Desktop notifications in for gmail in chrome/webkit - <AUTHOR> http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2011/01/desktop-notifications-for-emails-and.html

<comment><USER2> The window looks a little horrible on Mac. Why can't they use Growl notifications just like other apps do?

<comment><USER3> The notifications are allowed to be full webpages - which can then communicate back to the parent window. (or extension)

This will be a reasonable alternative to modal dialogs for chrome extensions initially, and eventually for web apps in general. (if it gets adopted by other browsers)

<http://www.html5rocks.com/tutorials/notifications/quick/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is cool but too distracting. Seeing the number of unread messages in the icon is already distracting enough!

<comment><USER5> ohhh handy, finally I can pin my gmail tab again... link for those (like me) who missed this

[http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2011/01/new-in-labs-unread- mes...](http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2011/01/new-in-labs-unread-message- icon.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Well, that's nice, but I've been pretty happy with <http://gmail- notify.sourceforge.net/>

</comment><comment><USER7> Anybody know how this works? Will my web-app be able to send notifications to the desktop? I assume so if it's going to be cross browser.

<comment><USER8> This works only in chrome, your web-app can also do this, but the user will have to authorize your web-apps use of this. I wrote a small chrome reminder extension which used these notifications => <https://github.com/minhajuddin/quickr> . That should show you how to create a notification from your app.

<comment><USER9> You can also utilize desktop notifications in an extension where user authorization isn't required.

ex: [https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/phokmbaffndjgejh...](https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/phokmbaffndjgejhemchophkkpdmpeln)</comment></comment></comment>


Panda porn shown in attempt to get two to mate - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Link or it didn't happen :)

[You forgot the URL?]</comment>


Ask HN: what does your blackout page look like? - <AUTHOR>

here's mine: http://twitya.com/503.php
The .htaccess is as follows:
Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} !^12\.345\.678\.901
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/503.php [NC]
RewriteRule .* /503.php [L]
[the ip address is my own so I can access the site]
top of 503.php:
header("HTTP/1.1 503 Service Temporarily Unavailable");
header("Status: 503 Service Temporarily Unavailable");
header("Retry-After: 86400"); <comment><USER2> Rewrite rule:

Options +FollowSymlinks

RewriteEngine on

RewriteRule ^(.*)$ sopa.php [NC]

The top of sopa.php:

<?php

       header("HTTP/1.0 503 Service Not Available");

?>

...followed by a body element that explains why the site is down and provides some links to sites with more info. ( One of which is BoingBoing, which has gone dark. )

I have some JavaScript in a Blogger site and an older web site that redirects to the site with the above mechanism in place.

<http://www.mailsend-online.com>

</comment><comment><USER3> <http://www.openrent.co.uk>

But the code is taken from: <https://github.com/zachstronaut/stop-sopa>

Courtesy of: [http://blog.appharbor.com/2012/1/18/join-the-sopa-protest- bl...](http://blog.appharbor.com/2012/1/18/join-the-sopa-protest-blackout)</comment>


BBC Suggests Broadband ISP Levy to Replace UK TV Licence Fee - <AUTHOR> https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2020/04/bbc-suggests-broadband-isp-levy-to-replace-uk-tv-licence-fee.html <comment><USER2> As someone who grew up in the UK then moved to the US where there is no functional equivalent I have little time for Brits that complain about the BBC. The value for money you get in return for the license fee is simply staggering. And while a genuinely strong public broadcaster has its downsides you're much better off with than without.

<comment><USER3> No sorry the BBC we have today is not the BBC you grew up with and the fact that when I buy a TV off Amazon they're informed and start to send me threatening letters straight away demanding their license fee would be considered dystopian and a huge breach of privacy if it were in the US.

I love a lot of the BBC programming from the 70s-00s but I have zero interest in funding anything they're making today. They're not even making anything for me anymore. Just too concerned with trying to compete with the big kids not serving the niches that was supposed to be the advantage of a public broadcaster.

<comment><USER4> > and the fact that when I buy a TV off Amazon they're informed

That stopped happening in 2013 when the law changed.

<comment><USER3> Happened for the TV I bought in 2017. Lived in a flat for 5 years, buy a TV and then the threatening letters started to arrive the same month.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I don't currently have a TV licence as I don't watch TV. My TV isn't hooked up to the aerial and I don't have an iPlayer account.

I can't possibly be expected to pay a licence fee on top of my broadband, surely.

<comment><USER6> Same for me, when I lived in the UK. Haven't owned or even wanted a tv in decades. ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Why not just make it part of income tax?

</comment><comment><USER8> How about getting rid of the license fee completely and just offer subscriptions for those people who want to see the programmes?

<comment><USER9> The BBC isn't like Netflix - the license fee pays for TV infrastructure, public alerting, World Service, school revision programmes etc. - you just can't treat a public broadcaster like an opt-in service, it would cease to exist.

If COVID-19 has shown us anything in the UK, it should be that the BBC is still trusted and used heavily by the govt to get their message out clearly and loudly

<comment><USER10> TV infrastructure these days is mostly satellite and cable based, sticks-on- hills broadcasting isn't that expensive and could simply be run by the government directly as it winds down over time.

Public alerting? Government can (and should) just serve videos itself, it can already SMS the entire nation.

World Service - was historically funded directly by the government, not the license fee. Should it even still exist?

School revision programmes can easily be handled by the private sector.

COVID-19 has revealed nothing about the BBC, which is now untrusted by >50% of the British population for the first time. All broadcasters have access to government broadcast updates.

Anything else?

<comment><USER2> > the BBC, which is now untrusted by >50% of the British population for the > first time.

Got a citation for that?

<comment><USER10> [https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles- reports/2019/1...](https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles- reports/2019/12/16/do-britons-trust-press)

 _YouGov figures show British trust in the press to tell the truth has fallen, with less than half believing BBC news journalists are honest and impartial_

Seems a lot of people can't really handle criticism of the BBC, judging that my list of facts is now at -3.

I used to love the BBC. Globally respected, good programmes, a voice I trusted to be neutral and fair. They helped me study, they introduced me to new music, made cool documentaries. I bought into it all.

I guess like many Brits I'm not quite sure if it's the BBC that changed or myself. It just doesn't seem the same anymore.

I think it used to benefit from a 'false aura' of trustworthyness because radio and TV news has very little space, so in any given day there were only a handful of stories the BBC could break. Of those it'd usually be obvious what they should be, so the journalists and editors had quite limited leeway to pick and choose.

Now there's BBC News Online and that's how I get their news output. I don't watch TV news anymore. Online there's infinite space and so they can write endlessly about whatever topics they like, including using it as their own personal blogging space. Combined with Twitter it's painfully revealed their biases and desire to shape the audience, desires that were probably always there but limited by available airtime.

Nowadays I don't see it as any higher quality than other outlets. Just yesterday their economics editor tweeted this: [https://twitter.com/faisalislam/status/1245380143071342598](https://twitter.com/faisalislam/status/1245380143071342598)

 _Throw in the millions of tests too, & I'm taken back to quote from developing nation's diplomat in my book on financial crisis, saying he looked to Germany and Google as examples for how to run his country "both run by engineers, whereas US and UK run by journalists and lawyers"_

This is just nonsense. Angela Merkel was never an engineer, she was an academic with a chemistry background but went into politics when the wall fell. She's been a professional politician for 30 years, so this tweet is just hopelessly misleading. I doubt Mr Islam is doing it deliberately, he just has low standards and doesn't bother to fact check even his own tweets, so what about the much harder job of checking stories?

When I go to BBC News Online and see endless articles with grotesque errors, distortions, biases and personal opinions I just can't care about them anymore. They should have stuck to TV. The internet is killing them, by revealing their true selves.

<comment><USER2> You're conflating "the BBC" with "BBC News". Given the sheer size and scope of the BBC that's a mistake. The BBC as a broad organisation is trusted by the public. It's the same mistake you see often when people complain about the license fee then exclusively talk about news coverage. It's really not the same.

I'm not sure why a tweet by a reporter would be particularly noteworthy here. By their nature tweets are off the cuff, and I'm not even sure that one is all that inaccurate. "Run by" does not start and stop with the Prime Minister of a country, it's a reflection of who is responding to a medical crisis from top to bottom.

<comment><USER10> What does trust even mean for most of their output? For music radio it's irrelevant. For comedy it's irrelevant. Trust enters the equation when things get serious and there's an aspect of teaching or communication of information involved.

The BBC's news output is symptomatic of a deeper set of political biases, it invades everything they do. Anyone can make a music radio station, many documentaries and dramas are produced by the private sector and then simply bought. There's nothing the BBC does that isn't already done just as well by other organisations, which is why they so often fall back on vague assertions of superior levels of trustedness or quality.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Build Android Wear+Pebble Apps with JavaScript - <AUTHOR> https://docs.straphq.com/guides/strapkit

<comment><USER2> This is a pretty neat concept. I'd like to start hacking on wearables soon.</comment>


My journey to a cochlear implant - <AUTHOR> http://spottedsun.com/my-journey-to-a-cochlear-implant/ <comment><USER2> Many people assume these sound much more like hearing aids they do. At best, they sound like a steampunk old time tube radio set with considerable static

<http://www.utdallas.edu/~loizou/cimplants/cdemos.htm>

for some demos. Ones with few channels sound positively terrifying to me.

<comment><USER3> That is fascinating, it makes me wonder if you couldn't use an array of multiple implants to achieve a better level of quality.

<comment><USER4> There are a number of issues around quality: the number of electrodes is not always the most important factor. The processing algorithm is also vital to good quality, and that can be improved in situ. There's a lot of research that has gone into algorithms that are best suited to speech, music, etc.

More importantly, many patients receiving implants do not have a healthy cochlear, in the sense many of their auditory nerves may be damaged. In this case the electrodes stimulate the surviving nerves, and additional electrodes may not provide much additional benefit.

Again, the audio quality is really down to the algorithms: because each patient is different the processor can require intensive tuning and individual work to get it sounding reasonably decent. Far more research goes into these audio processing algorithms increasing the number of electrodes (not least because improving the processing benefits both new and existing patients).

<comment><USER5> There are approximately 3,000 nerve endings in a working cochlea that need to be stimulated by a few (8, 10, 12, 24) electrodes. So no matter what, it not going to sound like what a fully functioning cochlea. You can't get the resolution. The algorithms are important, but so are the number of electrodes. Ideally you want 3,000 electrodes perfectly aligned with the nerve endings.

It must be a difficult choice for parents to implant their children. Children make the best candidates, but the technology is changing at such a fast rate. 24 electrodes today could be 3000 a few years from now. Once they are in, you can't replace the electrodes, only the signal processor.

<comment><USER4> This would be true for a consumer electronics device, but this is something that's inserted inside the body and is expected to function for many, many years. 24 electrode implants have been in the market for over twenty years. The major, major strides in implant technology have generally happened outside the body - speech processing packs have gone from shoulder worn packs to behind-the-ear models.

You need to bear in mind that we're not dealing with traditional technology here: we're dealing with implanted medical devices. This is not a situation where Moore's law applies. It is vastly cheaper to spend R&D developing speech/music processing algorithms than trying to cram more and more electrodes into implants which require extensive testing and certification by the likes of the FDA.

To be honest, it's not a difficult decision at all. If you're happy with your child having an implant[1], you would be _crazy_ to wait a few years 'just in case' the technology improved. Children implanted at an early age can often adapt far more rapidly than those who are older.

But it's a moot argument, because like I say these implants are not like smartphones that get improved every year. It is simply too costly to not only re-certify, but to re-train surgeons and audiologists on the new devices. Developing improvements to the external processing units is _many factors_ cheaper than upgrading the implants themselves.

[1] There are some parents who do not necessarily approve or want their children to get implants, but not for the reasons you suggest. This mainly happens with parents who themselves are deaf, or part of the deaf community. This is a whole other ethical kettle of fish though!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> My friend has a daughter who was born deaf and then she and her husband decided to implant her. It was a really hard decision but she was 4 and still not walking due to balance problems and because she didn't hear her surroundings. Well the decision payed off. She is 5 right now and she is walking and running and she started talking a few baby words, so the doctors are pretty sure she will be talking soon. I have been around in her life for about 4 years and I must say that since she got the implant she became a much much happier child.

</comment><comment><USER7> My wife received a cochlear implant in October, so we are on this journey right now. It has definitely been frustrating, but we have seen progress and we are optimistic about the future. If you are interested you can read about the implant activation process here:

[http://hegavememyears.blogspot.com/2012/10/what-i-saw-at- act...](http://hegavememyears.blogspot.com/2012/10/what-i-saw-at-activation- appointment.html)

</comment><comment><USER8> > "From their studies, they found that there were four generations of my > family with the A7445G mutation and the pattern showed that it is a maternal > mutation, i.e. it is carried out by the females of the family and passed > from one generation to the next."

Isn't that always the case with mitochondria, since they only come from the mother?

I am not a geneticist, so this is a real question.

<comment><USER9> Yes. In the comments, the author mentioned that they know this is redundant, but only if you already know it is.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> There's a really cool experimental history behind understanding the cochlea, especially concerning George Zweig, once a particle physicist. A lot of this work was done in the 70s and is, IMHO, some of the best examples of biophysics you can find.

One of the relevant papers you can find on google is: <http://symposium.cshlp.org/content/40/619.full.pdf>

</comment><comment><USER11> Startup request: create a service where you could transcript just from videos, without voice. Ideally a mobile app.

Some of the use cases are somewhat creepy, but there are quite a few legitimate ones. In particular, there are a lot of recording where sounds is broken/terrible and you could "restore" does.

You could start it yourself, but later you could make some kind of marketplace.

<comment><USER12> That's probably very hard, and then you have the "Bad Lip Reading" channel on youtube :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> > The disbelief came when it was time to listen to singular > words. With the > screen turned off, I got 0%. With the > screen turned on, I got 8%. That's > crazy!

It's really amazing how pervasive (putatively Bayesian) multisensory integration of information is in the brain. Even individuals without impaired hearing have their auditory perceptions strongly a affected by other inputs. The McGurk effect is a great example of this:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGurk_effect> <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-lN8vWm3m0>

</comment><comment><USER14> I really get a kick out of these personal stories that pop up on HN. I'd never find them otherwise.</comment>


Negasonic: Compose electronic music with code (in the browser) - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/merongivian/negasonic <comment><AUTHOR> This is a small project i've been working on. Uses Ruby for the code and is mostly inspired by Sonic Pi and Tidal Cycles, you can try it here: [http://www.negasonic.org/](http://www.negasonic.org/)</comment>


Infinite Recursion - <AUTHOR> http://paulbarry.com/articles/2009/09/02/infinite-recursion <comment><USER2> This had me laughing out loud:

"The same mistake is done on the Computer Language Benchmark Game. There's an Array sorting benchmark where Haskell just blows away even hand-optimized C. The secret is that the benchmark never prints out the contents of the sorted array. The C compiler isn't smart enough to recognize that the array is never actually used anywhere, but Haskell is, and so the entire benchmark basically compiles down to the equivalent of "int main() { return 0; }"."

</comment><comment><USER3> He forgot C! It's not in the language spec, but gcc will optimize tail calls, with -O2 or above.

</comment><comment><USER4> From: [http://stronglytypedblog.blogspot.com/2009/08/scala-tail- rec...](http://stronglytypedblog.blogspot.com/2009/08/scala-tail- recursion.html)

 _If the recursion is indirect, for example, Scala cannot optimize tail calls, because of the limited JVM instruction set._

Why is that?

<comment><USER5> Apparently the JVM goto instruction can only jump to an address within the same method:

[http://java.sun.com/docs/books/jvms/second_edition/html/Inst...](http://java.sun.com/docs/books/jvms/second_edition/html/Instructions2.doc5.html)

<comment><USER6> I think the CLR team was able to learn from some of the JVM's shortcomings; this limitation is one example. .NET IL has the TAIL. instruction prefix that allows tail calls. It can be prepended to any call instruction outside of an exception handling block.

There's also the JMP instruction, which is similar and allows the current method's arguments to be passed to another function, discarding the current stack frame and returning to the current method's caller.

<comment><USER7> Even more interesting is that C# and VB.NET, the two main languages targeting the CLR, do not make use of it. Before posting this though, I did a quick search to make sure they hadn't turned around and implemented it for C# 4 or something, and found this link:

[https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/ViewFeed...](https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/ViewFeedback.aspx?FeedbackID=166013&wa=wsignin1.0)

Apparently there are some performance issues with the TAIL IL instruction, though I wonder if it's really as slow as pushing a new frame on the call stack.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Prefrontal cortex as a meta-reinforcement learning system - <AUTHOR> https://deepmind.com/blog/prefrontal-cortex-meta-reinforcement-learning-system/ <comment><USER2> _Very_ interesting.

Oversimplifying and ignoring a lot of important details, the key idea proposed by the authors is that the brain's phasic dopamine system is a model-free reinforcement-learning system that learns to train the prefrontal cortex as a more efficient model-based reinforcement-learning sytem -- a form of meta- learning which the authors accurately refer to as _meta-reinforcement learning_.

The "Results" section provides compelling evidence that the authors might be on to something. The authors show and discuss the outcomes of six different kinds of computer experiments in which a (relatively simple) meta- reinforcement learning software system is shown to learn and behave in qualitatively similar ways as, for example, monkeys and rats in equivalent lab experiments.

I'm still digesting the implications.

Highly recommended reading.

<comment><USER3> One implication for products, if this work pans out, is that the systems which "adapt to you" (learn your voice, your schedule, what your face looks like) won't have to change the weights of their network. I believe this could lead to much better systems because adjusting the weights of an already-deployed network is dangerous - you could make the system perform poorly. It's also simpler for engineers because you can scrap all that logic and just deploy one RL network.

<comment><USER4> Sorry my head just exploded, but are you suggesting we have personal "prefrontal cortexes" used to customise general neural networks?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Full preprint available here:

[https://www.biorxiv.org/content/early/2018/04/13/295964](https://www.biorxiv.org/content/early/2018/04/13/295964)

</comment><comment><USER6> Paper is behind a paywall. Sci-Hub doesn't have it. Does anyone have a link to the paper PDF?

<comment><USER7> So here's something interesting to note. The "buy this paper" price for this article is _almost_ reasonable in and of itself. $22.00. In fact, for somebody who works in the field or even a tangentially connected field, they could probably justify spending the $22.00 for it.

But... hilariously, a one year subscription to the journal, is only $59.00 (for individuals, online only).

[https://www.nature.com/neuro/subscribe](https://www.nature.com/neuro/subscribe)

Something seems a bit out of whack when the price of one article is about 1/3rd of the price of the journal for an entire yet.

I'm almost tempted to subscribe. The problem with this model though, is that it doesn't scale. Even at "only" $59.00, how many journals can one afford to subscribe to before the aggregate cost breaks the bank? _sigh_

<comment><USER8> It scales because nobody subscribes individually. If you can't access a journal, you get your department head to forward things up the chain so your institution can just add another line item to the millions of dollars they spend annually on journal subscriptions for every researcher and student.

AFAIK almost all of that money goes directly to Elsevier [1] who, well, they pretty much run a monopoly.

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

<comment><USER7> What I mean is, for those people (like me) who don't _have_ a "department head" (or a university at all) to take care of journal subscriptions, and who _might_ be willing to subscri be individually - it doesn't scale beyond a journal to two.

At most, in years past, I subscribed to maybe a total of 10 journals, but that's when I was maintaining an IEEE membership and a lot of their journals are actually not very expensive, in terms of the marginal cost once you are already a dues paying member.

These days though, I find it hard to justify. I find myself wondering if the publishers would do a better job of providing a model that works for individuals, if they might not actually make more money in the end.

<comment><USER9> That is so darn insightful! So check it out, if there were a way to pay $20/mo for access to ~5 publications/mo from a list of hundreds/thousands, that would be fantastic! Netflix for research. I'd pay for it.

It wouldn't be terribly challenging to build. The tricks are in making the deals with the content owners, and getting the word out to users.

The total market is 137 Billion/year ( [https://www.ibisworld.com/industry- trends/market-research-re...](https://www.ibisworld.com/industry- trends/market-research-reports/professional-scientific-technical- services/professional-scientific-technical-services/scientific-research- development.html) ) Not bad.

Looks like half the market is the government. Might be enough there to build a business on. Hard to say. Requires more research.

<comment><USER8> The trick is that you're making a deal with Elsevier who is either going to kill you or buy you, making this a non-starter for most VCs.

It's tremendously difficult to make money in a space this entrenched. If you go a layer down and try to cut out Elsevier (go to researchers directly) you're asking scientists to basically ignore career-defining opportunities in high-impact publications... so that you can make money and a small market of hobbyists or professionals without a research budget can subscribe to journals. Also, the amount of work that needs to be done around peer-review is obscene and Elsevier (and others) have built a ridiculous moat around related volunteer work that is _hugely_ inefficient but constantly socially reinforced (reviewing can be a status symbol). At that point, the alternative is open access and free for everybody: why not publish there?

I'd be of the opinion that the only way to reasonably attack this space is to build an adjacent content management and distribution platform _not focused on journals_ and edge your way in, like, say, classroom management or MOOCs.

Which, well, there's Top Hat [1] who raised at a $185M valuation last year [2]. Not sure if they care about journals all that much yet though, not a whole lot of insight into their business beyond the pop business news.

[1] [https://tophat.com/](https://tophat.com/)

[2] [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-02-15/top- hat-r...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-02-15/top-hat- raises-22-5-million-to-go-after-pearson-mcgraw-hill)

<comment><USER9> Wow, you have a lot of knowledge in this area. Thanks! I wonder if because Elsevier is likely a bigger company it could be a good business to create by partnering with them, then let them buy it. So they don't have to take on the risk of developing it in house, but can still reap the rewards.

<comment><USER10> With continued pressure from SciHub, I'm thinking this might not be a bad bet to make. Elsevier et al. might just be willing to jump on the occasion, in order to save some of their business.

That said, I still think it's time to double-down on supporting SciHub. Both scientists and the interested public like it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> A more accessible discussion by the paper's authors is here at DeepMind:

[https://deepmind.com/blog/prefrontal-cortex-meta- reinforceme...](https://deepmind.com/blog/prefrontal-cortex-meta- reinforcement-learning-system/)

<comment><USER12> We've changed to that from [https://www.nature.com/articles/s41593-018-0147-8](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41593-018-0147-8). Thanks!</comment></comment>


The Adam and Eve Story CIA declassified - <AUTHOR> https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/document/cia-rdp79b00752a000300070001-8 <comment><USER2> Can anyone point to a rational discussion of this online? My few (admittedly cursory) searches have returned only results written by credulous tin-foil-hat conspiracy-mongers.</comment>


Nerd Discovers Exactly Which Day was Ice Cube's Good Day - <AUTHOR> http://andreawoo.wordpress.com/2012/01/27/nerd-discover-exactly-which-day-was-ice-cubes-good-day/

<comment><USER2> I had never heard the song but this is pretty cool inference work. This comment questioning the conclusions is great as well: [http://andreawoo.wordpress.com/2012/01/27/nerd-discover- exac...](http://andreawoo.wordpress.com/2012/01/27/nerd-discover-exactly- which-day-was-ice-cubes-good-day/#comment-327)

<comment><AUTHOR> Great link, that comment is amazing.</comment></comment>


Don't Fuck Up the Culture - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@bchesky/dont-fuck-up-the-culture-597cde9ee9d4 <comment><USER2> Prior post, with extensive discussion:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7618049](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7618049)

A critique of the article, with extensive discussion:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7759838](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7759838)</comment>


Copysets and Chainsets: A Better Way to Replicate - <AUTHOR> http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/02/14/chainsets/

<comment><AUTHOR> I think that this article shows a very interesting application of a technique known as "derandomization". Usually, derandomization is when you take a randomized algorithm and remove all sources of randomness. In this application, we see it only partially derandomized, to great effect: copysets improve reliability by reducing overall randomness, but still leverage randomness to approximate the solution to an NP-complete problem.

I wonder if other algorithms would benefit from partial derandomization?</comment>


Why the US stock market may have difficulty maintaining historical performance - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/30/business/30view.html?ex=1364529600&en=e214f8d8064a3ea7&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&pagewanted=all

<comment><USER2> Keynes quote is well understood by most modern economists. Keynes shifted focus from 100% belief in the long run to a system where we try to smooth out the valleys as much as possible while working towards to long run. I'm not really sure what sort of point Bernstein is trying to prove by dropping it in his story, but it seems misinterpreted.

Also, his point of "More important, not all investors can afford to hang on for the long run" is misguided. INVESTORS shouldn't be investing in high-risk speculation unless they can invest for the long run. Otherwise, there are plenty of investment options that will return more modest rates with significantly less risk. I'd imagine the bulk of your average American's market exposure is through their 401(k) plans, which are certainly long run investments. Maybe people are a little more speculative with their non- retirement investments than I thought.

The entire basis of his story seems to be that just because the markets grew at X average over the past century that it won't mean that it will grow at X average over the next century. Even that statement isn't entirely true and everything past that premise in his article was poor. I just don't see any value in this at all.

</comment><comment><USER3> summary: this time things might be different!</comment>


The Rise of "Logical Punctuation" (2011) - <AUTHOR> http://www.slate.com/articles/life/the_good_word/2011/05/the_rise_of_logical_punctuation.single.html <comment><USER2> "As a result, I have recently instituted a one-point penalty on every assignment for infractions."

These were always the worst type of teachers. When the majority of students are telling you and insisting that you are wrong, you are most likely wrong. This is especially true when they are able to provide a justification for their answer.

When a quote is used it is my firm belief that what goes inside the quotes should be a literal copy of whatever you are quoting. A full stop or a comma can in some cases modify the meaning of the quote and should not go inside the quotes because it makes the meaning of the quote ambiguous. For example if I used the above quote at the end of a sentence it would be unclear if the quote itself contained the period or if the period was just there to close my sentence.

Grammar has changed significantly over time and will continue to change. The argument that "that's the way we do it" doesn't hold water in my mind. It was a poor way of doing things to begin with so we should change.

</rant>

<comment><USER3> I tend to agree with you, but I'd like to understand better the mental process that leads him to penalize students for an approach that he concedes is logically preferable. My guess is that he thinks he's doing them a service by showing them how their writing will be judged "in the real world".

Perhaps someone who agrees with the author's approach can offer better insight?

<comment><USER4> The author teaches courses on Journalism. Agree with the logical style all you want, professional journalism is written according to style guides, and those style guides more often than not dictate American Style punctuation. In this case, "the real world" includes the newspapers his students wish to end up employed at.

In the case of a professor taking marks off for punctuation issues when writing essays on history or economics or engineering, I agree that's wasteful.

<comment><USER5> The "real world" of journalism is now highly globalized and casualized. Young journalists should expect to work for a large number of publications as interns, freelancers or short-term staffers. In this climate, adaptability is a core skill.

It is perfectly appropriate for an instructor to specify a style for an assignment and grade accordingly. Dogmatically teaching only one style is outmoded and actively harmful.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The author admits that "logical punctuation" is an equally valid form, and can even point to publications for which it is the house style. So why is he taking points away from his students when they use it? It strikes me as a rather petty way of enforcing a particular stylistic choice where it doesn't really matter.

</comment><comment><USER7> I never liked the idea of _changing the content of a quote_ for any reason.

Let's say I go on the record saying something like this:

> Code reviews are worthless when it comes to those nasty little runtime > corner cases that crop up now and again.

I sure as hell wouldn't want you writing the following:

> Mr. So-and-so was quoted today as saying "Code reviews are worthless."

Punctuation isn't just there for decoration. It has meaning. Injecting full stops into quotes in places they don't actually exist not only doesn't make any logical sense, it can actually change the meaning of the quote in very significant ways.

<comment><USER8> Moreover, in the tech world, these punctuation characters often have actual technical meanings and being precise can be very important. For example, consider the following punctuations of a quote:

\- "Resolve the DNS record for example.com.".

\- "Resolve the DNS record for example.com".

\- "Resolve the DNS record for example.com."

Only the first and second quotes are unambiguous. The third, which is supposedly correct, is unable to differentiate between a meaningful trailing period, which in DNS means to not use search domains, and the period inserted to end the sentence. While these issues are rare, logical punctuation solves this problem.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Oh wow, the American-style has always just _felt wrong_ to me and I've just chosen to ignore it in my personal writing, for most of the reasons stated in the article. But I've had to write it professionally, as a reporter, because of the Associated Press style guide [1].

Good to know there's an actual substantive debate...but of course there is; there always is a big debate when it comes to anything grammar :)

[1] [https://www.brandeis.edu/communications/digital/images/apsty...](https://www.brandeis.edu/communications/digital/images/apstyle.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER10> I'd be interested to know more about the origin of the illogical punctuation. All the article says is:

> According to Rosemary Feal, executive director of the MLA, it was instituted > in the early days of the Republic in order "to improve the appearance of the > text. A comma or period that follows a closing quotation mark appears to > hang off by itself and creates a gap in the line (since the space over the > mark combines with the following word space)."

So, quotes come into use to mark quoted passages in the 17th century [1], and are used inside punctuation. Other European languages develop similar or different conventions for quotes, but (based on a quick look at some newspaper websites), all put the quotes inside the punctuation. Typesetters across Europe happily follow this convention for the next three centuries and counting.

But some time in the late 18th or early 19th century, American typesetters suddenly realise that it looks better the other way round (and at some point persuade the Canadians too). An observation which has apparently escaped the typesetters of the old world, of whom there are probably ten times as many, for a century or two.

This doesn't make any sense.

Why did the Americans actually adopt this convention? Was this Noah Webster up to his old tricks again?

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quotation_mark#History](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quotation_mark#History)

<comment><USER11> It's possible that we did it as an intentional Americanism. Which I hear is how we ended up drinking coffee over tea.

<comment><USER12> Coffee was also a big cash crop in the new world and would have been a lot cheaper in the U.S. than in Europe, so maybe that was it?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> This claim is unfounded:

"the vast majority of the legion of logical punctuators are not consciously rejecting illogical American style, or consciously imitating the British. Rather, they follow their intuition because they don't know the American rules. They don't know the rules because they don't read enough. Don't read enough edited prose, that is;"

<comment><USER14> I have read _mountains_ of professionally-edited prose in my lifetime, and I _still_ use the "logical" punctuation when I write. I know damn well it's not the "proper" style here in the States.

Hell, my attachment to logical punctuation extends past quotes. If I'm ending a sentence with a hyperlink, the period goes outside the [link]. Except in the rare cases where I'm linking to something with a period in its name.

I wonder if Mr. Yagoda is still giving students a point off for ever use of logical punctuation in their papers, or if four years of fighting his futile battle for MLA/AP usage has finally worn him down.

<comment><USER15> A hyperlink is an especially problematic example, as periods are valid in a url (even if it's a bit unusual to end with one).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I agree that things not part of the quoted material should not be inside the quotes.

However, I don't see why that means they have to be _outside_ the quotes. There's a cozy and quaint area below the quote that could serve as a wonderful place for a period or comma to settle in and set up shop to ply its trade.

I'd like to see quote-period and quote-comma get ligatures.

<comment><USER17> There is a historical case for this, as the entire reason for the "illogical" style to exist in the first place is to emulate period _under_ quote in professionally typeset (with metal) prose, but using the limited medium of the _typewriter_.

The limitations of typewriters have also led to a number of other conventions baked into american style guides, such as placing two spaces after a period. It's amazing how strongly these odd rules are being held onto well after the typewriter has been made irrelevant.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I have heard the claim that this style dates to the introduction of typewriters, which required an ordering of the characters. Beforehand, it was customary to print the quotation marks _over_ the period,which can be done on a printing press.

<comment><USER19> I am not a graphic designer, but I did work in the publishing business earlier in my career, and this is exactly how I was taught to lay type up by hand: The quotes go somewhat over the period. There are similar things going on when you put quotes at the beginning of a line: They hang out a little over the margin.

If you have a period, like this. "Followed by a quote, like this," The space between the period and the quote will be smaller than the space between a period and a capital letter.

Most of this matters most with large type, such as titles or block quotes.

<comment><USER20> Interesting detail. So technology should fix what technology broke and the debate would be over.

<comment><USER21> It's already done. Unicode provides non-spacing modifiers which will overlay the previous codepoint. So you can type, for example, either U+0301 (COMBINING ACUTE ACCENT) or U+030b (COMBINING DOUBLE ACUTE ACCENT) over the period or comma.

<comment><USER20> I was wondering about that. But I don't think accent characters are intended for that. They don't seem to work for punctuation. We would have to use COMBINING DOT BELOW with a zero width space.

"This looks baḍ̋

Edit: Actually make that a space, maybe it's the proportional font

"This looks still bad ̣̋

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Fast forward about 15 minutes to where a student in the class codes up a linter for essays which changes correctly presented quotes to the style the teacher requests. LaTeX + Gulp!

<comment><USER12> Oh huh, it's weird to think about microsoft word's spelling and grammar checker as a linter. I like that it.

It sure would have been cool to be able to write custom lint rules when I was writing a lot of history papers. Like: If I start two neighboring paragraphs with the same word, as long as that word isn't "The" or "A". (This was a bad habit I had...)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Stick a fork in it, it's done.

I was typing in a list of blurbs this morning, titles for a to-do list. I thought about putting the punctuation the "right" way inside the quotes, then didn't do it. At some point it's better to get your message across clearly than it is to follow strict rules.

Relatedly, we're starting to see the rise of two words joined together, aka JavaScript, or SyFy. Looks like computers are doing all sorts of odd things to our punctuation.

</comment><comment><USER24> The author misses another big cause--the auto period on iOS puts it on the outside. Something that always bugs me, and I'm constantly going back and correcting.

</comment><comment><USER25> It might be because English is not my first language and that rule doesn't exist in my mother tongue, but I've always written like that (also, I don't use the Oxford comma and I won't, it just looks weird to me).

It occurs to me that the influx of non-native English speakers in social media/collaborative sites has at least something to do with this change.

<comment><USER26> That's funny, because it seems to me like the Oxford comma is the logical rule. The American standard is a special case: "use a comma to separate items in the list, _except_ the 'and' substitutes for the comma before the last time".

<comment><USER11> See I didn't grow up thinking I was using commas to separate list items, I grew up thinking I was contracting a bunch "and"s. That is:

      A red one and a blue one and a green one and a purple one.
      became
      A red one, a blue one, a green one and a purple one.

Notably kids seem to do the first one naturally.

If commas were list separators and not just a short hand why would we end them with "and" at all.

<comment><USER27> Possible reason: to distinguish the list from an "or" list.

<comment><USER11> It was more of a rhetorical question from 6-8 year old me. Yeah, though, and certainly there's other reasons, like distinguishing it from a bunch of dependent clauses. That we elide "and"s when speaking a list is of course a point in favor of the comma being a separator not a replacement too.

At the end of the day it's English; we just do what feels good.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> After reading the article and most of the comments, I still find one point unclear: if the period does logically belong inside the comma, does it also end the sentence?

For example:

> He wrote "I live here." Then he stopped writing.

> He wrote "I live here.". Then he stopped writing.

Of course the latter is the least aesthetic, but is it not the most logical?

<comment><USER29> Yes. If a quote ends with a period, then it ends the sentence. If the sentence shouldn't end there, then the period is replaced with a comma (even if the quote was of a complete sentence).

> He wrote "I live here," and then he stopped writing.

This rule only applied to periods, though -- if the sentence ends with (say) a question mark, then you leave it in:

> He wrote, "Do I live here?" and then he stopped writing.

<comment><USER30> I would have put a comma after the last quotation mark.

Personally, I think instructors put too much emphasis on punctuation. I had one instructor ding me for not spelling out numbers between 0-10. I still don't know if he was right. I don't really care.

Looking back he had some issues. This Doctor would love to argue with the boys. We were all so young. We didn't understand why he would make such a big deal out of little errors. Dr. B said, "Come to my office after class!" Looking back, I'm suprised he didn't offer us wine in those pointless office visits.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This seems like a good place to use ligatures to shrink most of the white space between quotes and following punctuation marks. I do it when I'm writing informally because yeah it's the sensible way to do it, but it does sometimes look awkward.</comment>


From Desktop 3D Printing to Desktop Electronics Manufacturing - <AUTHOR> https://blog.octopart.com/archives/2015/11/from-desktop-3d-printing-to-desktop-electronics-manufacturing <comment><USER2> Let me start by saying that I agree that desktop electronics manufacturing will be the "next big thing" in the maker movement, and I am a huge fan.

However, this article does not mention two very important issues. In order to make a circuit board of any interesting complexity (i.e. more than an Arduino and a few LEDs), you need more than 2 copper layers to route your traces on. And, you need VIAs (Vertical Interconnect Access), which are columns of copper that make electrical connections between the layers.

I have used a PCB mill and while it is very useful for making extremely simple circuits, it only lets you mill 2-layer boards, and it does not let you make VIAs (instead you have to manually drill a hole through the board and solder a pin into the hole, and this approach has a much much larger diameter than a real via).

In order to be interesting for "maker" goals such as Linux machines, IoT, and robotics, there needs to be a desktop fab solution that can _at the very least_ make 4-layer boards, with VIAs.

<comment><USER3> "via" comes from latin, it means " a place to travel trough".

For example in Spain "autovia" means via for autos or "tranvia" means a vehicle that goes over rails. "Via pecuaria" means a road for animal transport.

You can do lots of useful things with just two layers. We prototype professional electronics in house with just two layers and modules(over a big area), then shrink the design, use more layers and get it done using a professional service.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This describes the one of the first places I worked at. It started as small contract manufacturing house before becoming a significant player in this space. However, one thing is clear, the amount of manual work involve does reduce the consistency of getting good results, ie the amount of solder paste squeeged onto PCB is not controlled, the placement of the components are also not well controlled etc.

However in the maker space, this option is great! Fantastic for getting a small production run out the door!

</comment><comment><USER5> For decently capable(1) desktop manufacturing,"desktop" is a bit of a misnomer at this point. I've found that you need at least three desks, not to mention another desk for all of the test gear, and another for mechanical prototyping, and another for...

At this point, I have(2) an othermill and a pretty-near top-of-the-line LPKF S63 system + silkscreen and reflow capabilities, and am fairly impressed by both. I've been able to go from opening up a PCB editor to having a tested, functional board in under an hour, at least for simple breakouts.

The othermill is pretty flawed for PCB work, however. The spindle just isn't fast enough, cross layer alignment is inadequate, it doesn't have dust control for dealing with FR4 dust, etc. For good PCB routing, some sort of computer vision system for adjusting cut depths and picking up fiducials is also amazingly handy. That being said, we're really impressed with our othermill and do a lot of mechanical work on it - complex aluminum parts, engineering plastics, etc.

Cheap soldering for one-offs is pretty much solved at this point - laser cut a stencil on a decent laser cutter (which everyone should have, anyways), stencil paste, and reflow in a cheap Chinese oven with open source aftermarket firmware. You won't be able to do big BGAs or tiny (0201) passives, but who cares? If you have soldermask capabilities, either some photoresist method or laser cut kapton, soldering tricky components becomes much easier.

None of the additive (ink-based) systems have any hope of producing really useful boards - the electrical and thermal conductivity of real copper is pretty hard to beat, and doing anything controlled-impedance is pretty much out of the picture. With subtractive systems, you can just switch to 8+ oz copper or exotic substrates without changing the process materially...

Vias are tricky. LPKF makes two systems, one with conductive epoxy and the other with electrochemical copper, neither of which are quite satisfactory. Via rivets (or manually soldering wire) work for small boards, but are super tedious and not great for controlled impedance applications, either.

Being able to do decent multilayer boards is contingent on good vias, but in theory, the only other thing you need is a hot press for stacking things up?

Once you get into building complex multilayer boards, the time investment is just silly, even with perfectly calibrated processes, and you should just order from a board house and wait...

(1) I.e. boards better than DIY etching + manual soldering.

(2) Well, they're not actually mine, per se...</comment>


E.W.Dijkstra Archive: Are "Systems people" really necessary? (EWD 1095) - <AUTHOR> http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD10xx/EWD1095.html <comment><AUTHOR> A former associate, in what struck me as an absurd notion, recently questioned whether so called "systems people" are necessary today. I thought the contradiction of what the term meant back from EWD's time to today and from Europe to America will make for an interesting discussion.</comment>


Ask HN: Parents' Sayings - <AUTHOR>

Growing up, what did your dad (or mom) always say? They often seem very cliché, but usually have an immense practical value behind them. Let's pool parents and find some really good ones. Here's a few to start:<p>"Life isn't fair."<p>"Stop crying before I give you something to cry about."<p>"Don't have any fun!" (Before dropping me off at a friend's house) <comment><USER2> My dad, while growing up on the frugal end of things in the fad obsessed 80's, explaining why I wasn't going to get those vans and 'chute pants.

 _"To you those kids at school must seem like big stuff, but to me they're just a bunch of stupid babies spending their parents money on whatever shit the tv tells them to, no matter how ridiculous it is."_

Too damn right, dad.

</comment><comment><USER3> "99% of the world are schmucks and followers. But 1% are the leaders, creators, inventors. Be the latter, not the former." I try to take his advice to heart, being into research and startups.

"Religion is candy for the desperate, and a profit-generating machine for con artists and pedophiles."

Edit: he would add that there was a small group of people who belonged to neither group, as they were popular leaders, but did have any inherently useful talent. These people became religious leaders and politicians.

</comment><comment><USER4> 1\. You can't teach tall. 2\. Stay out of jail.

My readings: (1. Recognize your innate gifts and use them.) (2. I love you, have fun, don't be too youthfully indiscrete.)

</comment><comment><USER5> "Never argue with a crazy person."

"You can't fuck crazy sane."

"If it's worth doing, it's worth doing well."

</comment><comment><USER6> "It's only worth what the next guy will pay for it."

"Win fights with your brain, not your fists."

"I'm still 18 inside."

</comment><comment><USER7> "Don't get emotional with women; get emotional with knowledge." -- my mother

</comment><comment><USER8> "If you're not in bed by 10pm, come home".

</comment><comment><USER9> When I graduated SSC (Class 10th), when we choose our field of study (Science/Commerce/Humanities) my mother sat down with me before I filled my forms and said

 _"Dear, this is all your life now, we will just invest in you, what you make of that investment is all in your hands"_

To people who aren't familiar with Indian parents let me tell you they can be a little pushy. I have seen parents push student to take Science then take Engineering/Medical school and then work in a company with nice salary, they want it or not. I often found it rather unnerving how my friends were pushed to top classes, my parents always pushed me to do what I love, but do it right. Sure I couldn't crack the most prestigious exams of the country but that is not the only way to get a good life is it?</comment>


All Startups Should Consider Expanding in Multiple Geographies - <AUTHOR> https://feld.com/archives/2020/01/all-startups-should-consider-expanding-in-multiple-geographies.html <comment><USER2> Having several office locations is a downside: It impairs communication, collaboration, and maintaining a single culture.

IMHO there are two valid reasons to multiply locations (apart form having tens of thousands of employees): (1) acquisition of another company, and (2) expanding into another geographical market.

But do avoid multiplying small offices.</comment>


Finland is the only EU country where homelessness is in decline - <AUTHOR> https://scoop.me/housing-first-finland-homelessness/ <comment><USER2> To help contextualize this so I understand the situation better, can someone compare and contrast what treatment for debilitating mental health issues such as schizophrenia looks like in Finland vs. the US?

The second issue is, _In the last 10 years, the "Housing First" programme provided 4,600 homes in Finland. In 2017 there were still about 1,900 people living on the streets_. In the US, there are something like half a million people living on the streets.

<comment><USER3> They never had Reagan, so they still treat mental illness there.

More importantly, Finland allows for the involuntary commitment if the mentally ill. In the US, this is only allowed if the individual presents a danger to themselves or others.

<comment><USER4> That's almost what the Finnish system requires: [https://helda.helsinki.fi/bitstream/handle/10138/231986/comp...](https://helda.helsinki.fi/bitstream/handle/10138/231986/compulsory_psychiatric_detention_and_treatment_in_finland.pdf?sequence=1)

"The current Finnish Mental Health Act stipulates thefollowing criteria for compulsory admission:

.a person should be found to have a psychotic illness,and

.because of this psychosis, they are

(.in need of psychiatric care as their condition would otherwise worsen [this is the main different criterion], or

.a danger to their own health or welfare, or

.a danger to the health or welfare of others)

.no other mental health services are suitable or adequate

(Finland of course has proper free at the point of use healthcare for all residents, a far more important point for mental health than involuntary commitment.)

<comment><USER5> You can imagine how that's an artifact of a more socialized health system. Perhaps unintentionally, it would function in many ways as a cost saving feature that would be very difficult to implement in the US system. Think about junkies. Can they be involuntarily committed because their condition would "otherwise worsen"? Imagine the legal implications in a system where hmo and insurers get to influence the decision about who is committed.

<comment><USER6> Or imagine a woman who has children out of wedlock, causing financial distress. Obviously, if she's not institutionalized she'll _continue_ to have children out of wedlock, which will cause her condition to worsen.

And only a mentally ill person would have children out of wedlock, right?

And before you say that that's unrealistic... I'm pretty sure that that exact logic was used to institutionalize people in the US back in the 20s and 30s.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Finland is the only country in the EU that has figured out that people need to fulfill the lower levels of Maslow's hierarchy first before starting on the higher levels? Are you fucking kidding me? A college student could come up with this plan. Why isn't everyone doing it? Oh yes, I forgot about the part where it's necessary for society and government to be cruel to the homeless to demonstrate to everyone else that ... blah blah something or other stupid argument from cruel, heartless, unempathetic assholes goes here.

</comment><comment><USER8> I recently, with work, did a tour around Eindhoven (the Netherlands) together with Homeless people. I learned that one never has to be homeless in that city, there are many locations to get food, shelter and help. The homeless people on the streets have such severe ADHD that sleeping halls stress them out, or they have other mental issues, can't deal with authority, have a severe lack of trust or fear for the healthcare system, etc. It is impossible _for a healthy mind_ to stay homeless (unless by choice).

<comment><USER9> From what I heard from a homeless person is, that the problem with the sleeping halls are other homeless people.

It would stress anyone out, if your "cohabitants" fecate in the shower, start screaming in the middle of the night, pose a risk of physical abuse, stealing, etc...

So, if you consider preferring not to live in such conditions a choice, then yes, it is impossible. But in my book, it is sounds rather like a choice of a healthy mind and not one a civilized wealthy society should put one up with.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> >>The country applies the "Housing First" concept.

California also applies "Housing First", and it doesn't work. According to some reports, it gas led to social housing coming to be rife with drug use and dominated by drug dealers, because previous restrictions on drug use on premises were lifted as part of the Housing First philosophy.

</comment><comment><USER11> Where is the part on how Finland has been deporting Iraqi refugees.

<comment><USER12> In a different article, surely?

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> The headline is factually wrong. The truth is that Finland has reduced the population of homeless by 35% over ten years[1].

While I applaud easing the bureaucratic hurdles in giving people access to homes, in many cases not being offered a home is not the reason why people are homeless. It's simply not "as easy as that".

[1] [https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2019/jun/03/its-a- miracle...](https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2019/jun/03/its-a-miracle- helsinkis-radical-solution-to-homelessness)

<comment><USER14> Logically, your argument is baffling on its face: homelessness is literally the condition of not having a home. Giving someone a home literally solves the problem.

All that said, "Housing First" is the most effective, lowest cost, evidence based program we have to substantially lower homelessness. It works, and it's vastly cheaper than both the status quo ( [https://www.centerforhealthjournalism.org/resources/lessons/...](https://www.centerforhealthjournalism.org/resources/lessons/million- dollar-homeless-patient) ) and just about everything else we've tried.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Housing_First#Evidence_and_out...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Housing_First#Evidence_and_outcomes)

<comment><USER15> It can solve it in a literal way that doesn't actually meaningfully change the societal problems of Homelessness. If, for example, we thought it vital that everyone own a car and drive everywhere, and that people walking to work was a problem to be solved, you could give me a car and I'd no longer be "carless". That doesn't mean I will use it, or stop walking to work, or otherwise change the reasons I didn't have a car before.

That's not to say that literally giving people houses isn't a good idea, and won't solve some chunk of the issues of homelessness. But, for instance, if I was sleeping in my broken down car on the street near my work, and you gave me a free house on the other side of town, I'm not "homeless" now, but it now introduces new problems of how I get to work across town.

Giving someone something they lack in life is a lot like giving someone a organ transplant. Hypothetically, we could "cure" a lot of liver diseases by giving everyone a "new" liver, but we have to get that liver from somewhere, and the recipient has to be able to integrate it into their life without it being rejected, and they have to not keep doing the things that led to them having the problem in the first place or else it all repeats in a few years.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> While homelessness might be in decline and shelters have more capacity, you can still find people sleeping on the floors of public pay-per-use toilets in Finland. So no, homelessness is not ended and probably never will be.

<comment><USER17> Lol and polio and measles will never be eradicated either because we still have cases. oh wait there's a reason why they haven't been eradicated hmmmmm.

<comment><USER18> I don't see the connection. What is the point you are trying to make here?

<comment><USER17> my point is that to assume that something that has existed (continues to exist) will never cease to exist is fallacious reasoning.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER2> I take issue with the practice of labeling everyone on the street as "homeless", because the truth is that there are many different causes:

* battered spouses fleeing domestic violence

* runaway teenagers

* veterans whose mental and physical injuries

* debilitating mental illness

* impossibly high housing costs due to NIMBYism and local regulations

* alcoholism, drug, gambling addiction

That's not an exhaustive list, of course. We have to start by changing the way we speak about this. We need labels that strike at the heart of each issue, that capture the thing that's really going on, not just the surface-level phenomenon.

I live in LA, and I don't own a car, and many people that live on the street don't either. Does that mean that it's valid to label us all as "carless"?

I believe that the words we use matter, because they shape our thinking, and therefore the policies that we ultimately enact. Calling everyone "homeless" leads to attempts to treat multiple diseases with the same cure, and I believe that is ultimately doomed to failure.

<comment><USER19> > I live in LA, and I don't own a car, and many people that live on the street > don't either. Does that mean that it's valid to label us both as "carless"?

Yes, that's the exact definition of not possessing a car. The circumstances might be different and reasoning for not having one too, but if both were asked do you own a car the answer is the same.

<comment><USER20> Would the definition be based on possessing or owning? What if one does possess a place they choose not to use (run away teen)? What about being able to stay in a place but only for a short term?

I know a guy who recently sold his old house and bought a new one, but because of some confusion, ended up not having a home for two weeks. It would seem odd to call him homeless.

<comment><USER21> If you're not involved in adversarial contract authoring, I don't get the appeal of the "what about this edge case" game.

> Would the definition be based on possessing or owning?

Given that nobody calls people renting apartments homeless, I think this self- answers.

In any case, voluntarily being temporarily in a situation wherein one does not own property in not commonly confused with living on the street for reasons I believe to be fairly obvious. It has to do with that word "voluntarily".

<comment><USER20> >If you're not involved in adversarial contract authoring, I don't get the appeal of the "what about this edge case" game.

My mind often goes to the boundary cases because that is where the real differences occur at.

For social issues in general, I've seen enough cases of people stretching definitions and using selective definitions that are enough against the norm that the end statement made is purposefully misleading. You might say it is adversarial advertisement authoring.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> at-fates-hands For some perspective:

Finalnd's military budget: 300 million

US military budget: 700 BILLION

The US could dump a lot of money into these social services to address people who are homeless, drug addicts, and other people on the fringes of society.

We are however, constantly put in a place where other nations depend on us for their security. As such, they don't have to have a massive defensive budget when they can rely on us to take care of them.

If we had a military budget that was more inline with simply keeping our own country safe, we would have a ton more money to take care of the people who really need it.

<comment><USER22> Assuming, of course, that if Finland had to provide for its own defense (rather than relying on us), they would still have money left over for social programs.

<comment><USER23> 1\. USA cuts military budget

2\. Russia invades Finland. USA does nothing.

3\. Homelessness in Finland peaks

<comment><USER24> Why would USA defend Finland as Finland is not part of NATO? The same way they defended Ukraine as Russia occupied Crimea and invaded East Ukraine?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> "Those affected by homelessness receive a small apartment and counselling – without any preconditions."

I doubt it will work in Finland in the long run, and even if it does, Finland and the U.S. have very different populations. Most Americans work to put a roof over their head, and it's unfair to them to "unconditionally" give some people housing. It's also a big disincentive to work. The current unemployment rate is 3.5%. There are homeless shelters to prevent people from freezing to death, but that's very different from giving someone their own apartment. Millions of people would love a "small apartment" in Manhattan or San Francisco but cannot afford to live there. Are you going to allocate the apartments to people who are not contributing to society?

<comment><USER26> Freaking hell, "Sorry, you'll have to sleep outside, I can't let you sleep in this warm house and bed, because it wouldn't be fair to others.".

You probably have a meritocratic view of the world (as many Americans do), that hard work will lead to success. If you believe that, you logically would have to believe the opposite: the people failing failed because they are lazy. But you are discounting luck or upbringing: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTDGdKaMDhQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTDGdKaMDhQ) . Imagine someone becoming homeless after being dumped by their partner. Or not being able to afford doctor's bills and also losing their job after taking too many sick days (this is not relevant to Finland, since that doesn't happen there, but it is in the US).

And from the article, doesn't sound like the Finns will just let someone stay in such an apartment and be jobless and bum around:

> The result is impressive: 4 out of 5 homeless people will be able to keep > their flat for a long time with "Housing First" and lead a more stable life.

So that means 1 in 5 fail to reach that stable life and lose their flat again. As the article also says, their policy is actually cheaper compared to what you think is "fair", they let the homeless have somewhere to sleep, so they can start worrying about the next thing in their lives, which is probably getting a job. Imagine how shitty it is trying to find a job if you're mostly worried about where to sleep, shower, or shit, daily.

<comment><USER25> You ignored what I wrote, "There are homeless shelters to prevent people from freezing to death, but that's very different from giving someone their own apartment."

<comment><USER26> Fine. And I think I (and 1 or 2 other replies to your comment) have also addressed that a homeless shelter is not sufficient to put someone on a stable path to return to being a "productive member of society" (all hail capitalism, for productivity is the goal of life).

Or what do you want me to address in regards to this sentence? That you're not that heartless, because hey, the homeless in your world won't freeze to death, they can go to the shelter. Despite the fact that you think actually helping them long term by offering them the apartment (which the article says is cheaper than taking care of them as they remain homeless) and a path to normal life, that's just too much, and unfair?</comment></comment></comment></comment>


People fall off a 'humor cliff' when they start working - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessinsider.com/people-fall-off-a-humor-cliff-when-they-start-working-2017-7 <comment><USER2> I wish the article would talk about the difference between laugh-evoking humour and sarcasm. I work in a project where sarcasm is often used. People don't laugh at it, it's not always clear how the "joke" is intended (especially across cultures), and it just tends to lower everyone's expectation in an accumulation of wry perspectives. Skimming the topic of sarcasm from Wikipedia, it's clear there are a lot of drawbacks.

</comment><comment><USER3> The workplace is full of people ready to report you to HR. I can't say I'm enjoying the weather without fear of disciplinary action.

</comment><comment><USER4> An interviewer once told me "You were selected because I liked a joke you put in your resume.", essentially telling me my application was a joke. Needless to say, I didn't get the job.

<comment><USER5> I've done a ton of interviews, and I wonder if someone is quoting some offhanded comment I made without thinking as some meaningful aspect of the interview.

Not saying that happened in your situation, but it's a reminder of the importance of our statements, I couldn't remember a single thing I've ever said in an interview, but someone else surely does.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I've noticed that I'm alot funnier on social media and get alot more responses when I'm in between jobs.

</comment><comment><USER7> Author advises business person not to make others the butt of a joke, then makes fun of all business persons for not being funny and not understanding what a good metaphor is.

<comment><USER8> They advise that leaders should not make subordinates the butt of jokes. That's much more specific.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I just don't want to get fired / sued.</comment>


Ask HN: What are the best paid ad services/methods? - <AUTHOR>

I've had some luck with Google AdWords. Facebook ads were a waste of time. Are sponsored blog posts worth the money? What about other advertisement methods/services? <comment><USER2> May be useful as an answer to what other paid web traffic sources are out there: [http://www.pagewiz.com/blog/ppc/web-traffic- sources](http://www.pagewiz.com/blog/ppc/web-traffic-sources)</comment>


Everyday words that mean something else to programmers. First 65 tell a story - windy-topology https://twitter.com/LifeTechPsych/status/1275092453402574848 <comment> windy-topology More like a drunk story.</comment>