs. My guess is they thought they were close and wanted a piece of the wireless charging market so they announced it with 8/8+/X so that some of the population would hold off for an Apple charging mat instead of third party. I am very happy with my iPhone X and Anker charging mats everywhere.

<comment><USER5> The original white iPhone took way, way longer to bring to market than they originally predicted. At one point people were speculating that it might never happen. The problem was in getting the various plastic and glass pieces to look fully white and the same tone.

Steve Jobs announced that Facetime would be open source and never happened, apparently because he didn't check with any engineers or lawyers before making the announcement.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> This doesn't seem like an overly complicated problem to me - I wonder why they're having issues.

And by that I mean, I can buy wireless charging mats everywhere - hell, my desk has one built in, cars are coming with them.

There's something "odd" about a product when a company can build things like the XS, but not a charging mat that uses a well-supported standard.

<comment><USER7> Well right now charging mats require your product to be over a very specific spot. They are trying to just require you to lay your item on the mat and have it charge, no shifting it around and making sure it's in an optimum spot.

<comment><USER8> The Airpower was also supposed to support multiple -- very different -- devices at the same time (i.e., phone, watch, AirPods). Is this possibly also a complicating factor?</comment></comment></comment>


FeeFighters Acquired By Groupon - <AUTHOR> http://feefighters.com/blog/feefighters-acquired/ <comment><USER2> For some reason I'm not very excited about this. We jut moved to the Samurai Gateway and I've never been a big fan of Groupon and their business model. I'm just wondering what they are going to do with FeeFighters now. I wouldn't be too surprised if Groupon filed chapter 11 sometime in the near future... wasn't there recently something on HN about them losing money on every Groupon?

<comment><USER3> You're wondering what they're going to do now? I was too, for the 5 seconds it took between reading the headline and then loading the article, which says what they're going to do next: the same thing they're already doing.

You're really just, when you read a story like this on HN at this point, even though it's a story about a bunch of people that made good on the dream of a big chunk of everyone who reads HN (or at least what used to be a big chunk of them, in the time before 'pg started mailing his companies to stop commenting on HN because it's a fever swamp) --- you're really just like waiting for this whole story to be another godawful stupid referendum on everyone's third- or fourth- hand information on Groupon.

<comment><USER4> I think it's more that many of us are having trouble understanding how FeeFighters fits in with Groupon.

The strategy that I could see working well would be for Groupon to extend Groupon/FeeFighters to include a Shopify competitor. They have the credit card processing and the relationships with local businesses. "Are you enthusiastic about selling online? Want to extend your online presence and sales?"

Just continuing FeeFighters as-is wouldn't really help Groupon substantially. I mean, FeeFighters might be profitable and a good business, but if it doesn't tie-in nicely to one of Groupon's current or future businesses, it might not be a good purchase. So, I think we all expect something is going to happen - something to leverage a collective strength rather than basically being two separate companies with separate revenue and separate customers just jointly owned.

I think there's a reason why some might be worried. When a company gets acquired, sometimes that product gets discontinued (even if claims are made otherwise during the acquisition). Othertimes, the product languishes. Hopefully that won't be the case here, but it's hardly unheard of. Heck, even without a merger, directions can change. I remember when Heroku had a web editing interface and they gave that up well before being bought. But when an acquisition happens, sometimes new combinations of people lead to new ideas and the old ideas don't seem as exciting (or as likely to be useful/profitable). The acquiring company may think they will continue the acquired property, but six months later it becomes clear that they want to spend their resources elsewhere. I'm not saying that will happen - in fact, Heroku's purchase by Salesforce is a perfect contradiction as it has done wonderful things since acquisition. However, Jaiku, FeedBurner, Dodgeball, Gizmo5, DimDim, and others all show that a product can be discontinued or languish in a state that feels like no one is looking at it after an acquisition.

I guess if there was some announcement of "everyone, we're working on a new way to get local businesses online easily with FeeFighters credit card processing" we'd all feel like "nice! I can see how that would fit well and will continue to be an awesome, actively developed product." While there's no real reason to doubt the post, at least in the back of our heads we have to be thinking about whether it was a talent acquisition or how committed Groupon is going to be to FeeFighters.

<comment><USER5> You have not been following Groupon closely enough for this sort of analysis.

Consider the biggest change Groupon has made in the past 5 months was the implementation of Groupon Scheduler. Scheduler is a free booking service to help merchants of the world organize appointments. It's free except for a link to Groupon-- the price of using the scheduler is awareness of the fact that you could run a Deal or Now! deal with a few clicks and a phone call.

Considering that Groupon spent so much of their engineering talent on Scheduler, it's easy to see how a company with universal small business appeal like Fee Fighters in it's current form (give or take a few reminder links) becomes super desirable to Groupon.

<comment><USER6> I'm not sure how many Groupon engineers were devoted to Scheduler, but I do know that the core of Scheduler used to be OpenCal, who Groupon acquired last year: <http://opencal.com>

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This seems an odd fit to me. Groupon has a reputation for not being concerned whether the deals it encouraged businesses to run are good for the business. FeeFighters has had a reputation as a sincere advocate for SMB's.

<comment><USER8> Which could possibly be the reason why they acquired FeeFighters.

Companies sometimes make acquisitions to augment what they are lacking.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Congrats, Sean, Josh, and the rest of your awesome team. I wish you only the best and continued success with FeeFighter's and your vision!

(mqudsi)

</comment><comment><USER3> Wow, congratulations.

</comment><comment><USER10> Just curious, was this a talent acquisition? It's hard to tell with such few details right now. Only asking because they're both Chicago-based and aren't really in the exact same space.

<comment><USER3> _Most of the FeeFighters are coming along with the acquisition and we are not planning any major changes to our product line. The FeeFighters marketplace, our Samurai gateway and the FeeFighters and Samurai brands are continuing as before._

At this point I think you could literally put "this is not a talent acquisition" in your announcement and still see people say stuff like this.

<comment><USER11> Well obviously. Since when are press releases a reliable source of information? Especially given the number of companies that say "our product is not going to change" only to have the product change six months later.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Group on started off using an affiliate business model. However, running one deal per day means there isn't much recurring revenue to be had especially when cost of customer acquisition can be high.

However, if Group on can prove their value as an online marketing channel, then they can earn a steady revenue stream. One of Andrew Warner's interviewees did that, running a largely automated platform

</comment><comment><USER13> A few people have touched upon it, but the Chicago startup community is very small (compared to SV). Regardless of your opinions around why they were bought, it is nice to see an exit for a Chicago startup (even if they are eating their own) :0)

Next up - Grubhub!

<comment><USER9> Very small indeed. FeedBurner was the posterchild of Chicago-based startup success for a while until Google eviscerated them in the most publicly- humiliating fashion possible.

But as another Chicago-based startup founder that has had the pleasure of doing business with the FF team in person, I wish them all the best, and am confident that they will stick to their guns and keep FF/Samurai the quality product that it is.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Congrats guys. Really excited by all the stuff FeeFighters has and will accomplish.

Brian L.

</comment><comment><USER15> 2 Questions 1\. How much did they raise in angel/vc funds? 2\. What was the purchase price?

<comment><USER3> When the announcement doesn't say and there's no paired announcement at the acquirer, it usually means they're not allowed to say. GRPN is a public company and if the acquisition is material to the company there's a whole regs dance they have to do.

So long story short: not much point in asking the second question.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Hey guys - thanks to HN folks for your support over the past couple of years. We owe no small part of our success to the community here - not just in getting you guys to use our products, but lots of other stuff that has helped our business along the way.

We're super thrilled to be a part of the Groupon team, it has been a great outcome for everyone.

I was going to answer the questions that I could but Thomas has answered all of them accurately for me anyway.

<comment><USER17> How is being acquired by Groupon a great outcome for your customers? Your company that you put your heart and soul into is almost 100% guaranteed to die. It seems like a totally random and a bit of a silly purchase.

It seems little more than a developer acquisition which will result in feefighters shutting down in 3.....2.....1.....

EDIT: I shouldn't post when coming back drunk from the pub, but seriously, don't be proud about this, you sold out. This is like seeing your favourite band sign to Sony. If acquistion was your end goal then gratz.

<comment><USER18> I am a fee fighters "customer" and I don't really give a shit whether they are acquired. They sent me to gravity payments, who gave me an awesome deal that I wouldn't have known about except for HN and FeeFighters. I am happy now. I am drunk as well, so I'll be the first one to toast the team at FeeFigherts.

FeeFighers biggest weakness is that no one has ever heard of them. Groupon can fix that problem with almost no effort.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Yet another acqui-hire/Talent acquisition ?

<comment><USER20> Probably similar to the Obtiva acquisition in that regard. I know it's extremely hard to find competent unix/ruby/python/node (not-java-c#) devs in Chicago.</comment></comment>


You're 37% More Likely To Date Someone If You've Got Facebook Friends In Common - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2012/06/28/date-mutual-friend/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Techcrunch+%28TechCrunch%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

<comment><USER2> No fucking shit?

Also, this article is a textbook correlation-causation problem. You tend to date people in your social world, you tend to Facebook people in your social world, the idea that you date people because you share Facebook friends so thoroughly fails the smell test that the article's author mocks it... but instead of realizing that indeed, it is that stupid, uses it as the article's hook instead of a reason to not bother writing an article at all.

</comment><comment><USER3> People are so insecure, I don't understand culture anymore.</comment>


Show HN: Run Windows Container on Linux Server - <AUTHOR> https://hyper-demo.s3.amazonaws.com/hyperd-support-windows/demo-windows_support-v2.mp4 <comment><USER2> sounds interesting, but whats the licensing going to be like? Windows Server is licensed to allow you to host as many container under it, since the host (or VM) they are running on is licensed... Not sure what will happen when they are hosted elsewhere... still cool...

<comment><USER3> It's an OSS, so guess the first step is to build the technology, then licensing.

<comment><USER2> the tool itself is open source, and requires one licensing part, but the docker images from microsoft are a different story...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Is it Docker Mac?</comment>


NASA aims for first manned SpaceX mission in first-quarter 2020 - <AUTHOR> https://www.reuters.com/article/us-space-exploration-spacex/nasa-aims-for-first-manned-spacex-mission-in-first-quarter-2020-idUSKBN1WP1CS <comment><USER2> A bit of a contrarian opinion. But nasa, whilst lauded for their achievements thus far. Due to the issues like:

\- politics surrounding it

\- regulations

\- money dependent on jobs (think SLS program)

\- ever changing goals (bush, obama, now trump)

Should now just be a research only facility and fully give the mechanics of space exploration to private facilities such as Space X, rockets and Bigelow for the habitats for example.

To clarify this more. Nasa should be given monies by the tax payer for various projects.

Invest in such projects that require 100 years to come to-fruition to projects that can be achieved within 10-25 years and absolutely no government interventions! Just leave them alone and let them to their glorious work.

They should be projects that the private sector can't invest in because it's too costly. That said however, they should also act in a VC capacity. That researcher that wrote a paper about newer modes of transport? Throw $10m at him, put a team around him consisting of nasa scientists and engineers and see what comes out of this. Do this for 10 or 100 ideas and we'll get a lot of inventions.

Finally for gods sake, the current budget is 0.49% of the total spend. Increase that to 5%. If all the current engineers dedicated to the failed SLS program and moon base machinations were reassigned on separate projects like :-

\- vasmir ion engines

\- portable space nuclear reactors

\- simulating gravity without needing a spinning chassis

\- solving the galaxic cosmic rays problem with space ships

(and I could go on...!)

Would be a total game changer.

<comment><USER3> These types of ultra long open-ended research projects with no driving commercial or defense need, or real-world short term deliverables are just the kind of project you can dump billions of dollars into and get roughly nothing back in return.

At the Starship even a couple weeks ago Elon quipped when it comes to schedules, "Long is wrong, tight is right." The point is that humans respond well to aggressive but achievable goals with big payoff in the short-term. It focuses the effort on what is actually needed to achieve mission success.

To put it more succinctly, necessity is the mother of innovation.

<comment><USER4> Yeah, it helped when NASA had this:

 _" We choose to go to the Moon. We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard; because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills; because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one we intend to win"_

<comment><USER5> Yes, and the equivalent of 175 billion dollars per year (4% of federal budget times 4.4T$/y). I'm going to go out on a limb and propose that the money may have helped, too.

<comment><USER6> That is not how inflationary comparisons work with government budgets. The entire documented cost of the Apollo program[1] was $25.4 billion over 11 years. Adjusted for 2018 dollars that's $153 billion over 11 years, which works out to just about $14 billion per year.

The total expenditure in the 2018 United States budget was $4.109 trillion[2] or %0.34 of yearly expenditures. Budgets do not follow inflationary trends even remotely, the 1961 expenditure[3] was $181.588 billion (wow that's pretty crazy). For the year that makes the Apollo program %1.2 of the federal expenditure.

Another useful point of reference, the entire NASA organization in 2018 had an operating budget of $19.2 billion and this has to cover all of the mandated projects such as the SLS. They're also responsible for maintaining and monitoring a lot of infrastructure for other agencies (the weather service, DSN, etc) which wasn't the case during the Apollo mission. NASA itself is kind of left with scraps.

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

[2]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_United_States_federal_bud...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_United_States_federal_budget)

[3]: [https://www.usgovernmentdebt.us/spending_chart_1960_1970USb_...](https://www.usgovernmentdebt.us/spending_chart_1960_1970USb_20s2li011mcn_F0f)

<comment><USER5> > That is not how inflationary comparisons work

Right, but normalizing to the price of bread and milk is even more ridiculous than normalizing to the federal budget, which is not excellent for this purpose, as you point out.

In any case, thanks for digging up more numbers.

I stand by my claim that money (and enough assurance of continued money to bet everything on one large project) is key.

<comment><USER7> > normalizing to the price of bread and milk is even more ridiculous than > normalizing to the federal budget

No it's not. Maybe normalize to the median income if you don't like bread and milk, but how much the government spends on education, health care, interest, military fleets, farm subsidies... that's not relevant to NASA's budget.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Overall, the fact that the US experiencing the longest period without capability of sending humans into space seems to be a serious organizational problem.

<comment><USER9> Is there much value in sending humans into space besides studying how the human body deteriorates in microgravity?

<comment><USER10> With the caveat up front that I'm a huge idealist about space: I think humanity would greatly benefit from building large populations in space. Once the systems are in place then any power generation, industry, or agriculture done in space means less pollution here on earth. Solar energy is "free", asteroids are "free".

The setup isn't trivial, but in the long run I think it is best for everyone.

<comment><USER11> >Solar energy is "free", asteroids are "free".

The rocket equation says that if you want to do anything besides sitting in one place, it's super expensive. Moving mass around requires throwing huge amounts of mass away.

<comment><USER12> Or very small amounts of mass and a whole lot of time.

<comment><USER13> I think you mean velocity. Lots of velocity.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Given the fact that there are still some pretty difficult tests ahead and that they already incurred a significant delay as a result of the explosion in April I wouldn't bet on this happening on the proposed time table. Too many uncertainties.

<comment><USER15> Much like everything in aerospace, the NET (No Earlier Than) date is not the most likely date. In fact, it's almost tautologically obvious that you'll usually miss the earliest possible date, no matter what the endeavor. If Quarter 1 2020 was really the most likely time, they would've most appropriately given a NET date of by the end of this year.

It's a little frustrating that there's so little understanding of this, though. I blame lack of education.

<comment><USER16> If society stays in Spiral Dynamics stage orange, the education system will only cover things like this once there is profit in educating the public on it, like if asteroid mining becomes a thing (just an example, likely not feasible).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Had no idea [head of NASA] Bridenstine had visited SpaceX. This is really cool. Here [1] is a video Q/A with Musk, Bridenstine, and the two astronauts who will fly on the first commercial crew shuttle that he (Bridenstine) streamed.

For those unaware of the backstory there Musk recently had a major reveal of SpaceX's StarShip program. Bridenstine made a pretty direct jab the night before saying "I am looking forward to the SpaceX announcement tomorrow. In the meantime, Commercial Crew is years behind schedule. NASA expects to see the same level of enthusiasm focused on the investments of the American taxpayer. It's time to deliver." [2]

That was generally not so well received, since SpaceX is engaged in Commercial Crew (the program to get astronauts to the ISS on commercial launches) but so is Boeing. And SpaceX is substantially far ahead of Boeing on this front. So it felt like a partisan and biased sleight since Boeing, who went unmentioned, has substantially more political influence and clout.

In the Q/A Bridenstine acknowledged he was not really correct on his assumption, which makes me like this guy even more (as he does _genuinely_ seem heavily driven to get the American space program back on track) - even if I think he should have figured this out before racing to publicly Tweet. Looks like he genuinely wants to get Commercial Crew going ASAP and was worried that SpaceX was putting it on the backburner since StarShip is also a really big and extremely ambitious program being done at the same that as Commercial Crew.

[1] - [https://www.pscp.tv/w/1OyKAengZAMKb](https://www.pscp.tv/w/1OyKAengZAMKb)

[2] - [https://twitter.com/JimBridenstine/status/117771110630074777...](https://twitter.com/JimBridenstine/status/1177711106300747777)

<comment><USER18> > _Had no idea [head of NASA] Bridenstine had visited SpaceX. This is really > cool._

Why would it be cool / unexpected? Isn't most of SpaceX's funding public money funneled through NASA?

<comment><USER17> When a public figure makes a negative statement against a group or individual in modern times, it's generally a carefully calculated political play that's about as authentic as you'd expect of a politician. Because of this, even when their statement is wrong (and it often is) they'll simply double down on stupid. His rapid followup visit, let alone his public acknowledgement that he was incorrect were major indicators that he's authentic.

And this is a big deal because he is not only the most ambitious administrator NASA has had quite a long time but also the most politically capable. And that leaves me highly optimistic for the future of NASA. Bolden (the previous administrator) was everything you want on paper, but in practice he lacked both ambition and political skill. I've no doubt he very much had a love for space and technology, but he simply didn't have the toolkit to make it matter. As a result of this NASA ended up achieving little more than inertial progress for 8 years.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Bridenstine is the best thing that happened to NASA in a while: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TU_vOt3wSDg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TU_vOt3wSDg)

<comment><USER20> Maybe. He's done way better than I expected, I thought he'd be another idiot from congress who says global warming is fake - because that is what he was when he was in congress. He pretends today that he never said those things or changed his views or evolved or some bs (I figure that is just what he had to say to be in congress as a republican, I don't think he's so stupid as to deny reality in real life). He's played the political game and tried hard not to anger the SLS senators. If he was really effective, he would have figured out how to direct the SLS congressmen into doing something useful with that largess instead of the wasted billions and time that went into the Senate Launch Service.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> If you are interested in the Space X vs Blue Origin vs ULA, and/or want to learn more about the birth of the private space industry I can recommend a book called: The Space Barons.

It's an interesting read to be sure.

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

</comment><comment><USER22> Why should we send people further than orbit, rather than robots? Robotic missions have been huge successes - you could have teams of people lead many robotic missions instead of one very limited human visit.

<comment><USER23> Robotic missions are multiple orders of magnitude less inspiring or interesting to society as a whole, probably because human beings like to see human beings doing things.

For a good example, consider that the Moon Landing was a global, civilization- wide event, whereas even the most famous robotic mission has never been anything more than a popular news item of the week.

<comment><USER24> But the latter moon landings were news items of the week. And the latter shuttle flights weren't even that, unless they were carrying interesting cargo.

<comment><USER25> The last human on the moon was almost 50 years ago. Shuttle flights (barring obvious exceptions) were pretty routine; definitely not the most inspiring missions. But humans back on the Moon, or on Mars, in the 21st century and setting up colonies? That's completely different proposition.

<comment><USER24> Building a colony on Mars or Luna, beyond the celebratory beginning, is brickie work in a spacesuit. The inspiration will pale rapidly.

<comment><USER22> Even billionaires can find their lives boring. No human is safe from adapting to their environment and the banality of it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> After the death of the Peenemünde scientists its been all downhill for NASA.</comment>


Buying Real Estate in College - <AUTHOR> http://money.stackexchange.com/questions/11233/smart-to-buy-a-house-in-college/11241#11241

<comment><AUTHOR> What do you guys think of buying real estate near a major university as an investment?</comment>