If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear - <AUTHOR> http://jacquesmattheij.com/if-you-have-nothing-to-hide <comment><USER2> "When you say I don't care about the right to privacy because I have nothing to hide, that is no different than saying I don't care about freedom of speech because I have nothing to say or freedom of the press because I have nothing to write."

\- Edward Snowden

<comment> at-fates-hands This is such an odd statement and fundamentally confuses two very different ideas.

First of all, there is no express right to privacy in the Constitution. There is however, the Bill of Rights which everybody is familiar with. It does outline protecting _specific aspects_ of privacy which include such things as the First Amendment (freedom of religion) or the 4th Amendment, (privacy of your possessions against unlawful search and seizure).

The supreme court refuses to protect privacy beyond those issues which are directly related to the Bill of Rights even though the public believes it is their right to have a blanket type of protection against congressional overreach.

To hear Snowden confuse these things by lumping rights protected under the Constitution with a broad reaching idea of the public's right of privacy (which is does not have), and then equating them is puzzling.

<comment><USER3> I expect the fourth amendment to be a growing factor in SCOTUS cases related to privacy - at the time of inception, a person's self, house, papers and effects were tangible things - the idea that the other "digital effects" we all have in our "digital houses" didn't exist.

I think the argument that an email would be a "paper" under the fourth amendment is going to be the first test. I know that sort of thing has been challenged (users should've have an expectation of privacy, etc.) but it's my belief that the argument "users have no expectation of privacy when it comes to emails" is a misdirection. Our citizens have rights whether or not they expect those rights to be respected by those in power.

<comment><USER4> I would read "papers" as different from email. Papers I interpret as personal records: journals, financial records, etc. Email, tweets, Facebook postings, etc. are already by default shared with at least one other person or unknown other persons so there's an implicit reduced notion of privacy.

I agree with the larger point that information on digital devices should properly be considered "papers" or "effects" even if stored in something nebulous such as "the cloud." As long as there's no deliberate or implicit sharing of these things, "the cloud" should be considered as private as a desk drawer.

<comment><USER5> Financial records are also shared with others. And my correspondence with another person is also private whether achieved via paper and envelope or by email or instant message.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Something that people in silicon valley just don't get is that that the above argument also applies to tech corporations like Google who collect personal data for living and then say "trust us, we'll do no evil". The industry is upset about Snowden because it cost them sales in China, but for the most part while it talks the talk it doesn't walk the walk.

* If we're going to talk about WWII a good example would be IBM and their role in the holocaust:

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

<comment> chestnut-tree _"...tech corporations like Google who collect personal data for living"_

I agree. The largest and potentially most-revealing information about you is captured by technology companies like Google and Facebook.

The Amsterdam registry recorded _" Name, Date of birth, Address, Marital Status, Parents, Profession, Religion, Previous Addresses and Date of Death"_

Create a Google account and you are asked to provide: Name, Gender, Date of birth, Location, Mobile phone number.

This is some of your most private and personal information and it's tied to your actual behaviour on the web. Google's ability to track you across the web and across devices is simply unprecedented.

Google omits basic facts in their privacy policy about the data they collect about you. Things like: how long they keep your data (presumably forever), whether the data is anonymised, whether your searches or activity are disassociated from your identity, and who sees your data inside the company.

Does Google use your mobile number solely for two-factor authentication and absolutely nothing else? Google doesn't tell you. Do they really need your date-of-birth? And is it only used for age verification? Could they simply ask if you're 16 or over? Sure they could, but date of birth tied to your online activity is so much more valuable when it comes to crunching all that big data on user behaviour.

The amount of information that Google captures about you is gargantuan. They know more about your online (and possibly offline) behaviour than you know about yourself. Just to be clear, I don't believe Google does anything nefarious with your data. But even if you trust them, why is it considered perfectly acceptable for them to track you to such a relentless degree?

<comment><USER7> And imagine if they get pwned. Not fun.

<comment><USER4> I think the working assumption should be that they have been. There is no way that a company that big is not leaking like a sieve. Between social engineering, disgruntled employees, and active intrusion, they is no way that have remained unpenetrated.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Regarding his statement: "It doesn't require much of an imagination to see how this information could be abused." Rogozov answers: Yes it does! In fact, that is the whole point of the blog entry, and it's completely skipped over. Their was a lot of writing, but the whole point of the article was left as an exercise for the reader. Why be so lazy? There needs to be a set of concrete examples of how these information breeches actually hurt real people. Saying, "their privacy has been violated in a pretty drastic manner leading to death, identity theft or embarrassment" isn't specific enough, and as a reader, I don't buy that the Nazis are going to take over in America someday so they can eradicate all the Jews in the employment of the United States government.

Rogozov believes in his main point -- but we need specific examples that people (who actually vote) can relate to this.

</comment><comment><USER9> Agree 100% with the point being made here, but the two examples used are also examples of the (large) weaknesses of centralized systems, which is much more abstract, often overlooked, and can be a much greater threat to our well being. A centralized system that everyone depends on will hurt everyone when it fails. A robust, decentralized system limits this exposure.

<comment><USER10> Very true.

A single electrical grid certainly is. I'd prefer to see local co-operatives buying utilities from competing networks. The co-ops would own the last mile and could pick the combination of technology, price and robustness that suits them. And when one fails, they hook up to a competitor.

If Japan had had that arrangement, instead of having to bail out the utility monopoly that failed to prevent the Fukushima disaster, they could have just let it go bankrupt and spent only what it took to clean up the mess. And that distinct possibility might have helped prevent the disaster to begin with. They might have figured out how to move the pumps high enough above, for example. Or made provisions to bring in new pumps by helicopter.

A disciplined standing army is more vulnerable too, in some situations, than highly decentralized forces. If you can get the leaders to surrender, that's it. But those pesky insurgents never give up.

And then there's the French Navy, whose leaders refused to send them out to sea when the Nazis were invading. Churchill ending up destroying it so it wouldn't fall into enemy hands. Those ships could have been used to help the evacuation and then fight the Nazis at sea.

Centralization is becoming a problem in disaster relief now too.

[http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/05/us/nationalspecial/after-f...](http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/05/us/nationalspecial/after- failures-government-officials-play-blame-game.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Something important to note in the OPM data breach: 1.1 million fingerprints were stolen [1], and it would've been a lot more if say this happened 10 years later, and the US, just like Estonia, India and I think a few other countries, started asking their citizens for their fingerprints and stored them in their own databases.

When the governments start telling people "Hey, you already love using your fingerprint on that iPhone of yours - so why not give us your fingerprint, too? We'll make your life so much easier!", _forgetting_ to mention that there's a drastic difference between the iPhone keeping a _local_ "template" of the fingerprint, while the governments are likely keeping the fingerprint data directly and on their own servers - fight it as much as possible.

Remember you only have so many fingerprints, and even fewer of them you'll probably consider "practical" for authentication to devices and whatnot. Don't let companies or governments lure you into asking for your fingerprint and storing it for you on their servers "for your convenience".

[1] - [https://www.opm.gov/cybersecurity/#WhatHappened](https://www.opm.gov/cybersecurity/#WhatHappened)

<comment><USER12> Biometrics are fundamentally flawed as they can't be revoked.

I've never understood why people feel they are a good solution, my bank gave me a little card gizmo, I put my code in it generates a cryptographically secure response.

If it's stolen or lost I just ring them up and they invalidate it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> The beginning the post discusses Nazis and the slaughter of Jews in Amsterdam. Then toward the end, when discussing "if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear" he fails to mention...

"are you willing to publish your pin code, a high resolution scan of your signature, your passport... Are you ok with your entire family being murdered for their religious affiliation?". If you're willing to do all of that then congratulations, you really have nothing to hide and the word 'privacy' means nothing to you.

Privacy is not just privacy from reasonable people, but unreasonable people as well.

</comment><comment><USER14> _And if you're not content with living in a world where all of that data is public then you'd better stop repeating that silly mantra 'if you've got nothing to hide then you've got nothing to fear'..._

Serious question: Who's making this argument? I don't hear it articulated by anyone, frankly. I'm sure there are people who hold this position and have argued for it, but are any of them in a position to make policy? Have any of our dozen+ presidential candidates made this claim?

<comment><USER15> Google CEO (at the time) Eric Schmidt:

"If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place."

[https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/12/google-ceo-eric- schmid...](https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/12/google-ceo-eric-schmidt- dismisses-privacy)

Senator Trent Lott:

"What are people worried about? What is the problem?" asked Lott, a former majority leader. "Are you doing something you're not supposed to?"

[http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/05/15/bellsouth.nsa/](http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/05/15/bellsouth.nsa/)

Senator Lindsay Graham

"I don't think you're talking to the terrorists. I know you're not. I know I'm not, so we don't have anything to worry about..."

[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/06/lindsey-graham- nsa_...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/06/lindsey-graham- nsa_n_3396223.html)

<comment><USER16> Schmidt wasn't making a strong argument against privacy, he was discussing the relationship between using an online search engine and privacy. He was asked _People are treating Google like their most trusted friend. Should they be?_

And responded with your quote, and a bit more. The context is harder to ridicule:

 _I think judgment matters. If you have something that you don 't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place. But if you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines, including Google, do retain this information for some time. And it's important, for example, that we are all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act. It is possible that information could be made available to the authorities._

<comment><USER17> The context is easier to ridicule. He says it in explicit terms: Don't search for something you wouldn't want authorities to know about because we just may hand it over to them.

<comment><USER18> The reality is that what you do online is subject to seizure, exposure, and retaliation.

Knowing that reality helps people act accordingly.

I don't normally ridicule people for being forthright about reality.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I flagged a thread a week or so ago that was an opinion piece about women in tech advocating hiring women. At the end of article the author compiled a huge list of women in tech from github, linkedin and other available resources and linked to it in a spreadsheet.

Leaving aside that hiring a female engineer from google would not add more women into the ecosystem, it is poor form to take a bunch of personal data and use it to compile a list without consent. From memory, the list had full names, position and links to public profiles. This was essentially a massive doxx dump of female engineers.

I assume most of the listed individuals weren't "hiding" their employment position, but this list could be used to target them, spam recruit them, make it appear as if they were shopping employment offers etc.

</comment><comment><USER20> If you have nothing to hide, sure. But we aren't in an accepting enough world where that's the case for almost anyone. Have you had sex outside of marriage? Smoked marijuana? Are you gay or trans? All of these are things that in many contexts could be used against you, and as such it's pretty reasonable to want to keep those things secret from people you don't know and trust.

Just because you have something to hide doesn't mean you've done something wrong and deserve to have it exposed.

</comment><comment><USER21> I'm not sure about cause and effect with logging data and genocides. Ok it made the Nazis job easier in Holland but they killed a lot of people elsewhere. Since those times the amount of data stored on everyone had rocketed and the amount of genocide going on has plummeted - see the graph from Pinker's book - [http://i.imgur.com/rFWzUOd.png](http://i.imgur.com/rFWzUOd.png)

<comment><USER22> Are you kidding me? Of course, they found jews people in all the invaded countries and Germany, but they had a harder time finding jewish people. In the Netherlands, they basically knew who were jewish, and if the data had not been destroyed, 100% of the jewish people have had died because of it. Without the data, some people had the chance to escape or hide their true identify (there are plenty of jewish who could convince law officers that they were in fact not jewish). With that information, they had absolutely no chance

<comment><USER21> My point was that the data was not the cause of the genocide. If you look at modern genocides eg. Rwanda a few years ago or Southern Sudan as we speak they are mostly characterised by a lack of internet connectivity or data about people. The places where everyone is on Facebook and G+ are not where they happen. Indeed in the Sudan case if there was a lack of privacy about who exactly had slaughtered who's family I suspect it would make the perpetrators much less likely to do it.

<comment><USER23> No one said the data was the cause of the genocide.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> That still leaves open the question about what qualifies as worth hiding and what doesn't - who gets to decide that and is that going to be a thing everyone lives by forever or will that be a function of time and other circumstances? (Spectacles - not worth hiding but think of the Pol Pot era and you had to hide them if you wanted to survive.)

</comment><comment><USER16> This essay doesn't really say anything new (there's literally a Wikipedia article on the topic: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing_to_hide_argument](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing_to_hide_argument) and the religious registry being put to evil use has more or less reached classic status when it comes to discussions of it).

A more interesting essay might analyze the beliefs and attitudes that lead to people agreeing with the statement, and (perhaps) why they are problematic.

(It's actually quite difficult to figure out why people are comfortable saying they have nothing to hide, it's masked by the sea of text explaining they are wrong)

</comment><comment><USER25> If you are a real freedom fighter you should support the idea of destroying records full stop. There is no actual middle ground. It just needs to go, but of course it is very hard because it is obviously valuable user data.

It sucks and I am not sure what a good man should do.

</comment><comment><USER26> "If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear."

I agreed. Which is why I propose that for the safety of everyone, we station a cop inside everyone's home. After all, you never know when a burglary is gonna happen. With a cop inside everyone's home, you are guarantee safe when a burglary does happen.

Also, just to make sure you don't do anything illegal in the bathroom (like doing drugs), I propose that the cop must also be present with in the bathroom anytime anyone need to use the bathroom. After all, if you got nothing to hide, and you're not doing anything illegal in the bathroom, then you should not fear the cop being in the bathroom with you.

</comment><comment><USER27> The last part of this sentence has a false premise. You do have plenty to fear, because any government has made errors in their judgments many times before. In fact, any lawsuit brought against GOV that has been won, as well as any won appeal, is indeed a living proof government makes mistakes as well.

Ergo, it is not that I shouldn't have anything to hide because I shouldn't fear the government, it is rather that I fear that the government can misinterpret whatever it is that I'am _hiding_. (I strongly suggest watching movie "Brasil").

Government, after all, is about masses and implementing rules "for all", not "for individuals". A simple example is me being a long term photographer. I enjoy indoor photos. How the light is formed, aperture used, shots being taken, angles, etc. I browse Anne Geddes photos of almost naked children on secure Tor from a local starbucks on a Wifi dongle that I don't use for anything else (public wifis collect and store MAC data) not because I'm a pedophile (something Gov can assume), but rather because I have no idea how Gov could stretch this information, and I am unsure if I could be financially able to pick up my lawyers tab to get a chance to prove to the judge few months into the lawsuit that I am actually a long-term photographer hobbyist, no some twisted kiddie pron lover.

My second answer to this is a "gimme your password" test. Just few weeks ago I was pulled over in a shady neighborhood because my friend is broke and cannot afford anything better. The cop immediately wanted to search my car. I responded I have nothing to hide here. He replied "well, in this case if you have nothing to hide, then you shouldn't have anything against my search, Sir". To what I reached out for a pen and my notepad, opened it on an empty page and handed it to the police officer. He asked me "what is this?". I said: "kindly please give me your email address and password to it". He didn't laugh but clearly didn't want to get suck in. I quickly added: "I mean after all, if you have nothing to hide in your mailbox, then you shouldn't be concerned of me having access it, do you?". He responded "have a good day" and let me on my way.

</comment><comment><USER28> Sure, the Chinese have got the info, but could they sell it to American companies? Might a US employer be interested in that dataset? How much might they be willing to pay?

Could I set up a Private Investigation firm and charge $10/file for access? Would an American pay to see their ex-husband/ex-wife's polygraph results? I could even take payment in Bitcoin.

I think the television news emphasizes the possibility of identity theft & espionage but discounts the likelihood of this data making its way back to the US.

<comment><USER29> I think the major security concern is over blackmail, considering the stolen data concerned people with US government security clearances.

<comment><USER30> Yes, blackmail is probably the primary concern. But anyone who has your SSN, DOB, employment history, and every address you've lived at... they can convince banks, cc companies, etc., that they are you, because those phone calls usually involve questions about where you've lived and worked.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> All rights are worth fighting for even if they don't affect your life. The reasoning behind this should be pretty clear in that the individual rights tend to help protect the others much like chainmail. Maybe each individual link is not particularly strong but together they can fend off quite an attack but the hole that's left if a single link is compromised is why we should fight for all rights.

</comment><comment><USER32> A friend of mine once put it this way to some guy that was trying to proclaim that he has nothing to worry about:

> Of course you have something to hide. It's not bad to hide things from > others. For instance, do you mind if we talk about your sex life? Heck, can > I watch you and your wife next time? Sex is natural, we all do it, there is > nothing to hide!"

<comment><USER33> This is a terrible argument, mostly because it _allows_ for the persecution of minorities. "You're a filthy commie?!? Isn't that something you want to hide!?!"

Freedom of speech (the human right, not the legal right) should allow you to have as many harebrained ideas as you'd like, and be as vocal as you'd like. You _should_ be able to talk about your sex life, and you _should_ be allowed to let other people watch you have sex (which you are, on both counts -- your friends examples kind of suck).

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> I like that the article mentioned the difference between privacy and secrecy. I've been struggling with that for a while. What is private is secret but what is secret (a secret recipe, for example) is not necessarily private. But in some cases, a secret can be considered private (a secret love affair, for example). I'm confused...

</comment><comment><USER35> Unrelated, but in the light of all recent data leaks, I was thinking that privacy is just another advantage (business, political, relationship, etc.) If somehow all people's lives, businesses, politicians were completely transparent, there were no need to have privacy to begin with. This is utopical of course, but just a thought.

</comment><comment><USER36> That is a true statement. Yet privacy is a freedom that must be held onto with white knuckles. Who is to say that tomorrow your private poems about butterflies doesn't associate you with some extremist sect and a tyrannical government wont detain you indefinitely because of it?

</comment><comment><USER37> Privacy is gone; it's a chimera. Let's focus on building a society where we use openness for the common good instead! E.g. don't let some people still try to hide because they consider themselves "special." Sunlight is the best disinfectant.

<comment><USER38> I agree. If governments can't protect their private information from being leaked by hackers and whistleblowers, what hope do the average person have? Adapt to changing circumstances rather than hold onto outdated concepts.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> In terms of things I want hidden, the first thing that springs to mind is my medical records, which I'd like to keep between me and my doctor(s). My understanding is that, historically, governments and just about everyone have respected that.

<comment><USER4> You might want to read more history.

<comment><USER39> I'm thinking of this line from the Hippocratic Oath, which I understand to be quite historical:

"Whatever, in the course of my practice, I may see or hear (even when not invited), whatever I may happen to obtain knowledge of, if it be not proper to repeat it, I will keep sacred and secret within my own breast."

The point is that this isn't being challenged in the latest privacy wars, even though it flies straight in the face of the completely nonsense mantra of "if you've nothing to hide...."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> And it's the same line of reasoning that opposes a central gun registry.

<comment><USER41> The open question that the article didn't touch upon (probably because it's much more complicated) is where to draw the line between what is and isn't the government's business. There are many who don't buy into the "nothing to hide" argument and would nonetheless advocate for the use of a central gun registry. It's not mutually exclusive, it's just a matter of where a person draws their line of privacy. I'd imagine that libertarians are on the far "nothing is anybody's business" end of the spectrum.

<comment><USER40> That's one of many "it doesn't apply to me, so it doesn't matter" scenarios.

As the OPM "hack" has demonstrated, the government has no interest and little culpability in protecting the vital and dangerous information it has collected. If it shows this much disregard for the important information, how much less protection will they apply to the unimportant things?

* I hate calling it a "hack" since it's been determined that OPM _gave_ them access to everything. I covered that over three weeks ago too: [http://caseysoftware.com/blog/opm-background-check-hack-a-di...](http://caseysoftware.com/blog/opm-background-check-hack-a-different-angle)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Let's not forget likes and tweets - whenever an angry pitchfork mob will look for people to hang on the lampposts, victims (including photos and addresses) will be one Facebook Graph search away.

</comment><comment><USER43> Then why is our government so secretive?

</comment><comment><USER44> The title alone is misleading. It presupposes that its wrong to have something to hide. I have plenty I'd prefer to be hidden, none of it illegal.

Whats so damned wrong with having things to hide? Discretion used to be a virtue. What happened?

<comment><USER45> The title is intentional. I dare say it is designed to stir things up and get you to read the article. Did you read it?

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> I've got nothing to hide besides: \- my public opinion not in line with US foreign policy \- my genitals to not shock the frigid society \- my wage to keep sure that everybody is happy with his slave money and cannot compare

</comment><comment><USER47> "I have nothing to hide. You have me to fear."

</comment><comment><USER48> A person who has nothing to fear is dangerous, and that is then something to hide.

</comment><comment><USER49> Anybody who says this, is probably not a friend you can trust with a secret.

</comment><comment><USER50> Very timely words.

</comment><comment><USER51> GAYS

====

In the time after WWI, Germany was a relatively liberal country in some respects. The salon society was popular in Berlin and Gays and Lesbians were able to live their lives in relative freedom- not the freedom we have now in the USA, but not the level of persecution they would experience elsewhere. There were magazines that catered specifically to this population as well as private clubs for them to congregate.

Of course these organizations were then easily used by the Nazis to find all of the gays and lesbians in germany...

One thing that makes me really angry about most popular accounts of that regime is the convenient forgetting that Gays and Lesbians were part of the holocaust and were very likely to be straight up slaughtered rather than sent to camps. And while there were fewer gays killed than jews (smaller part of the population) there are other groups as well that are often forgotten... in fact I can only think of the Roma. Shouldn't we all know all the groups the Nazis systematically murdered?

GUNS

====

The important operational part of this is that the data was collected at a time when it seemed innocent and then the regime changed and the data was used to kill people. The nazis are, of course, a very extreme example, but regimes change all the time. For instance, a persecuted group in the USA right now are gun owners. (Yes, I know that guns are used wrongly, over 30 years nearly 600 people have been killed in mass shootings-- of course that doesn't compare to the 10,000 people killed each year by drunk drivers.)

Increasingly, one of the tactics used to go after gun owners is "registration". After all, if you're law abiding, why should you fear registering your guns? There is a massive program right now that causes "FBI Background Checks" for every gun purchase--and by this nature this is registration of firearms and firearms owners.

GERMS

=====

So maybe you hate guns and gun owners so you see nothing wrong with keeping track of them. The thing is, when you live long enough (Say into your 40s) you start to see how attitudes change. Some for the better-- gays are less persecuted now, and I'm grateful for that (being not exactly heterosexual myself). But you also see other groups being persecuted. This starts out seemingly innocently enough. Lets take Muslims. They have been linked to real crimes and that has been used to smear a whole group. (There are other groups getting the same treatment right now- gamers, men, christians, etc.)

The germ, which becomes an infection and spreads, is thinking that because a person of type X committed a crime (A jew in germany charged too much? a boy at college committed rape? a muslim killed people in a terrorist act?) ... that the whole group can be painted with the brush of prejudice.

That prejudice becomes systematic and eventually it can become oppression. Often it becomes the situation where those who think they are oppressed justify oppressing others because they claim their victims are oppressing them. (You see this now with the more extreme elements of feminism. No, not all men are rapists! Really. Some of them are gay!)

This is exactly what happened in Nazi Germany where the county had been victimized by the treaty that ended WWII and humiliated and felt widespread victimhood.

So, beware of victimhood being used to justify prejudice!

That's one lesson people don't seem to learn from this era-- its the mechanism by which a peaceful, tolerant society (as germany had) becomes fascist.

After all, germans are not genetically predisposed to fascism, any more than americans are.

<comment><USER51> This is a substantive riff on the original article that provides food for thought. When it only talked about the fact that gays were killed in the holocaust it was accruing upvotes. But now that it also talks about he mechanism by which groups are smeared it is rapidly accruing down votes. I'm guessing because of the defense of gun owners. If HN is a place where substantial discussion is warranted, I've given ammunition to a substantial discussion. IF HN is a filter bubble, where only politically correct perspectives are tolerated, then my post will fade into nothingness as I am silenced for the crime of critical thinking. Why should I invest time in a community if only certain thoughts are tolerated by that community?

Oh, and this whole idea of "thought crime" is a mechanism by which prejudice is fostered and spread-- you saw it in Germany, Orwell wrote about it. We have it in action here in the USA... and on this site.

Surely you know where this will lead. In fact, anecdotally it already looks like this site has lost %80 of its participation... it used to be you needed hundreds of uproots to get to the front page, now only 10 will do it.

<comment> vezzy-fnord I downvoted you because I frankly think implying that gun owners, men, Christians and gamers are persecuted in the United States (which was the implication) makes you just as laughable as the same radical feminists you claim to oppose.

<comment><USER52> Why does persecution have to reach epic proportions before it becomes safe to acknowledge it?

<comment><USER53> To imply that Christians or gun owners are in the least bit persecuted in the US is stretching the meaning of the word to include "People expressing different opinions to me".

Just because legislation that you do not agree with is implemented (Checks on individuals before they can buy a gun, or rights of homosexuals to get married for example) this is not persecuting a group.

To imply so is disingenuous.

<comment><USER52> First off, I asked a question about what the tipping point was in regards to "persecution", a question neither you nor vezzy-fnord have answered. Instead, you both thigh-slap about how silly it is for Christians to feel persecuted. My question still stands.

Secondly, I am no Christian. Indeed, I personally feel that religious beliefs of any flavor are a mental illness.

Thirdly, I am agun owner. I advocate the ownership of guns as a check/balance on the central government. I accept the gun deaths that accompany ownership (accidents, suicide, murders) as I believe the benefit far out ways the cost. I believe this because of what I have seen in countries where there are severe limitations on personal gun ownership. For me it comes down to this: when weapons enter the equation, you are either a Player or you are Furniture. I choose to be a Player.

Fourth and finally, I believe in complete free speech, no exceptions, and as such I in no way wish to limit you, or any person's expression. Still, any time people choose to scoff instead of respond, I can't help but feel they need to return to their seat and pay better attention in class before raising their hands.

<comment> vezzy-fnord _First off, I asked a question about what the tipping point was in regards to "persecution", a question neither you nor vezzy-fnord have answered._

I did below.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Well said, Jacques.

</comment><comment><USER54> I could swear that I've read this exact article before...

</comment><comment><USER55> Great argument for privacy. A someday hostile government cannot use information it doesn't have

</comment><comment><USER56> >The fuss is that even if you have absolutely nothing to hide the 'privacy is dead' crowd seems to miss out on the fact that privacy by itself is considered important enough to make it into the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 12

Ive seen this mentioned twice now.

When did `a piece of paper says X` become a leading argument?

</comment><comment><USER57> Everybody already understands that those who claim to "have nothing to hide" are always those found in some intersection of sets representing those arbitrarily constructed classes of people which were invented and exist to extract resources from all those outside of the set. We have set in stone the history of Jews in Europe as containing the premise of "yes they were definitely outside of the class at the time" but that's about the only admission in the world of any sort of thing like that which has been universally adopted in any region.

The processes of resource extraction in which Class Men and Class White have been and are engaged in is obvious from the historical record. But the incentive is to just work around the possibility of asserting this as a premise to any degree, so you don't get screamed at or worse. The form and content of much of the thinkpieces you've read has been modified by these kind of incentives. Yet many seem to sincerely believe that everything they read is an honest translation of the author's deepest thoughts, feelings, and beliefs into human language, when in reality most writers on topics like this are, to some degree, scared or cowardly.

<comment><USER58> I've read it a few times but am not sure I follow what you're saying. Is this high context writing? If so what is the background?

<comment><USER59> I think it's saying "Insiders exploit outsiders. Only insiders say they have nothing to hide."

<comment><USER58> Excellent translation. And your comment is a lesson in the value of brevity and clarity!</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Dear FTC, Thank You For Not Saving Us From Facebook's Privacy Changes - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/04/thankyouftc/

<comment><USER2> Thank you FTC for not doing your job and letting privacy die. Stupid article.</comment>


Inside the fall of BlackBerry (2013) - <AUTHOR> http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/the-inside-story-of-why-blackberry-is-failing/article14563602/ <comment><USER2> I read this article a while back. Probably my favorite part:

> Mike Lazaridis was at home on his treadmill and watching television when he > first saw the Apple iPhone in early 2007. There were a few things he didn't > understand about the product. So, that summer, he pried one open to look > inside and was shocked. It was like Apple had stuffed a Mac computer into a > cellphone, he thought.

> To Mr. Lazaridis, a life-long tinkerer who had built an oscilloscope and > computer while in high school, the iPhone was a device that broke all the > rules. The operating system alone took up 700 megabytes of memory, and the > device used two processors. The entire BlackBerry ran on one processor and > used 32 MB. Unlike the BlackBerry, the iPhone had a fully Internet-capable > browser. That meant it would strain the networks of wireless companies like > AT&T Inc., something those carriers hadn't previously allowed. RIM by > contrast used a rudimentary browser that limited data usage.

<comment><USER3> Mr. Lazaridis let common sense stop him from building the iPhone. Much like the article where the author talks about his brain stopping him from creating YouTube. People are going to upload these massive video files and we're going to host them for free, and then they're going to sit and stream them all day? Malarky!

[http://prog21.dadgum.com/39.html](http://prog21.dadgum.com/39.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "The marketplace has abandoned our business model? OK, we'll just iterate endless new hardware and firmware until everyone leaves or a miracle happens."

Its a very old story in IT. Some companies survive it, most don't.

<comment><USER5> It's very difficult to replace an obsolete business model that was widely successful with a new one that is equally successful. Such success is rare enough that achieving it twice in a row requires a lot of luck or really incompetent competitors (which Android & iOS were certainly not!)

<comment><USER6> Blackberry had very successful corporation-friendly software. They could try to fight BYOD, enter the BYOD fight with decent phones or they could embrace BYOD and make their server software compatible with Android and iOS and let corporations go on with unchanged processes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'm looking forward to the release of the Blackberry Classic and hope that turns the tide. My spidey sense tells me that people are starting more and more to appreciate old tech, diverse tech, tools that do one job and do it well. Hopefully instead of machines and platforms dying, their capabilities can be maintained and used by those who see their value.

</comment><comment><USER8> They simply failed to realize it was all about the software.

<comment><USER9> Exactly.

Blackberries were, at their heart, 2-way messaging devices with other features grafted on. iPhones were computer that just happened to have a "Phone" app and an "SMS" app.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Blackberry is still alive and well!

Send from my BlackBerry 10 Smartphone.

<comment><USER6> Alive, yes. Well, not at all.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Don't emulate your competition.

It's something I see over and over again. Blackberry had a huge loyal user base around its keyboard model, but they had to emulate the touch screens of Apple and Google since... well... that's what everyone else was doing.

Result: they lose their loyal customer base who liked that they were different, and they failed to gain any new customers since people who liked touch screens were already using their competitors.

<comment><USER12> They never stopped having a model with a physical keyboard as far as I know?

From my experience the only thing that kept it's user-base as high as it was is the glacial pace of change in large company central ITs. Yes, there was a small holdout of physical keyboard users, and yes they will exist for some time - but blackberry was not going to continue functioning at that scale.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> This is from September 2013.</comment>


Bull Market Hits a Milestone: 3,453 Days – Most Americans Aren't at the Party - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/22/business/bull-market-stocks.html <comment><USER2> > But for many seasoned stock market observers, the existence of continuing > worries about whether the bull market can last is a strong piece of evidence > that it can.

>According to this line of thinking, the moment to worry is when there is broad agreement that the market can only go higher. That would suggest there is little fresh money to drive stocks to new heights.

This is what I keep wondering about. It seems like everyone is just waiting for the crash to happen for the last 5 years. The slightest downtick seems to send people into a tailspin. Thus, possibly enacting it's own self balancing mechanism? I can't tell, but then, neither can anyone else.

<comment><USER3> It's hard to argue there is not a lemming effect in the market. If the "spook level" reaches a certain threshold, then a mass of investors all bail out at once, and it snowballs. Professional investors are trying to time their sell point so that they bail early in the crash instead of late. (Warren Buffett has mostly ignored this strategy: he just waits for good deals to appear, such as low PE ratios, regardless of the general market trend.)

<comment><USER4> Professional investors do not time markets.

<comment><USER5> Sure they do! They just may or may not be any good at it.

<comment><USER4> No they don't. There are a few exceptions, but the vast majority of assets are managed but asset managers who have mandates to stay fully invested. Only niche hedgefunds time markets.

<comment><USER6> Sector rotation is a pretty popular strategy. The manager stays fully invested, but they move the investment to different sectors, trying to time which sectors will be hotter than others.

Just one example of a way to stay fully invested while also timing the market.

<comment><USER3> An example: expensive products, like new cars and refrigerators, tend to slump more during general downturns. Thus, fund managers may shift out of car & fridge stocks into something with smaller consumer price tags, like soda stocks.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Wow, 10% own 84% of all stocks. That's a bit sad.

Is it because 90% of Americans don't even have money left to invest after their cost of living? Otherwise, where are people investing, if not the stock market?

<comment><USER5> > Is it because 90% of Americans don't even have money left to invest after > their cost of living?

In part, I think this is true. But "cost of living" is maybe a bit broad. _Most_ of these 90% of Americans have a poor grasp of personal finance, and spend _way_ more on unnecessary crap than they should (car loans, credit card debt, restaurants, alcohol, coffee, cell phone bills, cable tv, etc.). This isn't to say that there aren't systemic problems that increase wealth inequality (there are), but a big part of the problem is just good old fashioned consumerism.

<comment><USER8> So you can either spend money on useless junk that is advertised to you, or you can buy stocks in the companies that are producing the junk and the ads. What a choice!

<comment><USER5> Or buy bonds, or real estate, or start a business, or a nuclear bomb shelter, or build a house, or donate to charity, or whatever. These are hardly the only two options.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Financial education is a must. So many people miss out on opportunities, splurge when they could build for the future, etc.

When I was a young programmer (nearly 30 years ago), a retirement-age colleague took me aside and told me that if I paid the maximum into my retirement plan (401k) and didn't use it as an ATM, when the time came to retire I would be very pleased with the result.

I'm not at that point yet, but I still have about a decade to go. If nothing extraordinary happens, my friend's advice will have been very good. The market has gone down, it has gone up, but always on an upward trajectory.

It's a crime that kids aren't taught this and other basic financial tenets from the very first grades.

</comment><comment><USER10> Inflation adjusted graph here seems to suggest that the stock market isn't really higher than since 2008: [https://inflationdata.com/Inflation/Inflation_Adjusted_Stock...](https://inflationdata.com/Inflation/Inflation_Adjusted_Stock_Price/NYSE_Inflation_adjusted_stock_price.asp)

<comment><USER11> Following the link: I find it odd that his google plus pic is of him wearing a tux, with what looks to be a pile of money on fire above him.

<comment><USER10> I don't see that, but then I also just linked the first google result.

<comment><USER11> It's on the side. It's also the same on his fb page, which is also on the side

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The very good longterm chart reminds me of the saying "The stock market is most boring if you invest over decades: It is just a log-linear curve with ignorable dips"

</comment><comment><USER13> How could a startup begin to address wealth inequality?

<comment><USER14> Take a wealthy person, ask them what they would do if they had zero money and connections, and teach that as a skill.

<comment><USER15> No. Ask a person why they are "successful" and they will give you the answer they tell themselves. "I worked harder than others, I am smarter, I went to a good school, etc. etc." While they think that's true, it's mostly hogwash and most people can't tell you why they are or aren't successful.

The problem is that most of what it comes down to is luck. Luck in the sense of time and place. People born into a wealthy family or even with two loving parents are lucky and way more likely to be wealthy than those that were born without.

Warren Buffett came of age in the greatest period of prosperity in American history. Bill Gates came of age right at the time that PCs became possible. Bezos was first to market on a new and unproven platform. Zuckerberg got lucky because he was able to get started when broadband penetration in developing countries was finally starting to get some traction.

No man is an island and teaching success as a skill is just silly in my opinion.

<comment><USER16> The whole point of his question was that you take those advantages away from those men and see what they would do. The key is their creativity and ability to find ways to make money.

Bill Gates was actually famously asked a version of this question. (What would you do if you were poor with no education and lived in a third world country.) He responded "Buy Chickens".

<comment><USER3> The one thing in common about the mega-rich is that they are _obsessed_ with money and/or success. Warren's family members often complained he didn't spend enough time with the family because he was in his den sifting accounting and finance material. Warren is in love with numbers.

The thing is the obsession trait doesn't necessarily scale. If you cloned a billion Gates', that would NOT give us a billion Microsofts. It's not a zero sum game, but pretty close to one. There's only so much room in any given niche.

Another thing, I've been using and following Microsoft for about 3 decades. They didn't do anything special or innovative in my opinion, at least not relative to their size. MS just did smart marketing, acquisitions, pricing, and packaging. MS mostly leveraged monopoly in one category to gain another category: not raw merit. If MS never existed, the world would be the same or even better off: more OS and office-software choice. I have a bit more respect for Steve Jobs: he spotted useful product configurations before any one else (with means). MS just copied/purchased trends after it was obvious they were catching on.

<comment><USER17> Really? The world would be the same if Microsoft never existed or better off?

No doubt IBM would have led innovation if not kneecapped by M$.

<comment><USER3> I don't mean _exactly_ the same, but in terms of general innovation. There were decent, good, and great alternatives to ALL of their key products: PC GUI's, spreadsheets, word-processors, desktop databases, etc. Heck, they purchased most of them from other co's. Granted, MS usually charged less, at least initially, but that's because they took an up-front loss in that product to gain market-share. But then stagnated once they killed competition. I know an obvious MS-Access bug not fixed for 15 years.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Currency devaluation (mostly)

<comment><USER19> Odd you would think that, considering the US dollar is extremely strong right now relative to other global currencies and has been for the last 5 years (save for last year).

I'd love to hear why you think this, and what information sources you're hearing this from? I've seen this line used equally by right wing political groups as well as left wing crypto anarchists who both seem to lack a basic understanding of how finance works.

<comment><USER20> 1\. my rent

2\. my healthcare bill

<comment><USER19> Those are both problems that have nothing to do with currency or the economic concept of 'currency devaluation.'

Inflation has barely been present in the US for the last 10 years compared to historical levels.

The reason your healthcare bill and your rent have increased much faster than inflation (I'm guessing you're in the bay area) is because of US federal government failings in the case of healthcare; and in terms of rent the geographic limitations, rapid growth, and local government failings of the area you've chosen to live in.

<comment><USER20> This is the definition of currency inflation.

Goods and services costing more in my currency than they used to—and trust me, the housing hasn't gotten any nicer, nor my healthcare services.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Well, what can you do- buy into the market _now_? If you really believe that strongly in the idea that it's impossible to time the market then be my guest!

Your options pretty much boil down to "a crash is coming" (so says everyone for the last 5 years), or "it's different this time" (we all know the issue with that)

</comment><comment><USER22> Misleading article. It's not that we are continuously in the bull run from last 3453 days. We had a few crashes in between.

<comment><USER3> But "crash" is relative and continuous. The article defined what's traditionally been defined as a "crash". It's like "unemployment": there may ways to measure, each with different strengths and tradeoffs, but there are one or two traditional "common" metrics. Politicians tend to cherry-pick different metrics over time to fit their narrative of making them look good and the "enemy" bad.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> We are entering Crash Territory. 100+ years of the same general pattern; meaning an economic "correction" is coming soon.

<comment><USER23> I see you like predicting 10/3 recessions.

<comment><USER3> I'm not following. It's Occam's Razor: what's more likely: A) We will set a record bull market & recovery duration, or B) We'll hit a recession soon. Further, the yield curve is also near an inversion, another common pattern preceding recessions.

<comment><USER23> Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

<comment><USER3> Various metrics have predicted the majority of slumps for about 100 years. That's like every hour, not "twice". I don't believe the pattern of slumps is random: it's roughly a decade cycle. Inverting yield curves, PE ratios above average (using long-term earnings), and bull market duration all point to a likely pattern.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Project to Run RTL-SDR Dongle with Microcontroller Host - <AUTHOR> https://fallingnate.svbtle.com/portable-rtl2832-usb-dongle <comment><AUTHOR> I started this project a while back and am just now releasing the results piecemeal. If anyone has experience running SDR DSP operations on an MCU, I'd be very interested to hear about it! So far, this seems very feasible for at least small-ish bandwidth applications (ie ~100 KHz) and simple modulation schemes. Looking forward to pushing the limits of ~450DMIPS processor...</comment>


AWS Experiencing Intermittent DNS Resolution Errors - <AUTHOR> https://status.aws.amazon.com#r53 <comment><USER2> "We want to give you further information regarding the occasional DNS resolution errors. The AWS DNS servers are currently under a DDoS attack. Our DDoS mitigations are absorbing the vast majority of this traffic, but these mitigations are also flagging some legitimate customer queries at this time. We are actively working on additional mitigations, as well as tracking down the source of the attack to shut it down. Amazon S3 customers experiencing impact from this event can update the configuration of their clients accessing S3 to specify the specific region that their bucket is in when making requests to mitigate impact. For example, instead of "mybucket.s3.amazonaws.com" a customer would instead specify "mybucket.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com" for their bucket in the US-WEST-2 region. If you are using the AWS SDK, you can specify the region as part of the configuration of the Amazon S3 client to make sure your requests use this region-specific endpoint name.

The DNS resolution issues are also intermittently affecting other AWS Service endpoints like ELB, RDS, and EC2 that require public DNS resolution. We are actively working on this issue and will update you as soon as the issue is resolved on our end, however at this moment I won't be able to provide an ETA. I am keeping this case in Pending Amazon Action, will update you as soon as I get further information on the resolution of this issue."

[https://www.reddit.com/r/aws/comments/dlnl28/route53_is_fail...](https://www.reddit.com/r/aws/comments/dlnl28/route53_is_failing_to_resolve_s3/f4sj7tk/)

<comment><USER3> Maybe they should disclose when they are carrying out DDoS mitigation strategies that could have adverse effects on their customers. I can only imagine how many people wasted a more than few hours as they were misled by a green status page.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Nothing listed on AWS Personal Health Dashboard related to this incident. Also nothing abnormal listed on the AWS status page under S3, which is seemingly having DNS resolution issues for buckets with the `[bucket_name].s3.amazonaws.com` pattern.

<comment><USER5> We've observed the same... we started seeing this at ~9am et this morning so this has now been going on for over 8 hours.

<comment><USER6> There's almost a business model for a 3rd party to run a AWS service status dashboard that's more accurate.

<comment><USER7> [https://www.datadoghq.com/](https://www.datadoghq.com/) has something like that

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Switching to googleDNS 220.127.116.11 or 22.214.171.124 bypasses the affected DNS servers and will resolve the simple URLs (no region in url). Still really surprised this isn't making bigger news yet.

<comment><USER9> Forgive my ignorance, but how does using Google's DNS get around Route53 not being able to resolve URLs? Does the default DNS just target Route53 DNS?

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> My company hasn't been able to deploy any updates to our ElasticBeanstalk application for about 7 hours due to this. Luckily there's nothing urgent we need to deploy, but this makes me extremely nervous about using AWS going forward. If we experienced an outage that required a rollback or forward fix we would be totally hosed.

<comment><USER11> AWS's track record is still good, though. I mean, there will always be problems with cloud technology. But would you rather try to mitigate a DDoS attempt yourself or would you rather Amazon do it? I think giving up on AWS because of this event would be kind of throwing the baby out with the bath water.

<comment><USER12> The question is really "if you're not on AWS, do you have to mitigate a DDoS"? It's a big target for reasons unrelated to what most people run.

<comment><USER13> In my experience, you eventually piss SOMEONE off, or a competitor thinks it can drive business to them, etc. You probably won't get a huge one, but even a small DDoS can be difficult to mitigate for a company with limited resources.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> And of course Route 53 still has a green checkmark.

<comment><USER15> Now on [https://status.aws.amazon.com/](https://status.aws.amazon.com/)

Intermittent DNS Resolution Errors

We are investigating reports of occasional DNS resolution errors with Route 53 and our external DNS providers. We are actively working towards resolution.

<comment><USER16> Yes, that's the original link. There's still a green checkmark next to route 53, though.

<comment><USER17> Likely because Route53 doesn't have any degraded service at the moment. Would be more apt for a yellow status next to S3, given context in threads above.

<comment><USER18> It's not just S3. I'm seeing failures of DNS resolution of well known, and very much still working, non-AWS sites from within AWS now.

It's really hit or miss, though. Most of the big stuff works.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> [https://aws.amazon.com/route53/sla/](https://aws.amazon.com/route53/sla/)

<comment><USER20> Why bother?

30 days service credit is gonna wind up $0.50/domain. $0.10 for each over 25. Unless you're running thousands of domains, it's not even worth applying for.

<comment><USER21> That's just the per-hosted zone pricing. The SLA covers the per-query pricing, which can really add up.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> AWS is not really "Too Big To Fail".

It's more like, "Too Big, Will Fail".

<comment><USER20> There aren't many technological systems - big or small - that don't ever fail.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> The internet is about to halt. SQS & SNS are not resolving from many parts of the world.

<comment><USER23> It's amazing how much a ddos attack can do.

I read a few days back that when attackers had trouble attacking cloudflare they then went for the internet infrastructure (Internet Exchange) itself. In this case attacking a DNS service can block connection to a much larger set of internet.

<comment><USER24> Fwiw from some info posted above it sounds like it's the automated response to the DDoS causing issues, not the DDoS itself.

<comment><USER23> That would still be part of the ddos though, No mitigation is impact free.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> This is affecting my websites that use cloudfront, for which Amazon apparently uses their own Route 53 for DNS (nslookup -query=ns cloudfront.net). Since the only way to call remote assets from cloudfront as a website asset is to use: xyz.cloudfront.net or a CNAME such as mysites-cdn.com that maps to xyz.cloudfront.net it seems there is no way to use cloudfront without the Route53 lookup.

If route53 is down and that is required to use cloudfront how is this not affecting more people? I have had about dozen customers complain today.

</comment><comment><USER26> In our case the issue is affecting DNS resolution of 'only' S3 related hostnames (my-bucket.s3.amazonaws.com)

<comment><USER27> This comment from the other thread may be useful in mitigating your issue.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21328285](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21328285)

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Is Route53 under attack or a customer on Route53?

By all appearances the Route53 DDOS mitigation strategy is massive scale and distribution. This includes distributing customers and their NS records across infrastructure AND TLDs. I would have thought a blanket attack against Route53 impractical..

<comment><USER23> Nothing is impractical when you have enough tps.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Maybe a stupid question, but what to do when eu- central-1.signin.aws.amazon.com is down?

<comment><USER11> Make some coffee and do something else until it comes back up.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> If you got paged and are currently dealing with this, one thing you can do is set better defaults for AWS_REGION. i.e update the configuration of your client that is accessing the AWS resource to specify the resource's region

</comment><comment><USER30> I've noticed CloudWatch Dashboards malfunctioning today (not showing any data).

</comment><comment><USER31> We are facing this right now. Trying to push new pages to Cloudfront.

</comment><comment><USER32> I was getting some weird notifications about "kms: server misbehaving". No production impact so far, fingers crossed.

</comment><comment><USER33> Why does the AWS status say the issue is resolved when it obviously isn't? S3 is still down in parts of US

</comment><comment><USER34> YouTube is having issues as well (via the Android app), does YouTube run partially on AWS?

<comment><USER35> Well... I mean it's owned by Google so I want to say that's a negative ghost rider.

<comment><USER36> Waze uses AWS: [https://cloud.google.com/blog/products/gcp/guest-post- multi-...](https://cloud.google.com/blog/products/gcp/guest-post-multi-cloud- continuous-delivery-using-spinnaker-at-waze)

You're probably not wrong, but still.

<comment><USER37> Spinnaker on EC2... how painful.

<comment><USER13> I'm fairly sure that's where the primary developers and original creators of Spinnaker use it.

<comment><USER37> It is, their infrastructure was (or maybe still is) mostly based on EC2.

However, I think they kind of wanted to support many cloud providers, so maybe they stopped focusing on it througout the years.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Dont worry, the internet was designed to circumvent nuclear attacks like these

</comment><comment><USER39> Is this the cache poisoning ddos posted earlier?

</comment><comment><USER40> AWS has wasted so many hours of my life troubleshooting their "throw shit at the wall and see what sticks" services.

I don't know why developers put up, even push for, their garbage services.

<comment><USER41> But it's not very hard to find out the issue is dns

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> China</comment>


Vulkan in Open Source [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://fosdem.org/2016/schedule/event/vulkan_graphics/attachments/slides/1007/export/events/attachments/vulkan_graphics/slides/1007/vulkan_fosdem_2016.pdf <comment><USER3> More Vulkan slides how everything is going to be great without real content[0], whereas Metal and DX 12 are already here.

Not only as drivers, but also documents, books, tools and graphical debuggers.

I hope this doesn't turn out into another Longs Peak.

[0] Yes, I know it is Mantle inspired and I have those PDFs.

<comment><USER4> Proprietary APIs can't be a replacement to an open industry standard.

<comment><USER5> I'm pretty sure that DirectX is a living, breathing counterexample to that claim.

<comment><USER6> And how exactly can you use it on Linux or any other non MS system? It's an example of the disgusting practice of using development tools for lock-in.

<comment><USER7> Or it can be a very nice object based API instead of a state based API that made sense in 1992 as the slide deck said and certainly didn't make any sense in 2008 when the industry group Khronos sided with the commercial CAD industry to screw over Linux consumer gaming because there was no money in it. How was that DirectX's fault again?

I am guess you're not a game developer and your post is yet another case of [1].

I am a game dev and here are some links that show to non game devs why DirectX is more popular:

[http://programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/60544/why- do-...](http://programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/60544/why-do-game- developers-prefer-windows/88055#88055)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2711231](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2711231)

[http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/opengl- directx,2019.html](http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/opengl- directx,2019.html)

[1] [http://arstechnica.com/information- technology/2009/07/linus-...](http://arstechnica.com/information- technology/2009/07/linus-torvalds-microsoft-hatred-is-a-disease/)

<comment><USER6> _> Or it can be a very nice object based API instead of a state based API_

That's exactly what Vulkan is. So where is MS voicing their support?

 _> I am a game dev_

So did you ask MS why they didn't join Vulkan working group?

And I'm not sure what was your point in those links about OpenGL. We are talking about Vulkan.

<comment><USER7> Perhaps because design by a committee of peers usually results in a fragmentation and compatibility nightmare like this:

Edit: The below blog redirects HN referrers to a funny image macro, copy paste the link instead.

[https://www.jwz.org/blog/2012/06/i-have-ported- xscreensaver-...](https://www.jwz.org/blog/2012/06/i-have-ported-xscreensaver- to-the-iphone/)

The delayed spec hasn't even been released yet and Nvidia is already making Vulkan extensions on its own.

[https://developer.nvidia.com/engaging-voyage- vulkan](https://developer.nvidia.com/engaging-voyage-vulkan)

<comment><USER6> _> Perhaps because design by a committee of peers usually results in a fragmentation and compatibility nightmare like this_

It can. Or it can result in spec which helps everyone instead of just MS alone. Depends on how it's done. Vulkan is done from scratch, and so far I see no signs of them making mistakes of OpenGL. I guess we'll see more once it's released. Either way, what's the alternative? There is none, unless of course you work for MS and envision them controlling everything.

<comment><USER7> >Or it can result in spec which helps everyone instead of just MS alone.

Just MS alone? DirectX helps hundreds of millions of gamers, a whole bunch of game and application developers and companies.

That's like saying improvements to the Linux kernel help only the Linux kernel.

>Vulkan is done from scratch, and so far I see no signs of them making mistakes of OpenGL

Huh, how do you see that? The spec is developed behind closed doors by corporate folks each with their own interests. Even the W3C holds open discussions with specs.

A real alternative would be for the FOSS/Linux dev community to create and implement a standard properly.

<comment><USER6> _> Just MS alone?_

Yes. How can you use DirectX on non MS platforms? If MS wanted to help someone besides themselves, you could answer that question in a satisfactory fashion. But of course, they don't care about it, they only care about lock-in. Trying to pretend that lock-in serves anyone besides those who push for such lock-in is highly disingenuous.

 _> Huh, how do you see that?_

From what was published about it so far (origin in Mantle, collaborative input of those who know better and so on).

 _> A real alternative would be for the FOSS/Linux dev community to create and implement a standard properly._

Linux community was involved. In fact the main link in this post is from one of the contributors to Wayland and Mesa who was working on Vulkan.

<comment><USER5> Other folks are beating about the bush, so I'll just come out and say it:

 _Linux is basically irrelevant to game developers_.

Other folks have been nice, but let's just be clear here. Linux's graphics story is a stupid joke, the driver story is a stupid joke, the 3D story by way of OpenGL is a stupid joke, audio is a stupid joke.

 _That 's_ why it _doesn 't matter_ if you can only use DirectCX on MS platforms--because by reaching only that teensy tiny _vast majority_ of installed computers, devs can do well.

MS has _always_ treated their developers better than anything in the 'nix or BSD ecosystem, and that extends to better thought-out and implemented APIs.

Sorry, but that's the world we live in, and in reality there is little point in MS worrying about a non-DX API--and little point in supporting one if you're making games for PC.

<comment><USER6> _> Linux is basically irrelevant to game developers._

Sounds like a quote form early 2000s. We are long since past that. If you didn't pay attention to the last few years - then may be research what's going on now.

 _> That's why it doesn't matter if you can only use DirectCX on MS platforms_

It does matter. Lock-in forces developers to do double work. I.e. if they can't reuse the effort - they need to duplicate it. To put it differently - <USER2> on purpose increases the cost of making cross platform games. Obviously for the reason of putting competing platforms at a disadvantage. How can any developer find such behavior beneficial is hard to understand. All normal developers have no respect for lock-in.

 _> MS has always treated their developers better than anything_

Oh, really? Forcing people to do double work is not called treating you better. It's called being a jerk. And jerks they are, same as anyone who uses tools for lock-in purposes (instead of for what they should be - tools).

<comment><USER3> So to be clear, you are calling all the game industry studios that specialize in platforms, porting and tooling, a practice that goes all the way back to the industry roots, jerks.

<comment><USER6> _> you are calling all the game industry studios that specialize in platforms, porting and tooling, a practice that goes all the way back to the industry roots, jerks._

How exactly did you read that into my words? I said those who force people to do double work are jerks. I.e. those who create and enforce lock-in (MS and their ilk). Why would developers who have no option but to do that double work be jerks? It wasn't their decision and they have no control over those who create those walled gardens and lock-in.

Practice of lock-in doesn't go to "industry roots". It goes to those jerks who don't care about the industry and want to make life harder for developers by making tooling useless outside given walled gardens. Their selfish and stupid idea is based on assumption that the harder and more costly it is for anyone to do the work (because of duplication), the less likely they'll do it, thus sticking only to the walled garden they initially focused on. I.e. their usual exclusivity idea. Remember browser lock-in? Same idea here. It has nothing to do with the industry - it's all about jerkiness of those who make the tools and control the market.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> At this point, my advice to the Vulkan folks is:

Ship it, or shut up.

I don't need another slide deck promising the universe. I need an API that I can build on even if it's primitive.

And, if it's too primitive to build on, my advice would change to:

Shut up and code.

<comment><USER7> Also, Vulkan is going to support extensions like OpenGL did which fragmented the hell out of OpenGL.

Nvidia is already beginning the lock in and fragmentation process by making Vulkan extensions.

[https://developer.nvidia.com/engaging-voyage- vulkan](https://developer.nvidia.com/engaging-voyage-vulkan)

>NVIDIA will therefore provide a few Vulkan extensions from day zero, so that you as developer can enjoy less obstacles on your path to Vulkan. We will support consuming GLSL shader strings directly next to Vulkan's mandatory SPIR-V input

<comment><USER9> Nefarious intent aside. This will make it much easier to port large projects over piece by piece so its not an all or nothing proposal that requires a complete rewrite from day 1.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The lack of information about Vulkan is a bit concerning. For something that is about to be announced anyday now there is very little concrete information available about basic details like - what hardware that is currently shipping will support vulkan and how long after announcement will vendors have drivers out (weeks/months/years?).

<comment><USER11> Drivers will be available on release day and all currently sold hardware will support it.

<comment><USER10> Thanks - is reading the Mantle docs a good way to hit the ground running with Vulkan or have things diverged significantly?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Expecting to hear more Vulkan details from Khronos at the Game Developer's Conference 2016 in March:

[https://www.khronos.org/news/events/gdc-2016-khronos- session...](https://www.khronos.org/news/events/gdc-2016-khronos-sessions)

</comment><comment><USER13> Newest thing I've heard is that there will be games using Vulkan at launch. So, the specification, the drivers and some game ports will all go public the same day. Anything might be holding it up (most likely the ports), but GDC in March seems like a reasonable deadline considering the amount of talks about Vulkan.

</comment><comment><USER14> I really think one of the important aspects is that it should be much easier to reverse engineer proprietary drivers now given how explicit the API is supposed to be.

</comment><comment><USER6> I hope Vulkan will catch up. And MS deserves strong disrespect for not joining the effort which can move the industry forward.

</comment><comment><USER15> Url changed from [https://fosdem.org/2016/schedule/event/vulkan_graphics/](https://fosdem.org/2016/schedule/event/vulkan_graphics/), which points to this.

</comment><comment><USER16> More garbage from the same trash factory. Get back to me when you have an API that doesn't incentivize drivers to behave differently based on the name of the video game engine.

<comment><USER17> While some might find your wording a bit strong, I was also surprised by the lack of content in that slide deck.

<comment><USER18> Vulkan was originally supposed to start shipping in Q4 2015, and there's still not more publicly available than 12 months ago.

The frustration is a bit understandable.

<comment><USER19> Its a free and open API developed in secret by committee. What could go wrong?

Still, it will be an improvement over openGL.

<comment><USER20> Seriously Khronos, take a fucking page out of C++. They went two decades with awful broken language syntax until sometime between 2004 and 2008 they got together and decided to fix it.

Today, [https://isocpp.org/](https://isocpp.org/) is a gold mine of how to do an open standard correctly. Everything is public, future features are discussed with the community, and all the working groups are on github. _That_ is how you take a legacy standardization body and modernize it for the open source world, not make presentations at every event for over a year going "Hey guys its gonna be great! Just wait until you see it! Ooooonnnnnneeeee day! We just _know_ you'll love it!"</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>