We need to document macOS - <AUTHOR> https://eclecticlight.co/2017/08/13/last-week-on-my-mac-we-need-to-document-macos/ <comment><USER3> When I did some work on porting out product to macOS (so developers could run their server environment locally, though a few loons wanted to actually run macOS on servers), I was immediately struck by how awful and incomplete the documentation was. And, I've been working in the Linux world for a couple decades...where docs are copious but wrong about 50% of the time.

In particular, the service launcher (launchd, mentioned in the article), and various other system level things (including logs, also mentioned in the article), have so little official documentation as to be laughable. You just have to spelunk the web to find someone who has the tribal knowledge and has shared it in some form.

I gave up on the task, as the level of pain was far too high.

But, I'm kinda baffled why anyone would volunteer to provide free labor to one of the largest and most profitable companies in the world. I give away tons of my time for OSS, but I'm not about to get out and push if I've paid for a luxury car.

I'd rather put my time into something that is free and open for everyone, including my future self. Actually, the word "rather" isn't strong enough: I would never give my labor to an $820B corporation.

<comment><USER4> > But, I'm kinda baffled why anyone would volunteer to provide free labor to > one of the largest and most profitable companies in the world.

Somewhat related, it has become Apple user/developer etiquette not to mention bugs without filing a bug report on Apple's closed issue tracker beforehand:

[https://blackpixel.com/writing/2012/02/radar-or- gtfo.html](https://blackpixel.com/writing/2012/02/radar-or-gtfo.html)

I can't believe how many hours I've wasted on detailed bug reports only for them to be closed as a duplicate, or "works as expected".

If you are frustrated with Apple, there is only one thing that works: 1) be influential, 2) complain publicly. If you want macOS to be documented, don't do it yourself. Find people at prominent media outlets and start the meme that Apple's documentation sucks, and that it matters for <reasons>. Add all sorts of pressure and with any luck, Apple will address this issue to turn the narrative around in its favour.

Since I don't have any of that power, I try to find open source projects that affect me and donate time or money to them instead.

<comment><USER5> The big difference is that while bugs can only be fixed from the inside, the documentation can be greatly improved even without Apple's buy-in.

<comment><USER6> Not efficiently. And others volunteering their time to reverse engineer documentation on an ever moving target sounds like an exercise in folly.

Especially when the first party could hire technical writers for a fraction of the cost of developers and make this problem disappear.

<comment><USER5> They could solve the problem, but they are not doing it. Trying to force their hand by public shaming may work, but I don't think it will. Volunteering the effort seems like a pragmatic approach. I would love to have a place where I could send a PR to fix a documentation shortcoming. Adding requests to Radar is futile.

<comment><USER7> That's not pragmatic, that's just... wrong, on so many levels. Either 1) shame them, 2) move to OSS, or 3) suffer, but please don't donate your precious time to solve the problems of a rich company who doesn't care about its users. Doing so would only diminish the effect of first option (shaming) and is just not fair to anyone.

Or, write a complete reference book and sell it for profit.

<comment><USER5> You could say the same thing about many free software projects created for the ecosystem. Many of them could have been created by Apple and shipped as a part of the system. I have donated my precious time to solve problems that should have been solved by Apple before. I'm not extatic about it, but my itch got scratched and hopefully I may have helped other people, too, so I consider it a pragmatic improvement. I can see your point, though, so let's simply disagree, it's good for the world to have different people try different approaches.

<comment><USER8> Yes, and it's a good reason to pause before making new free software for a nonfree system.

Sometimes it is good because it helps people use more free software- but not always. Sometimes it just helps people use the non-free software.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> No. It's Apple who needs to do that. This isn't a free software project - <USER2> of documentation is an argument for abandoning the platform, not for starting a community project of doing work for Apple for free.

<comment><USER10> I guess the problem is that Apple don't _need_ to do it; lots of people would like them to do it, and maybe they should do it, but it's not hurting their bottom line much so they can just continue as they are. Unless a whole heap of customers suddenly decide to buy different laptops instead over it, but I'd not be betting on that.

<comment><USER11> Arguably, this might happen in the long run. They might slowly lose dev over the years if they neglect documentation, which will eventually hurt the app ecosystem. Eventually, that'd affect user.

Very hard to say if the problem is serious enough yet though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> OT a bit but I think still related. 8 years ago when I switch to OSX I was furious with finder. Tiny window, no hierarchical browsing and the search just doesn't do shit that is useful.

I normally default to locate or find now so much that I was using it the other day I was reminded about how much it sucked. It's literally identical (aside from tags and labels) to what it was forever ago and is a terrible paradigm. I looked around for a bit for some help on refining the search sensibly and nothing in the OS helped (back on topic!). I've been using a great replacement for Finder called PathFinder that does everything Finder should do, but you can't swap it out. All the native places I access Finder are important inroads. They used to have instructions to hack it but apple shut them down.

I feel more and more like UI and usability innovation totally ate itself and died at maybe a specific moment in time ~6 years ago. Where did the people and companies go that do cool new things? Are the giants on their laurels long enough yet to get eaten? I'd switch totally to Ubuntu or Mint for my desktop work, but I do things that require the adobe suite, I need a trackpad that works as well as the mac one without fighting it, and I want to just solve problems, not fiddle with barely supported gizmos for weeks.

Did we reach the absolute end of all we can do with this juggling of rectangles that display and accept text and now we just get everything that matters to a power user stripped off for the sake of what "most users care about"? I really don't think we have.

I'm still pissed and I still have no answers. My kingdom for a $3000 laptop that "Just works" and helps me murder code, deployment, graphic arts, music, and still loads HBONow.

<comment><USER13> Ugh, finder is shit. I've set my default to list view a million times only to see a bunch of folder icons on my screen everytime I double click a directory.

I enjoy living in terminal. I'm very mediocre with both find and grep but I'm getting better and it makes me feel cool ;-), heh.

<comment><USER14> FWIW, I've never had that issue. Are you aware it sets the view type for each folder? It makes sense if you want to view different files in different ways. If you want to set all views to list system wide, you can set list as default in the view menu. Depending how you've set other folders you may need to nuke view settings, by it sounds like that won't be an issue for you. Spend a minute to learn how your tools work man. [https://howchoo.com/g/mzuxyjqyzmy/how-to-set-the-view- option...](https://howchoo.com/g/mzuxyjqyzmy/how-to-set-the-view-options-for- all-finder-windows-in-os-x)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Better: We need to stop using undocumented proprietary systems like macOS.

<comment><USER16> In contrast to undocumented free (open) systems? Documentation is an issue irrespective of prorietariness(??!) of a system.

I welcome this initiative.

(Yes I know there are examples of documentation excellence to be found in some free/open systems. You can advocate their use whilst also having well documented macOs.)

<comment><USER17> There is no undocumented open source software, the documentation is just in a technical language. This is why learning to program is important, as it also means learning how to read the documentation.

I'm not being factious. We always say that documentation doesn't keep up and that the only real documentation is the code. Ultimately the only reliably documented software is free software.

<comment><USER18> Code is the end result of a thinking / problem solving process, not the process itself. If I implement a mathematical formula in code, the "documentation" is the academic paper where the formula is described and proved, and the whole context of textbooks and other papers where the relevant terms are defined and abstractions are constructed, not the handful of lines of abstract arithmetic on one-letter variable names in the code. If I throw away the paper, the code doesn't suddenly become self-documenting.

If you're going to make such a reductionist definition of "documentation", why not go all the way: every executable program is just a sequence of clear and simple instructions to the machine. The documentation of what each instruction does is right there in black and white. Why would you need anything else? All programs are documented.

<comment><USER15> Good code can be understood just by reading it. That is practically impossible with binaries.

<comment><USER19> I think that's kind of jacobolus' point though.

(at the risk of speaking for someone else)...

jacobolus is saying that in both binary and source format, code is readable. It's just a matter of scale as to how readable each is.

Source is an abstraction of the code that is actually running, and documentation should be an abstraction of the source and how the running code works.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Just in case no-one read the leaflets that came with their new Mac, Apple has fairly comprehensive macOS documentation online:

[https://support.apple.com/macos](https://support.apple.com/macos)

A lot of this is built into your Mac also, at Help > Mac Help in the Finder.

For those who prefer physical books, I've always found the "Missing Manual" series to be excellent.

<comment><USER21> How come I never see them come up in Google searches? I have seen it come up when looking for conditioning your battery or the shortcut keys for Target Disk Mode. But more often I'll search for a runaway process name or an OS message that is spamming Console. The top results are Apple Discussion posts that go on for pages, but often don't have a clear result. I also recently was trying to learn more about macOS' init system and got lost like the article mentioned.

<comment><USER22> For the processes, it's not that the documentation doesn't exist, it's that they're very low-ranked in search results (and many who know that they're looking for a process name know to try 'man foo' before a web search) [0]. Any documentation rarely describes exactly a problem someone is experiencing but a discussion forum might, so those are the links that come up first in a search.

As for message in logs, I don't tend to find those in other *nix documentation either.

[0] [https://developer.apple.com/legacy/library/documentation/Dar...](https://developer.apple.com/legacy/library/documentation/Darwin/Reference/ManPages/man8/mdworker.8.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> For all the things that Microsoft takes flak about, this is one of the few areas you really can't complain much about. They maintain detailed versions documentation and make it easy to explore.

Every so often I come across something that isn't documented well or at all and it hurts. But it has a page at least and on every page they have a public feedback mechanism.

<comment><USER24> Not only that but also tooling (Visual Studio) and community development(Codeplex, Codeproject).

The Android ecosystem is not bad, also.

</comment></comment><comment> unkown-unknowns > Yet Apple's documentation for users and those supporting users has all but > dried up

You and me we both RTFM, but the population at large? Not so much. When computers were in their early days more of the people that used them were willing and even interested to learn a lot about what was going on. Now the computer is a tool used by most people to do specific tasks. Just like I don't care to learn how to fix my car they don't want to learn how to troubleshoot software nor hardware problems with their computers.

So it might not make economical sense for Apple to spend any significant amount of money on employing technical writers.

<comment><USER21> I think a more common example would be Googling a daemon that's hogging memory or CPU. Ideally, the top result would be Apple docs with a clear, concise description. In practice, it's usually an Apple discussion thread (which I do give some credit for them hosting/maintaining) or Stack Exchange. Although, I don't think I've ever seen an official response in their forums. It's usually a meandering set of posts (and "me toos!") before I can get any description of what it is or how to address it.

Sure, the average person doesn't have Activity Monitor (or top) open, but they could be walked through that process when their fans blare and battery life nosedives.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Apple has always been vague and stingy with the documentation; despite the author mentioning this,

 _In the days of classic Mac OS, when print publishing was growing as a result of Macs, Apple published an exemplary series of books under the banner Inside Macintosh_

I have read the Inside Macintosh books but they still felt somewhat incomplete and superficial (although they're definitely a little prettier) compared to what I'd consider close to a "gold standard" for documentation, the _IBM PC /AT Technical Reference_ and the same one for MS/PC-DOS.

I suppose it had a lot to do with the general attitude of Apple's culture, summarised in the famous phrase "it just works". The notion that systems should be designed to be so easy to use and obvious as to require no documentation, has resulted in a lack of documentation even for those cases which are _not_ easy to use nor obvious.

<comment><USER26> _I have read the Inside Macintosh books but they still felt somewhat incomplete and superficial (although they 're definitely a little prettier) compared to what I'd consider close to a "gold standard" for documentation, the IBM PC/AT Technical Reference and the same one for MS/PC-DOS._

One of these is a foot of big books documenting a GUI system and its components, the other is a single volume that tells you handy things like 'The PC/AT has three programmable timers'. I don't think the documentation was ever complete but Apple did produce a lot more of it and had a lot more to document to begin with. The level of documentation is not really directly comparable let alone a symptom of some non-existent 'just works' culture and attitude. If anything, one could make a reasonable argument Apple of the time spent too much effort on beautifully documenting piles of things that were ultimately not useful or successful.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> The author seems confused. Launchd is a service for starting processes (on boot, on other events, or on a schedule), Centralized Task Scheduling (CTS) is a low-level API used only by developers writing native code to perform tasks _within_ a process [0]. CTS can only be used by a running process while launchd _is_ a running process you can instruct by loading .plist files (normally they're only loaded at boot from LaunchAgent/ and LaunchDaemon/ directories).

[0] [https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/Pe...](https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/Performance/Conceptual/power_efficiency_guidelines_osx/DiscretionaryTasks.html)

</comment><comment><USER27> If you haven't already, join the MacAdmins Slack. [https://macadmins.herokuapp.com](https://macadmins.herokuapp.com) It's an open-invite slack team with over 12000 users - sysadmins, MDM developers, security researchers and so on.

We have various ongoing efforts to document and improve the macOS experience for users. If you have a macOS question, you'll likely find the answer there.

<comment><USER28> > _you 'll likely find the answer there_

Well, I hope the Google Bot (plus whichever one DDG uses) also has an invite to that proprietary, closed, messaging system, or that the "macadmins" owner has set up a channel mirroring system ala IRC web logs, otherwise the system you described isn't contributing to the open body of knowledge.

 _Related, although mildly off topic, :fu: slack search_

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> This problem is actually the reason I've fallen out of love with Macos as a platform for my home computers.

There's way too much stuff that goes around, daemons that are waking up at any given point and doing a lot of I/O, for which there's absolutely no documentation whatsoever.

It kills the performance on my old Macs and also doesn't inspire confidence that I'm a user/owner of the device.

<comment><USER30> > and also doesn't inspire confidence that I'm a user/owner of the device

...What gave you that delusion? Are you one of those people who clicks "okay" to EULAs without reading them?

<comment><USER31> Actually you still own the device just not the stuff making it actually useful. That is still owned by apple. (EULA)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> >> "I am also daily reminded of Apple's wholesale failure to provide consistent and complete documentation of its flagship product."

The author of this article fails to realise that the Mac is not Apple's flagship product anymore...

</comment><comment><USER33> TFA gives two very disparate examples of documentation failures (basic use of the dock vs service management and the init system). What does the author want to write? A book in the style of the For Dummies series? Something more like the Windows Internals books? Both, everything in between? Some of those surely already exist...

</comment><comment><USER34> Does anyone remember "Inside Macintosh," the manuals Apple published back in the classic Mac OS days? I have many of those books, covering everything from how the hardware handles drawing to the screen, up through memory management, files, networking, etc. They're examples of some of the best technical documentation I've ever encountered. It's too bad they don't prioritize that anymore. :(

<comment><USER35> I remember reading about them in the second paragraph of the article... ;-)

<comment><USER34> S'not the same to read _about_ it. If you're interested in documentation writing I recommend looking for some of Apple's older stuff on archive.org to see what it's like. I don't see much documentation written in their kind-of extended style these days... A lot of documentation seems to be either terse or tutorial-y, there's not much that tries to focus on the concepts relating to / the purpose of a given feature.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I hope the author of this site is proud of their fixed-position page header. Because it takes up fully 1/4 of the screen height in my browser.

Just sayin'.

</comment><comment><USER37> Open-source documentation (PRs requested!) on macOS security & privacy: [http://www.oss.io/p/drduh/OS-X-Security-and-Privacy- Guide](http://www.oss.io/p/drduh/OS-X-Security-and-Privacy-Guide)

 _"... a collection of thoughts on securing a modern Apple Mac computer using macOS (formerly OS X) 10.12 "Sierra", as well as steps to improving online privacy. This guide is targeted to "power users" who wish to adopt enterprise- standard security, but is also suitable for novice users with an interest in improving their privacy and security on a Mac."_

<comment><USER38> This is a great resource. A lot of things I didn't even know.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> To the author, did you file radars listing specifics of which areas you need documented? [https://bugreport.apple.com](https://bugreport.apple.com) isn't just for bugs.

</comment><comment><USER40> [https://opensource.apple.com/](https://opensource.apple.com/)

<comment><USER28> I have a rule that says something isn't truly Open Source unless you can build it, because binary patching is for chumps. Have you tried to build those? There are several projects attempting to do so, and I have yet to experience "download tar, ..., boot that Darwin build in a (qemu|vm)!" for any value of "...".

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> I find most answers I need on Stackexchange. However there are books like "Mac OS The Missing Manual", I always wondered if anyone bought them and what they actually contained.

<comment><USER42> My thoughts exactly. First thought was what problems did this person run into that can't be found in a single google hit today? I was thinking the piece would go into some obscure internals but that doesn't seem to be the case.

MacOS is simple enough to grasp for most people at first use. More advanced usage is documented, not in one location but scattered over the internet. Google made that not matter anymore.

In addition, most documentation you would need today is for the products you install I guess, not macOS. But again, it really doesn't matter much with Google finding anything you search.

My experience with (large) documentation projects. They are outdated almost always. Q&A style works much better nowadays.

<comment><USER28> > _Q &A style works much better nowadays._

I believe that's only true if the questioner is versed in "How to ask questions the smart way," and/or the answerer is _also_ versed in that, so they know how to answer what the questioner was _really_ asking

Not to mention the tons of "dear lazyweb, do my homework|task for me, kthxbai" level of effort expended by the questioner

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> "We"??

Maybe _we_ as customers of Apple should demand Apple to better document macOS. Apple can well afford to get the documentation fixed.

</comment><comment><USER44> When it's documented it cannot be changed as easily, so it's often better to not document everything in detail.

<comment><USER45> Then your users find that their own memory of where to find things and how to perform tasks is unreliable. Has the system changed or they forgotten it? You're effectively "gaslighting" your users if you rely on this.

<comment><USER30> Apple gives users APIs at the level they think users should be operating, not system internals.

Are we seriously having this discussion, HN? Did people just wake up today to what their reality has been for years? [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ilcRS5eUpwk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ilcRS5eUpwk)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> > We

That would be Apple's job, and if you're waiting for them to make it easier for third parties to work on the system they think rightfully are theirs alone to develop, don't hold your breath.

Did we all start taking amnesia pills or something? You knew what you signed up for.

</comment><comment><USER46> There is a saying in French which says that half of the treatment to get better is to recognize/admit you're sick . There is an other saying which says "Faute avouée est à moitié pardonnée" (If you admit a flaw/mistake, you're already half the way through forgiveness).

That to say that maybe there is a lack of documentation because Apple would have to admit to itself (...and to the world) that macOS is not the absolutely perfect OS without any flaws, virus/malware, or room for improvement, that they want all of us to believe.

<comment><USER47> > There is a saying in French which says that half of the treatment to get > better is to recognize/admit you're sick

I believe this comes from the 12 step program of the Alcohol Anonymous (religious sect).

1\. We admitted we were powerless over our addiction - that our lives had become unmanageable.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> The most profitable software company ever still can't build software properly (meaning: fully documented). Does this mean that it is impossible to build software properly at scale? Or is it just that you don't become that profitable without cutting a few corners?

(In my original comment I said "most profitable company", but it seems the dutch east india company gave them a run for their money. So, good news for apple, they still have room to grow.)

</comment><comment><USER49> It's old (circa 2006) and really low level, but I loved reading through Mac OS X Internals ([http://www.osxbook.com](http://www.osxbook.com))

If it were updated, or a vol2 was released with all the new stuff, I would immediately buy it.

It's not going to teach you how to use Finder, but you'll have a great understanding of the internals.

</comment><comment><USER50> Launchd documentation:

[https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/Ma...](https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/MacOSX/Conceptual/BPSystemStartup/Chapters/CreatingLaunchdJobs.html)

See more documents linked at the bottom of that page.

<comment><USER51> Nice, XML config. I wonder if Apple employees are internally allowed to voice criticism.

<comment><USER52> Plist files have XML, binary, and JSON-like serialization options, and have been in use for longer than JSON has existed. Any Mac developer will be familiar with them, and have access to multiple APIs for handling them. Of all the things in MacOS to criticize, this is just ignorant.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> > I am also daily reminded of Apple's wholesale failure to provide consistent > and complete documentation of its flagship product.

Well, I'd argue macOS is not their flagship product. Apple makes their money from selling phones these days. I think they have better things to do than to document a marginalized OS.

</comment><comment><USER54> I just wish apple would stop breaking gdb every release. They need to make up their mind on whether OS X is a general purpose OS intended for developer use or if its just a locked down version of iOS which runs on larger devices.

<comment><USER55> It intended for OS X and iOS developers, which use the official supported debugger, lldb.

<comment><USER54> In other words writing systems software for OS X if you are not employed by Apple is a fools errand?

<comment><USER55> No, a fools errand is to buy a Mac and use GNU/Linux tooling instead of the official OS X SDK tooling.

GDB stop being part of the official modern SDKs quite long time ago.

<comment><USER54> I understand that gdb is not part of the official SDK. I would expect an OS in widespread use to not break userspace and when it does, take substantial remedial action to fix / patch widely used applications.

<comment><USER55> The onus is on gdb developers to keep up with the OS API changes, not the other way around.

<comment><USER54> Gives a fairly balanced view of the picture - [http://www.infoworld.com/article/2988096/mac-os-x/sorry- unix...](http://www.infoworld.com/article/2988096/mac-os-x/sorry-unix-fans-os- x-el-capitan-kills-root.html) .

<comment><USER55> As I can not edit my comment any longer, examples how Tru64 made use of Security Integration Architecture, are described on the "Security Programming" guide, [http://h41361.www4.hpe.com/docs/base_doc/DOCUMENTATION/V51B_...](http://h41361.www4.hpe.com/docs/base_doc/DOCUMENTATION/V51B_ACRO_DUX/ARSFDATE.PDF)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> Apple's primary focus and the source of money is iOS. That is why macOS has to be 1) just noticeably better than competitors 2) inconvenient enough for average users to partially migrate to iOS.

</comment><comment><USER50> How to charge you Magic Trackpad:

[https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT205160](https://support.apple.com/en- us/HT205160)

Also included in paper documentation in the box.

<comment><USER57> There's also a low battery notification that says something like 'plugin a Lighting cable to charge'

</comment></comment><comment><USER58> How can outsiders even begin to effectively maintain documentation for obscure macOS things like DAS and CTS? I can't be the only person who has never heard of these before.

</comment><comment><USER59> Are we talking about technical documentation or unofficial user manual? We don't need the latter for sure.

</comment><comment><USER60>
        > I don't know how many technical authors were employed
        > by Apple at that time, but I suspect it was a
        > far higher proportion of total staff than it is now.

Or maybe the proportion is the same, but Tim's shorter release cycle has resulted in the OS permanently being in a state of churn.

</comment><comment><USER61> No we don't have to.

Stop consuming proprietary code from for-profit corporations.

</comment><comment><USER62> Read the FreeBSD documentation ... you'll get it ;-)

</comment><comment><USER50> End user docs about The Dock:

[https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT201730](https://support.apple.com/en- ca/HT201730)

More links at the bottom

</comment><comment><USER63> Here are some docs

[http://images.apple.com/server/docs/Command_Line.pdf](http://images.apple.com/server/docs/Command_Line.pdf)

[https://www.apple.com/jp/server/pdfs/Mac_OS_X_Server_v10.2.p...](https://www.apple.com/jp/server/pdfs/Mac_OS_X_Server_v10.2.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER64> This is Apple we are talking about.

If you built a knowledge-base like this on your own time and for the right reasons I bet they send a DMCA.

<comment><USER65> >If you built a knowledge-base like this on your own time and for the right reasons I bet they send a DMCA.

Why do you say that? Your post makes me think I'm ignorant of Apple's past litigation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER66> Why bother? If the people making the thing can't be bothered documenting it you're going to fight an uphill battle. In the long run, for better or for worse, code is documentation. If the code isn't available there'll be only so far you can go. And with the unification of iOS and macOS fast approaching the number of people able to have transparency into even just the POSIX layer is going to drop another order of magnitude.

macOS is dead, Apple just hasn't told anyone about it yet. And iOS 11 is going to be it's murderer.

If you have the time to document, you might as well spend the time documenting Windows, BSD or Linux; Blink or Servo. Or the JS ecosystem.

The Apple specific SMB implementation or APFS or Cocoa are not worth documenting any more than OOXML would be - only as a specification that one party has the power to change and to implement. There is no way for the documentation to be considered prescriptive rather than descriptive for anyone touching the code. It might be useful in some limited aspect for a limited time, but it will decay as Apple considers every single pixel their OS is going to render to be under their control in some way. Apart from what they can sandbox, which amounts to the web platform, which is plenty documented already.

> launchd – second only in importance to the kernel – controlled and > orchestrated most of the services supplied in macOS

Who cares about the launch facilities in macOS when anyone who should care about launch facilities is going to be using Windows Server, Linux or BSD? Apple couldn't have been saying fuck off to anyone wanting to screw around with CUPS or Samba or launchd more loudly unless they shouted it from all the rooftops in Cupertino.

> Magic Trackpad 2, never knew how to launch an app from the Dock, or couldn't > manage their Photos library.

1\. It'll stop working (here we go, top result for a Google search: [https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204621](https://support.apple.com/en- us/HT204621)) 2. Launchpad exists and has a keyboard shortcut and 3. Photos manage themselves. What does manage even mean in the context of you take a picture with a phone, it adds geotagging and a time and that's it. What more do 99% of users want?</comment>


Landlord service Naborly makes blacklist of tenants who missed 4/1 rent (YC '18) - <AUTHOR> https://www.qpbriefing.com/2020/04/06/unconscionable-landlord-service-naborly-draws-criticism-for-creating-blacklist-of-tenants-who-missed-april-1-rent/ <comment><USER2> If you know anyone in California who might be affected by this company please let them know to file a complaint against Naborly. They apparently have no idea what the laws here are, and they are also most likely in violation of numerous other United States credit reporting laws.

Edit: Their Privacy Policy says nothing about California, and it looks like they're most likely already in violation of California's CCPA.

Edit 2: Can't find them registered anywhere in the US as a credit reporting agency. I guess YC is now funding companies flagrantly violating US law.

<comment><USER3> Naborly are in Ontario; they are, it sounds, flagrantly violating _Canadian_ law. A former privacy commissioner is quoted as saying that they would investigate Naborly over these allegations.

For examples of flagrantly violating US law amongst YC's prides and joy [0], consider examining DoorDash [1] or Airbnb [2].

[0] [https://www.ycombinator.com/topcompanies/](https://www.ycombinator.com/topcompanies/)

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DoorDash#Criticism_and_lawsuit...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DoorDash#Criticism_and_lawsuits)

[2] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbnb#Controversies](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbnb#Controversies)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > "The more data we have on what happens over the next few days is going to > really accelerate our ability to retrain our AI systems and then help all of > you accurately understand tenant risk moving forward into this new world,"

This is actually dumb in terms of ML, and really dumb in terms of discrimination.

Given someone missed rent April 1st 2020, what does that tell you going forward about their future? Does it imply they're likely to miss rent again someday? Far less than the same data point _any other time_ before. So it's not useful that way. So why get these data points about people?

Perhaps what it does imply is that they may have poor health? Or a disability? Or that they don't have a university degree? Or (data still coming as to this relationship) that they are more likely to be a specific race?

I feel that what these folks are really doing is trying to have their model learn to predict "won't pay rent" based on a data point that implies all the things they're not allowed to train their model to predict with due to obvious discrimination laws.

Edit 5 minutes later: It could be innocent stupidity too. Hanlon's razor is important.

<comment> T-hawk There's value in the _converse_ of that data point, though, right? If someone _made_ rent on April 1st (and maybe even more importantly May 1st), that might be an even stronger signal that they'll continue to do so without interruption.

<comment><USER5> The big differentiator is going to white collar jobs. There will be others, but it doesnt take an AI to figure out who is at risk.

<comment><USER6> The UK government announced and started support for pay (income tax) as you earn employees a while before support for the self employed/contractors, so maybe the AI prefers standard salaried employment above all else.

<comment><USER7> > maybe the AI prefers standard salaried employment above all else.

Is it wrong for AI to have the same biases as the general population?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm a Naborly user (landlord) in the USA. Naborly emailed repeatedly asking for this information (I refused).

Interestingly, they asked about my tenants' payment on April 1st, not even taking into account grace periods or such.

Also, I never signed up to receive their emails, and I've expressly asked them to stop emailing me.

<comment><USER9> I'm interested in checking this out myself, if you're comfortable sharing those communications would you contact me, devin at techcrunch dot com? I'd just like to see how the company approached this.

<comment><USER10> There's (apparently) one posted in this very discussion at [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22807064](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22807064) , notice.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The big problem here is that it will be hidden. If I get a tenant applying this fall, and I see on their credit report a "missed April rent" mark, I'm going to ignore it for obvious reasons.

But if I get their report, it will just say "high risk" but won't tell me why, and I'll have no way of knowing it was because of missing rent in April.

<comment><USER12> And this is what people talk about when they mention the dangers of blindly trusting technology. It bakes in inequality, and no one is to blame, because it's such a complicated piece of software/hardware/code/whatever you want to blame.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> "The more data we have on what happens over the next few days is going to really accelerate our ability to retrain our AI systems and then help all of you accurately understand tenant risk moving forward into this new world"

AI seems to be like Javascript. It can be used for good, or it can be used for evil. And for some reason the evil uses are always out in front.

We need to fix people so they don't think this sort of thing is OK.

<comment><USER14> People have ethics. Technology does not.

<comment><USER15> What ethics allow someone to think creating a "blacklist" of people who were unable to pay rent during the largest public health crisis in a century is a good idea? Five seconds of thought tells you this is just a way to target the most vulnerable among us.

<comment><USER16> Which is exactly the goal, every landlord would rather have ridiculously rich tenants, and most wouldn't give a single shit about what happened to the people who weren't.

<comment><USER15> Of course, but rich people are on to that scam already. I would wager that most of those who can afford to own a home do, simply because they don't want a landlord as a liability.

<comment><USER17> You'd lose that wager. There are many reasons why someone who could pay for a home would choose not to - e.g. maybe they do not plan to their in their current geographical area for a long enough period of time for it to be worthwhile, the cost of renting vs. owning in their area is low, they do not want to be responsible for maintenance, etc.

Edit: I now realize you said "most". You would not lose the wager.

<comment><USER15> Where is the data set on this?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> There's actually a TON of regulatory compliance involved with tenant screening like this in the US.

Pretty sure that they run afoul of a few provisions in the FCRA. That they claim to "keep reporting fully confidential and DO NOT notify your tenant that you have reported to our system." seems really fishy to me. If a landlord makes an adverse decision based on information in their system, the person being screened has a legal right to view that information and dispute it.

</comment><comment><USER19> This doesn't sound all that different from a regular credit rating.

As it relates to the financial troubles people are going through right now, while failing to pay April 1 rent is _a_ data point, I think the uniqueness of the situation we're in will prove it not to be a particularly useful data point for landlords going forward.

Any landlord that overweights that in their decision-making around who to rent to is probably doing so to their own longterm detriment.

<comment><USER20> " _Ries said Naborly seems to be acting as a consumer reporting agency, of which there are currently two licensed in Ontario: Equifax and TransUnion. The industry is tightly regulated due to the personal information involved._ "

On the other hand, if it isn't acting as a consumer reporting agency, then Naborly's operation seems like it should be strictly illegal:

" _The process has also raised concerns from the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA), which noted that property managers in Canada are not allowed to publish "bad tenants" lists._"

> " _Any landlord that overweights that in their decision-making around who to > rent to is probably doing so to their own longterm detriment._ "

On the other hand, as in technical hiring, it is probably better to miss 10 good tenants rather than rent to one bad one. Right?

<comment><USER21> > On the other hand, as in technical hiring, it is probably better to miss 10 > good tenants rather than rent to one bad one. Right?

Sure, if there is a shortage of housing and surplus of potential tenants. But in areas where there is a surplus of housing, it might be better than fill a unit with a tenant who has a 15% chance of not being able to pay rent (but who is otherwise a good tenant) than leaving the unit vacant for a year.

<comment><USER22> > it might be better than fill a unit with a tenant who has a 15% chance of > not being able to pay rent

That's nowhere near the worst-case "bad tenant". The worst-case scenario takes months to evict and leaves behind tens of thousands of dollars of property damage. There might even be some personal harassment thrown in just for good measure. Avoiding such a tenant is absolutely worth missing some opportunities to fill the property with a paying tenant.

Not that missing rent this April 1 is likely to tell you much about that particular risk.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I've been thinking about this a lot lately, starting with the public outcry from Airbnb hosts who have had their bookings cancelled.

And then, Cheesecake Factory announced it would not pay April 1 rent on any of its locations.

The economic fallout of this situation is something we will all bear the brunt of. Landlords are not shielded from it. I'm not saying everyone should stop paying rent, but the fact of the matter is, if people and businesses are not making money for months on end, many of them will have no choice but to stop paying.

It is unconscionable that someone thought to turn this into a blacklist which many of the unlucky millions who have recently lost their jobs will end up on.

<comment><USER24> blacklist is bad yes I agree because it doesn't take situation in mind and current situation may not indicate anything about the renter in the future.

Landlords are in a slightly different boat than say the restaurant down the street. The restaurant isn't forced to provide services to anyone if they aren't getting paid, most places right now have basically blocked evictions (which is a good thing) and forcing landlords to keep people in place regardless if they get paid or not.

Many are turning this into a protest against rent and even if they have the means to pay are organizing rent strikes ... this is going to bite people in the butt this summer / fall when we are out of this mess.

My not so informed opinion is that once states of emergency are lifted if you didn't pay your rent your landlord can take you to the arbitration board in your area ... if you can prove you were out of work then you get X months to pay back your back rent (where X maybe equals 2x the number of months you missed rent) and if you can't prove you were out of work you have 30 days to pay your back rent or your out.

<comment><USER25> In my county, renters have to show hardship to skip their rent. Then they have 90 days to pay back any missed rent once the emergency has passed, which they can extend, 30 days at a time, up to 180 days total (including the first 90) if they can still show hardship.

Additionally, you cannot be evicted for lack of payment during the emergency. After is less clear.

<comment><USER26> In my country, the UK, it's not that good.

Eviction proceedings require 3 months notice now. That's not as good as it sounds: It was already 2 months normally.

Notice can still be given. If you miss rent on 1st April and then the grace period passes (which is not long), they can send you notice of eviction proceedings that will start in 3 months.

So you can't be removed from your rented home for 3 months, but you can lose your right to continue renting there in 3 months, caused by events happening right now.

I don't think they can evict due to lack of payment in the emergency. Which is just as well, because the notice period for non-payment eviction proceedings is quite short.

However, landlords have the right to give no-reason eviction notices to most tenants _anyway_ (I think it's mostly tenants who've been there for > 6 months). They don't need to give a reason, they just have to feel like it.

The notice period for that is now 3 months instead of the former 2 months...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I mean, they can create these lists all they want - but in the end, it's gonna be all noise. We're living in extraordinary times, and records like these do not work for their intended purpose: Singling out renters with history / patterns of delinquency.

In fact - If anything, landlords should buckle up and brace for the worst. Trying to get someone evicted right now isn't going to do sh!t. You'll spend MONTHS on the process, with probably no good replacement.

No, the best thing to do right now is to contact your tenants and bank(if they own your unit), and work out a plan that works for all parties. You're both deep in it, and there are no _good_ ways out for the next 3-4 months, only the least terrible.

And I absolutely understand the frustration of fresh landlords that are mortgaged to their necks with their (maybe) only rental, but that's unfortunately how life is. Good times and bad times.

<comment><USER28> Not going to be noise for prospective tenants who are denied based on a missed payment, reported without context or mitigation. As usual, this is good news for the business end of the database+AI, screw you end of the stick for consumers who have no access to examine, dispute, or have deleted anything the company has collected.

Transparency again. And again. Companies need to be forced to disclose the column names in their DBs and justify publicly why they are keeping each piece of data.

<comment><USER26> The database people really ought to be working on a blacklist of abusive landlords and their properties, for tenants to avoid.

Something easily searchable and integrated into mainstream property search sites would be great.

"[ ] Hide landlords and agents with many bad reviews from verified tenants, verified history of no-fault evictions, official complaints and government sanctions."

But it won't happen as long as it's the landlords who pay for the searchable listing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> >"Please note that we keep reporting fully confidential and DO NOT notify your tenant that you have reported to our system."

Brutal. They know how it looks, they just don't care to be seen being that guy.

<comment><USER30> If this is YC backed, can we have an ethics discussion sometime?

<comment><USER31> Didn't YC back a lot of advertising/marketing crap that adds zero value to the world beyond spamming users and tracking them?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> If nothing else this seems like the type of data that you just don't want to collect. The PR and potential risks of what happens next massively outweigh any sort of value I could see this having given the situation around COVID.

Just because you can doesn't mean you should

<comment><USER13> It also seems like exactly the sort of information that the credit agencies would collect and offer for sale.

As we have seen with their data breaches, they have no shame, and operating in a black box under the shield of "trade secrets" lets them do any slimy thing they want.

PR might bring down a small company like Naborly, but Experian and the others are bulletproof.

<comment><USER33> Posibly off-topic but I read these often here

> (these companies) have no shame

Companies have no morals. People have morals. Thus reframing 'BigCorp is bad' trope.

<comment><USER13> I think you're just splitting hairs.

It's much easier, common, and not incorrect to say, "Company A does bad things" rather than "An important subset of the people at the head of Company A have enacted policies that caused bad things to happen."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Sad to see this from a YCombinator company.

<comment><USER35> Would be useful to edit the title to note it is a YC company, as is convention.

<comment><AUTHOR> Done. Had to tweak title for character limit.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I'm reasonably sure this is illegal in the US (in Virginia at least.) You're required to process rental applications in the order you receive them and can only reject them for certain reasons (failing a credit check for example.) Unless a credit company starts using this it means very little here.

</comment><comment><USER37> This seems like it would naturally be one data point and risk calculation service in an eventual/inevitable social credit system.

Publicly trying to create that specific aspect in isolation seems to be a big misstep, though they'd probably have a better chance with it legally in the US than Canada.

</comment><comment><USER38> I am curious at what point all those private corporations with their never ending data gathering, scoring, etc will accomplish that exact thing done by China. China profiles their citizens, assigns them social score and the ones that do not get enough points get their rights diminished. We seem to have a lot of black lists that affect our lives. And those lists multiply and grow bigger by the day. But of course as long as we being screwed by corporations rather than the government it is all kosher.

</comment><comment><USER39> Is this even legal? Can someone who knows about Canada's tenant protection laws chime in?

<comment><USER40> I don't know very much and can't speak to it's legality, but I do know Canada (at least Ontario) has very strong tenant protections, and the law tends to land on the side of the tenants instead of the landlords. I wouldn't be surprised if this was either illegal or if tenants could take the landlord to court if they though they were passed over because of this.

<comment><USER41> My experience of Ontario tenant laws were very much the opposite. If you want to have a terrible housing situation, moving to Toronto is a good bet.

<comment><USER24> The LTB [1] in Ontario is heavily leaned towards the tenant and currently is blocking all evictions in the city regardless of payment of rent.

>COVID-19 Notice: Until further notice, the LTB is suspending the issuance of eviction orders and all hearings related to eviction applications — unless the matter relates to an urgent issue such as an illegal act or serious impairment of safety.

1\. [http://www.sjto.gov.on.ca/ltb/](http://www.sjto.gov.on.ca/ltb/)

<comment><USER26> What stops them issuing a no-fault eviction notice as soon as the COVID-19 notice is relaxed, because on their preference for a more creditworthy tenant?

<comment><USER42> I'm in BC, not Ontario, but no-fault eviction isn't a thing here. You can evict a tenant for reasons such as:

\- didn't pay rent

\- late paying rent at least three times

\- your family is planning to occupy the unit

\- unit is uninhabitable

\- major damage to property

\- broke the terms of the lease

Family occupancy is the most common workaround that landlords use, and it takes a long time to make it happen. Followed by "renoviction" (leaving the unit in disrepair until they can force the tenant out for construction). That is also expensive and takes a long time. In any case, there has to be a reason.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> Did any of these legal (not to mention ethical) questions come up when they applied for YC?

</comment><comment><USER44> And people wonder why Mao has recently gained in popularity.

There's a maximum you can push people until it springs back into your face.

<comment><USER15> Since you mentioned Mao, I'm going to glom on here with this: what service does a landlord offer beyond four walls, a floor, and a ceiling, that's worth hundreds or thousands of dollars a month? They deal with maintenance issues, sure; occasionally, they can help mediate disputes between neighbors. But, beyond that, what justifies them getting paid simply for owning more of a thing (housing) than they can personally use? It seems like the perfect set of incentives to create hoarding and abuse, which is exactly what we see in the real world.

<comment><USER45> They offer the service of providing limited-term accommodation with no assumption of liability for regular, small payments. Contrast this to owning a house/condo, where the owner has an indefinite right to the property, but assumes liability (e.g. mortgage debt, property taxes) and/or plunks down a very large amount of cash all at once.

> what justifies them getting paid simply for owning more of a thing (housing) > than they can personally use?

... Because they own it, and let others use it for a fee.

Let me just ask straight up: Do you believe that private property should not exist?

<comment><USER46> > They offer the service of providing limited-term accommodation with no > assumption of liability for regular, small payments. Contrast this to owning > a house/condo, where the owner has an indefinite right to the property, but > assumes liability (e.g. mortgage debt, property taxes) and/or plunks down a > very large amount of cash all at once.

This presents a false dichotomy in my view. If a property is paid for, there's no emergent liability set upon the owner that isn't also set by the state (which grants them absentee property title in the first place). All of the market mechanisms that incentivize transformation, maintenance, and occupation of land can exist without recognizing absentee title as legitimate, enabling people to occupy spaces they don't own without having to pay a rentier in perpetuity.

<comment><USER45> > If a property is paid for, there's no emergent liability set upon the owner > that isn't also set by the state (which grants them absentee property title > in the first place).

I mostly agree here, although there is an argument that certain torts against property owners are not really "set by the state" except that they recognize that without official codification and means of redress, mob justice or personal vengeance might proliferate.

> All of the market mechanisms that incentivize transformation, maintenance, > and occupation of land can exist without recognizing absentee title as > legitimate, enabling people to occupy spaces they don't own without having > to pay a rentier in perpetuity.

I'm not clear exactly what you're arguing here: The government could just own all land but allow anyone to build on it and occupy it indefinitely for free? Or nobody can own land they do not reside in?

There are so, so many problems here. How do you resolve disputes between rival claimants to a building? How exactly does one move to a new place-do they sell the house? So they retain ownership of the improvements, but not the land? If there is no formal ownership, how are property taxes assessed? Do they just go away? Are they based only on improvements?

If we can still own improvements, but only one per person and a person must reside on the property to own it, people will still need an improvement to live in, and they will still have to either buy one or rent one, changing nothing. If we can't own improvements we don't live in, well, who will be building new apartments and condos? You will end up with a huge market inefficiency, with lots of low-capital people with demand for housing and lots of capital owners who could theoretically supply that demand by building commercial residential property but will not because they legally cannot own and profit from any construction.

<comment><USER46> > How do you resolve disputes between rival claimants to a building?

What I am envisioning here is a world where abandoning a property grants rights to the next person to occupy it, rather than allowing the original proprietor to act as a permanent parasitic middleman between maintenance and occupants. In the case of conflict, I would imagine it would carry out similarly to how all disputes get resolved. With a state you can navigate through a legal system, and without one you have market solutions such as Coasian bargaining, social sanction, arbitration, etc. This doesn't mean that someone gets to sleep in your bed if you haven't used it since you woke up, but approaching these kinds of problems require recognizing property as the dynamic and fluid social relationship that it is. How do you deal with a family member eating your leftovers in the fridge?

> If we can't own improvements we don't live in, well, who will be building > new apartments and condos? You will end up with a huge market inefficiency, > with lots of low-capital people with demand for housing and lots of capital > owners who could theoretically supply that demand by building commercial > residential property but will not because they legally cannot own and profit > from any construction.

I don't buy this. It doesn't follow that eliminating one vector for rent- seeking eliminates all incentive to satisfy demand, as there is still profit to be made from production!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> Unless you can request and dispute your data, it's absolutely illegal. I'm sure they are reaming out a loophole, but the bottom line is; A company cannot secretly gather data used for financial decisions and just not tell you about it.

</comment><comment><USER48> It's becoming increasingly obvious that we're assembling our own copy of China's social credit system, except it's privately-owned (and apparently YC- funded). I don't see that as an improvement in any way.

</comment><comment><USER49> Results of the survey if anyone is interested: [https://naborly.com/blog/covid-19](https://naborly.com/blog/covid-19)

And the email that was sent after the initial request for data:

>I would appreciate a moment of your time to clarify my team's efforts to make a positive impact amidst the COVID-19 crisis.

Yesterday, I wrote an email asking landlords to provide information on April rent payments. This information was intended to allow Naborly to better support landlords and tenants and promote a mutual understanding of the severe impact the economic shutdown is having on the rental industry. Upon reflection, I recognize that the email was poorly worded and did not provide sufficient context. I am deeply sorry if it suggested that Naborly or myself were trying to do anything other than help.

Our goal at Naborly is to provide a tenant screening tool that is free from bias, and we are firm believers that housing is a human right. For tenants, we aim to remove traditional barriers to housing such as level of income, student or immigration status, or prior evictions. For landlords, we provide a screening tool that captures a tenant's entire ability to pay rent, beyond factors such as credit history.

As part of that goal, we have always had a reporting tool that allows landlords to provide feedback, both positive and negative, on their tenants. In light of the COVID-19 crisis, this information is more important than ever. We serve over 800,000 rental units and their owners and are in a unique position to compile information on the hardships facing tenants and landlords alike. Having accurate information allows us to adapt our screening tools to ensure tenants are not unfairly viewed as intentionally delinquent on their rent obligations. Last week, we were grateful to have received survey responses from more than 5000 tenants and 700 landlords on the difficulties the COVID-19 pandemic has created for them, and were able to use that information to promote a constructive dialogue between tenants and landlords. You can read the results of our survey here.

Naborly is and will always be committed to unbiased accuracy, fairness, and equality in our risk assessment. The notion that we are trying to hurt tenants in this time of crisis is against everything we believe in as a team. I am deeply sorry that the way I expressed myself did not reflect who we are as a company and what we are trying to accomplish. It was not my intention.

Our support lines are open to all landlords and tenants to assist in navigating the government programs available to them and to answer any other questions they may have.

Sincerely,

Dylan Lenz

Founder & CEO Naborly Inc.

<comment><USER50> This seems like a huge PR risk just to have people tell you that times are tough out there, if you aren't retaining the individual data points.

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> So... is data good or is it not? I mean, I am sure each and every bank, renter, landlord, whatever has a list including those people who did not pay on April 1.

Otherwise it would be against everybody's interests.

What is the problem here? Intent? Ah, then the burden of the proof is greater.

</comment><comment><USER52> @samatlman check your boys out.

</comment><comment><USER53> Apparently Naborly is like Yelp, but about tenants, for landlords...

But that must mean there's something else like Yelp, but about landlords, for tenants...

<comment><USER35> Yelp itself is roughly like this actually, a few large apartment buildings are on there. One of the places I used to live offered us a Starbucks gift card if we wrote a positive review.

</comment></comment><comment><USER54> this is like a creepier version of Don't Date Him Girl.

</comment><comment><USER55> This seems to be a common thread amongst YC startups. Uber, AirBNB, Instacart, DoorDash, etc. Why do many YC companies act in such sociopathic manners?

Cash Rules Everything Around Me.

I'm throwing a party when these guys go to jail.

</comment><comment><USER56> Hrm. Wasn't everyone saying a few years ago that "freedom to do X isn't freedom from consequences for doing X"? How is this situation any different?

If you don't pay your rent, that's fine. Plenty of jurisdictions have suspended rent payments. But _that_ you didn't pay your rent is a true fact. You either did or you didn't. It's part of history. It's a feature of objective reality. You can't stop people from remembering true facts and talking about them. You don't make a better world by suppressing information.

<comment><USER57> > Plenty of jurisdictions have suspended rent payments.

Many jurisdictions where I am have suspended _evictions_ for non-payment of rent, but not the rent payments themselves. Tenants are still liable for the rent and may be liable for additional interest.

In the U.S., it would probably be unconstitutional for a government to just take away all the rents from landlords.

</comment></comment><comment><USER58> > Housing lawyer Benjamin Ries, with the University of Toronto's Downtown > Legal Services, said his organization has sent a letter to Naborly seeking > clarification of the company's intentions, because it seems like it's > building an illegal "blacklist.

Is such a blacklist actually illegal or did they mistype "immoral"?

<comment><USER59> It violates privacy laws so it's illegal. And like the article also says, credit rating agencies need to be registered through the government and consumers need to give their consent for a credit check.

<comment><USER60> I am not so sure. Do you have to give consent for a bank to submit a charge- off report to the various credit bureaus in case of negative balance or other delinquency?

This sounds like the initial data collection which is a massive grey area IMO. The _use_ of that data to make an approve/decline decision is where the regulations start to take effect.

<comment><USER59> > I am not so sure. Do you have to give consent for a bank to submit a charge- > off report to the various credit bureaus in case of negative balance or > other delinquency?

No, but you need to give permission for anyone to run a credit check on you. Literally no one can legally see that info without you giving them permission to do so. Whereas anyone can sign up for this service and see info about you.

Edit - also, banks won't give you a bad score as long as you keep paying the minimum on all your credit products. And in my experience, their willingness to give you a mortgage or extend credit has more to do with your income and assets than a credit score.

<comment><USER57> > No, but you need to give permission for anyone to run a credit check on you.

Whether that is true will depend on your jurisdiction. In the U.S. at least, it is not true. In the U.S., a consumer report needs to be for a permissible purpose, but it does not always require explicit permission of the consumer. See 15 U.S. Code § 1681b, [https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1681b](https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1681b).</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


StackStorm, OpenSource "IFTTT for Ops" Acquired by Brocade - <AUTHOR> http://venturebeat.com/2016/03/29/brocade-buys-data-center-automation-startup-stackstorm/ <comment><USER2> I looked into StackStorm several times in the past and got turned off by its complexity and the choice of MongoDB. And, now, somebody paid money for this? Wow!</comment>


The New iPad Mini - <AUTHOR> https://daringfireball.net/2019/03/the_new_ipad_mini <comment><USER2> Apple's lineup is getting so confusing. The iPad Mini is praised by a lot of Apple enthusiasts but for me it just adds more chaos to their product lineup. Which tablet supports which pen? Can I connect my iPad to my Macbook using the included cables? Do I charge with USB-C or lightning? Does my device support 3D touch? What's the difference between an iPad and an iPad Air? What's the difference between the Macbook and the Macbook Air and why is the Air thicker? Does my Mac have a T2 chip (the new iMacs don't). Can I get my device of choice with 128GB (only the XR, not the XS). There's too much segmentation and I think it's appropriate to ask whether this would've happened under Steve. If I can't keep up with this mess, how do they expect non-tech people to do so?

<comment> yoz-y I think that the iPad lineup is pretty okay currently. You have the iPad which is the cheapest, Air is lighter and Mini is smaller. They all use lightning and support the Pecil 1. Pro hardware has USB-C, faceid and supports Pencil 2. None of them has 3D touch.

Mac lineup tho... makes less sense.

<comment><USER3> I'm so glad 3d touch isn't on every device. It's such a bad technology. Touching should be simple and understandable. 3D touch just feels like random events are happening for no reason. Between long press, tap, and drag there is already plenty of complexity there. 3D touch takes it too far.

But because Apple didn't standardize on it, it will hopefully never get wide adoption.

That said, I'd it does eventually seep into Apple's low end, that will just make it easier for the company that takes a usability-first approach to designing a mobile OS, when they come to eat Apple's lunch.

I think that's a huge opportunity for whoever builds up enough gumption to think a new mobile OS startup is worth trying.

<comment> yoz-y I think 3d touch has problems but they are all tied to software. I find it extremely useful for keyboard cursor. It requires some finesse but the 3d touch version (as opposed to the long press available on iPad and iPhone XR) is more useful as it can do selection by changing pressure. It is not very accessible as it requires some finesse though.

Another feature I use all the time is 3d touch on apps which have quick shortcuts.

Where I agree is that there is too much of a fine line drawn between long press, drag and 3d touch and it is far from easy to be able to activate the desired one 100% of the time.

<comment><USER3> The fact that you use it all the time doesn't mean it's good design. Often it takes time to find solutions which allow the same benefits without increasing complexity.

3D touch is a the equivalent of "just add more buttons". Sure, people will use the buttons. Doesn't mean it was the best design.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This may sound crazy, but I would consider my iPad Mini 4 (with cellular) to be my primary computing device.

To be fair, I have multiple desktop computers, laptops, and servers in my house. And for work we each get a development laptop and a desktop with multiple monitors. So I'm no luddite by any stretch.

But it fits in the front pocket of a pair of Dockers type pants. Meaning, I often leave my phone at home and carry just my iPad.

It travels with me to work and home. I bring it to meetings instead of my laptop, unless I am coding. I leave it open to skype so that conversations don't break my typing flow.

It sits in front of my computer while I am home playing youtube. I bring it onto the front porch on a cool evening for kindle and carcassonne. And it goes with me to the hot tub.

I originally bought it as a travel companion device. But found it fit so well, that I just carry it with me pretty much anywhere.

<comment><USER5> I'm with you but with my S10+ at this point.

I use it for browsing the internet casually. As soon as I get to work I hook it up trough my USB-C hub to DeX to watch plex. When I get home, if I want to get some work done I hook it up over DeX and boot ubuntu on it.

I don't bring a computer with me when I travel, I use RDP from DeX if I need to do some real heavy lifting that the Ubuntu distro I have can't do (which rarely happens, but does happen.)

At this point I could go months with my phone, a USB-C PD charger, an HDMI cable, and a cheap ($20) USB-C hub.

DeX is criminally underrated and the major reason I'm going Android (Samsung more than Android even) over iOS this generation. Granted, I'm losing out on security/privacy :(.

<comment><USER6> How do you run Ubuntu on the phone?

<comment><USER7> [https://www.linuxondex.com/](https://www.linuxondex.com/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> > It has the same A12 CPU ... with 3 GB of RAM on the _system-on-a-chip_

Actually that's _package-on-package_. The LPDDR4X DRAM is glued (well, reflow soldered) to the back of the A12 Bionic.

[https://www.techinsights.com/about- techinsights/overview/blo...](https://www.techinsights.com/about- techinsights/overview/blog/apple-iphone-xs-teardown/)

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

</comment><comment><USER9> There's an acute problem with using the iPad Mini that no one has yet mentioned here. The text is too damn small unless you have perfect eyesight. For example, Hacker News in Safari on the Mini appears in a super tiny font. If you pinch-zoom, the edges of the page roll off the screen, and you'd be constantly panning left and right. I've tried extensions that increase the font size on web pages -- they all have some failing, like making the letters run together or messing up tables.

I'll grant that this is not the fault of the iPad Mini itself. I blame web standards and browsers for not requiring all parts of a page to scale linearly and re-flow cleanly. It is (in theory) a problem solvable entirely by software. However, the reality of the web is what it is. If you don't have perfect eyesight, it's better to buy a large iPad with the same resolution as the Mini, and then everything is nice and legible. It's a shame because I love the portability of the Mini.

<comment><USER10> There's a fix that every person over 40 eventually learns: Settings > General > Accessibility > Larger Text

<comment><USER9> That setting does not increase text size in _web pages_ which was my main complaint. It increases size of text in some menus in iOS (and not even all of them) and not in third-party apps either, and is completely useless for web pages.

<comment><USER11> You could try a browser called iCab Mobile. This app has an option "Increase text size" for web pages that works with HN (just tested it myself).

<comment><USER12> There's a name I haven't heard in a decade. I didn't realize iCab had a mobile version. Thank you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> ....Why did the Pro get USB-C but the Mini is now shipping with Lightning? I'm so confused. I just want all my shit to have one charging cable.

<comment><USER14> I'm glad they didn't, my main soundcard uses the lightening connector its not optimized for usb c, for musicians there are tons of existing lightening based devices we would have to toss out for usb c so for musician users having lightening and 8th inch audio jack are superior to usb c.

<comment><USER5> This is like .01% of users though.

<comment><USER15> No, there are millions of users with lightning accessories.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I love that someone finally made a small 8" 4:3 tablet again - it seems like the perfect form factor for reading. Right now I'm still using my aging Galaxy Tab S2, but it's software support has ended.

The only serious annoyance I have is the lack of USB-C... all my other devices (laptop, phone, headphones, etc.) are on that new port now and I only have to carry a single charger. Except for the tablet :(

<comment><USER17> I would likely read on it some if I bought it, but I can't stand anything other than a kindle or paper for reading for an extended period of time.

<comment><USER16> Kindle is awesome for books, but I use my S2 8.0 for reading the internet / PDFs and watching movies. Which isn't as practical on a Kindle :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Wish they'd come out with an iPhone Mini! That is, back to the 5/SE roots. I love the iPad Mini but it doesn't really have a space in my repertoire alongside my SE and Watch.

</comment><comment> crooked-v If this had been in the "Pro" style with a thin bezel and USB-C, it would have been an instant buy.

<comment><USER19> I agree. For $100 more, they could have had both a thin bezel and usb-c, and I would have bought one instantly.

<comment><USER20> That kind of defeats the point. They were trying to reach a price - $499 for the Mini wasn't that price.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> So what is the nomenclature for these things now? Apple keeps calling them the "New" i-X, which gets me confused with the last one they released that they called the "new" one, and eventually we settled on some kind of retroactive name for it like "Retina i-X" or "i-X (20XX)".

<comment><USER22> iPad Mini (2019) seems like the reasonable choice. The Mac and iPad are stable enough as products that the main pressure to upgrade is that it's broken or too slow. It's not like an iPhone where there's a new design language every three years, steadily improving cameras, or big improvements to screen brightness and anti-glare.

If they put iPhone version numbers across all their products you'd have obnoxious names like iMac 19s Max. Calling them by their size and year is more meaningful than trying to remember "How old is an iMac 14?" since they aren't on a strict yearly release clock like the phones are.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I've had my iPad Mini 2 for years now and love it. Finally a worthy upgrade.

<comment><USER24> Same, I have a gen 6 ipad that I like and an iPad Mini 2 that I love, I bought the mini 2 for mobile safari testing but outside of my desktops/laptops I spend way more time on the Mini than I do my phone, it's just a convenient form factor.

Think I'm gonna spring for the new mini and give my old mini to the boy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> I feel like the mini is way underrated and I was worried they would cancel it. My mini is my favorite device. I'm excited to trade in my old one for a new one.

</comment><comment><USER26> > The iPad Mini hits a sweet spot: it's way bigger than any phone and way > smaller than any laptop.

Yeah, I bought a One Mix Yoga 2S for that purpose. I understand the need for pure tablets for some but you can't beat that little powerhouse of a laptop- tablet. The hardware practically matches up with the latest Macbook Air -- Amber Lake Core CPU, 8GB RAM, NVMe SSD. It's 7". I love, love, love it for emergency purposes. Not an everyday workhorse but if you are on call ... beats hauling a 14" laptop everywhere for those once-in-a-half-year emergencies.

</comment><comment><USER17> I've been eyeing a tablet for a while. Unfortunately, the pickings with Android are rather slim, so that really only leaves the iPad. I haven't bought the iPad (6th gen) due to it only having 2gb of ram, but maybe the Mini is right for me.

<comment><USER27> I'm curious, why are you concerned about 2gb of ram? What do you plan to do on the iPad that requires more than that?

<comment><USER17> I'm not even sure. I probably wouldn't do anything too extensive. Probably Plex and some light browsing. I just didn't like the idea of limited ram someday causing me issues.

<comment><USER28> You can't really measure iOS RAM usage to a PC or Android device. The OS handles memory completely differently.

At most you might notice that some memory hungry apps that don't suspend correctly "start over" when switching between multiple apps.

<comment><USER29> How is that different from how a modern Android manages memory? That's all I've ever noticed from limited RAM for many years now.

<comment><USER27> Android requires significantly more memory because it's a garbage collected environment (one of the reasons). Apple's platforms by comparison have much more efficient memory models, though the developer overhead is arguably a big greater (which Swift has helped to address a bit). To get the same performance on an android device that you would get on an iOS device requires significantly more memory on the android device.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> $3xx - iPad 9.7

$4xx - iPad Mini 7.9

$5xx - iPad Air 10.5

Is it just me, or is the small cheap one to give to the kids, or keep around as the 'spare iPad', missing from the lineup? Even if it was just 20 or 30 bucks less than the current iPad 9.7 ?

<comment><USER31> Apple's "budget" options are essentially last year's models. Given my little ones still rock an iPad mini 1 and it still runs Netflix fine...

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> question? couldnt apple make an accessory that connects/syncs the pencil 2 to the ipad mini 5 without having to use the pencil 1?

<comment><USER33> How would you charge it?

<comment><USER34> I think PHGamer answered that already: an accessory. Presumably some kind of dongle.

<comment><USER33> But there aren't any ports on it.

<comment><USER35> The hypothetical dongle would get electricity via the iPad port and then would expose a surface that would leverage the magnetic coupling/inductive charging for the Apple Pencil in the same way that it works now. Might not be the most attractive dongle but I don't think there's anything physically impossible in engineering something with the capabilities needed to allow charging...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> Is there anything similar to the new iPad Mini on the Android side?

<comment><USER37> 8" tablets with broadly similar features exist (e.g., Galaxy Tab S2 8"), though details vary a lot, and since I don't think any near the top of the field have a refresh in a couple years (8" isn't a hot spot in the Android tablet market), they're probably mostly less expensive but not quite at feature parity, ignoring OS/ecosystem preference issues.

<comment><USER38> They usually get bad screens in that segment. The last 8" Android tablet that I would consider good was Huawei MediaPad M5, which is 8.4" 2560x1600.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> I used to read Gruber often, but I feel his reviews especially grew stale and uninformative, well written but plain. Also, he's quite late to a lot of stuff while not adding enough insights to justify being that late. I think I changed in the way I read Apple-related news, so maybe he has always been like that and it's just my perception that shifted? Either way, I think I just don't want to spend my time reading one-company pundits. (He usually gets any other company's doings so shallowly wrong, it's embarrassing)

</comment><comment><USER40> I love that the mini has been refreshed with the retina display - though was hoping for the new form factor (no button + smaller bezels)

<comment><USER33> The last couple of Minis have all had Retina Displays, with the same resolution as the larger iPads.

<comment><USER31> This one is TruTone and laminated display though. Definitely an improvement.

<comment><USER33> Yeah, no doubt.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> I posit that while iPads may be "the best" tablet, you could get 95% as much utility out of a 3 year old Kindle Fire.

<comment><USER33> Does your Kindle Fire perform well?

<comment><USER41> I don't actually have one. I never use tablets for anything. I have a few iPads in the house that fell in my lap and they are basically used as portable YouTube machines by my kids.

I do use a phone that costs $300 unlocked and is 95% as useful an iPhone.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> > Face ID is so much better than Touch ID.

Yeah, no.

<comment><USER33> Have you tried using it?

<comment><USER43> yup... have the iPad Pro 11 & an older mini (use that for the gym/cardio and when I don't want to lug something so big around)... I do not use FaceID at all. Tried it, yet went back to the Pin.

<comment><USER33> Why not? Did it not work for you?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> if this had edge to edge and face ID I'd line up to get it.

</comment><comment><USER45> >>> The iPad Mini uses a Lightning port and has a microphone jack.

Is Apple returning to reality?

<comment><USER33> No, they just kept the same external ports as last time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> No FaceID? TouchID often failed. never works with wet fingers, for example.

I've also gotten used to saying "Hey Siri, my weather" as I pick up my phone then looking at my screen to unlock.

        "open New York Times"
        "open Wall Street Journal"
        "open CNBC'

I should look into Siri shortcuts. I'd like a "Hey Siri, Hacker News"

[Update]

Done! Siri was ready with Hacker News as a suggestion.

I noticed on another device, even without a shortcut, I can say "open the website Hacker News"

<comment><USER47> I wish I could use Siri as you describe. Alas, it rarely recognizes the wake word unless I'm holding it very close, and queries take far too long anyway. For weather, it is much faster to simply pick up the phone, which automatically turns on the screen, then swipe right.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Dynamic Wallpaper Club (macOS) - <AUTHOR> https://dynamicwallpaper.club/ <comment><USER2> Hi, i think it super cool! I misunderstood that I need to login to download at first. you can hide 'sign in' button into create page.</comment>


My Childhood in a Cult - <AUTHOR> https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/05/06/my-childhood-in-a-cult <comment><USER2> Someone I knew was raised in a similar UFO cult. Her mother died when she was young, her dad was a neglectful drug addict. There were times where she and her brother were abandoned for days, and she'd literally survive by eating dog food.

At some point, her dad met and married a woman, who happened to be in a UFO cult like this, where they thought many of them had been abducted or had had close encounters of various kinds. This woman, who I met many years later, was funny and kind and took care of my friend and gave her unconditional love in a way that she had never experienced and treated her like a daughter. Her real dad disappeared again and went off to Canada permanently, leaving her with the cult as her only family. It was a distinct step up as a family situation from how she was raised.

In 2000, when my friend was 17 or 18, the whole cult went off into a compound in the mountains waiting for the world to end and go off into space. My friend, who was super intelligent and curious, at that point was skeptical, but she went because it was the only family she had.

The world didn't end, and she turned 18 and moved out on her own.

I met her a few years later, and we started dating, not knowing any of this back story — she was remarkably _normal_ , all considering — and at some point, she told me the story of going off into the woods, and I laughed and just sort of assumed she was as cynical about that as she was about everything else — but her eyes flashed with anger and I realized I had stepped on a land mine.

It wasn't that she really believed in aliens, or that she had been abducted by aliens as her foster mother had convinced her of, when she was younger. She just wanted to believe that this woman who loved her and had saved her wasn't crazy, so she held open the possibility in her mind.

Cults are complicated, and so are families.

<comment><USER3> _> I met her a few years later, and we started dating, not knowing any of this back story — she was remarkably normal, all considering — and at some point, she told me the story of going off into the woods, and I laughed and just sort of assumed she was as cynical about that as she was about everything else — but her eyes flashed with anger and I realized I had stepped on a land mine._

My guess, that it is nothing to do with her cynism or beliefs. You can be sceptical about Christian God, and at the same time you may be angry with people who make fun of sacred items and rituals. It was a _real_ emotional experience for her and for others, it is something that you seem to miss, and your laugh offended all of that. The land mine was not a belief system, but a narrative, while you thought of that as of funny adventure of stupid people, she thought about people whom she knew empathically.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Prior to my life in technology I had similar experiences to the author. I was involved with multiple spiritual groups that could be classified as cults. One mistake that I have seen people without first-hand experience make is assuming that the people are in it to deceive or take advantage of others.

On the contrary, I have seen that people in these groups often have the best intentions. For a long time, it was a mystery to me how these groups could end up going so wrong, often devolving into gun battles, suicides, or sexual deviance. A few years ago I found a book called "The Guru Papers"[0] which does a fantastic job of explaining how these things occur, even in well- intentioned groups. If you have been involved in a group like this, or are just curious about the psychology involved, I highly recommend it.

[0]: [https://www.amazon.com/dp/B007WL0JHE/ref=dp-kindle- redirect?...](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B007WL0JHE/ref=dp-kindle- redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1)

<comment><USER5> Another resource I like is the ABCDEF framework: [http://www.neopagan.net/ABCDEF.html](http://www.neopagan.net/ABCDEF.html)

It's a nice way of scoring some group to see how cult-like it is.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Cults fill important human needs for human connection, structure, seemingly- legitimate authority, existential meaning and a driving purpose for life. To the degree these aren't provided by healthier structures in our society, individuals will be drawn to these organizations. And many things which we do not often think of as cults in many ways fit into the broader conception thereof: militaries, political parties, yoga studios, etc. have all been known to fall into that classification.

Steve Hasan's BITE model is a great framework for thinking about these things. In many ways, control of behavior, information, thoughts, and emotions is what all human organizations do, so it's more of a cost/benefit analysis than an either/or analysis that's called for. There are varying degrees of "cultiness". Recommended reading: "Combating Cult Mind Control".

An evolutionary analysis of these sorts of social structures is also fascinating. If you treat a cult like a superorganism that must compete for resources with other organizations in the culture, you can understand many of the pressures driving them. Jonathan Haidt has shown how "morality binds and blinds", and this is nowhere stronger than in cults whose distinct moral code both binds people together into a unit, and blinds them to the true nature of the group.

<comment><USER7> _In many ways, control of behavior, information, thoughts, and emotions is what all human organizations do_

I'm pretty cynical, and I recognize how pervasive and successful these manipulation techniques are (so pervasive that it seems silly to talk about them as if they're particular to cults at all), but it seems wrong to say "all human organizations" seek to control. Unless you consider things like the following examples of control: disseminating information, saving lives or healing people, having fun, etc.

I think it would be much more accurate to say there's the potential for manipulation to seep into any human organization. But a weekend softball league isn't manipulating anyone.

Give humanity a little credit.

<comment><USER8> Exertion of control does not always imply manipulation; compliance can be enthusiastic and voluntary.

A weekend softball league might schedule games, which to a (yes, _very_ minor) degree, is all about controlling who goes where and when for those who want to play softball.

Really, if an organization cannot expect voluntary compliance from its members on anything at all, is it even an organization? A single shared common belief is all it takes.

<comment><USER7> This reduces the meaning of "control" to be completely useless. "Combating mind control" kind of loses its edge if you're going to war with book clubs.

<comment><USER9> Control is both enabling and disabling, depending on the specifics; I think that is an important lesson that can come from looking at "cults".

Examples of enabling control: Learning math was forced on me as a child (unlike reading, I _hated_ doing problems), but its importance to my life cannot be overstated. I join exercise classes to control myself and make sure that I get healthier. Etc. While there is a lot of difference between these and a "cult", I think the point of the OP is that control isn't simply bad.

<comment><USER7> And yet that doesn't change the point of this thread -- that it's going too far to say all human organizations exert control over their members.

<comment><USER9> I think the point of the thread is a _discussion_ of whether "all human organizations exert control..." You disagree, but I think the statement under question is basically correct. Your last reply doesn't add any support to your position.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> It's easy to dismiss cults until you realize how easily an intelligent person can fall under their spell. Many cults have very logical belief systems predicated on a few twisted axioms. If you convince an intelligent, rational person that those axioms are true, you have them. Often the smartest folks are drawn in because they are used to having beliefs and convictions far outside the mainstream which are rooted in reason(general relativity, for example).

I grew up atheist, but ended up spending about 6 years in a cult-like, nameless, christian denomination. It wasn't until the results of their belief system became absurd that I started to question the entire system.

<comment><USER11> > If you convince an intelligent, rational person that those axioms are true,

If you convince them that those axioms are true, than they are not intelligent nor rational.

<comment><USER12> No, this kind of reductive thinking doesn't hold. Ever heard of that alchemist quack who also did some math on the side? Newton, his name was.

<comment><USER11> From Wikipedia:

 _Alchemy (from Arabic: al-kīmiyā) was an ancient branch of natural philosophy, a philosophical and protoscientific tradition practiced throughout Europe, Africa, and Asia, originating in Greco-Roman Egypt in the first few centuries AD. It aims to purify, mature, and perfect certain objects. Common aims were chrysopoeia, the transmutation of "base metals" (e.g., lead) into "noble metals" (particularly gold); the creation of an elixir of immortality; the creation of panaceas able to cure any disease; and the development of an alkahest, a universal solvent._

So, what was irrational with alchemy at the times Newton lived?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Back in the mid 80s, I attended a Heaven's Gate presentation. The ideology was preposterous, but they were interesting people. And very into computers and stuff.

One of our friends joined, notwithstanding our advice. We remained off-and-on in touch, and he seemed happy, and up to cool stuff. But then he was one of the 1997 suicides.

<comment><USER14> Sorry to hear that. I think we all think of cults as something distant and weird, but the reality is if you're in one or close to one, you are not aware of it, almost by definition.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> "The community founded by the late Mel Lyman is still around today and runs a flourishing home-renovation business in the Los Angeles area."

In case anyone else was curious, the company is called Fort Hill Construction. Here's their website, where you can get a sense of just how well they've done:

[http://www.forthill.com/](http://www.forthill.com/)

<comment><USER16> This is the best real estate site experience I've ever had on mobile.

<comment><USER17> It's almost like they _want_ my money. A very unusual model for restaurant/real estate websites.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> >See, now the whole story has taken a turn. You've maybe forgotten everything I wrote before. You're horrified; you want to know more. I've told you these things because I didn't want you to think I was weak or timid, or apologetic about some of the uncomfortable truths. Now I can't take them back.

That is a pretty hard turn but maybe a good lesson too about how in this day and age there is so little room for understanding that we struggle to think of anything else once we hear things that are objectionable.

</comment><comment><USER19> For those who ask us Germans why we're so adamantly opposed to homeschooling and why we have mandatory medical checkups for children/infants ("Vorsorgeuntersuchungen"): this is why.

Having kids end up immersed in cults and brainwashed is a real risk, and the costs that society has to bear once these kids "wake up" is immense. Not to mention kids ending up totally uneducated and unfit for adult life due to plainly incompetent parents and the follow-up costs of that.

<comment><USER20> Assuming that the government itself doesn't get taken over by a cult, as has happened in some countries.

<comment><USER19> Yeah but not even Scientology managed to do this in the US...

<comment><USER20> If you interpret "cult" slightly less literally, I'm sure you can think of some fairly vivid examples of cults that have seized control of the governments of even developed countries, and used that power to indoctrinate children via the official school system. In a situation like that, some homeschooling might have even been beneficial, compared to the alternative.

<comment><USER21> What's on the back of your mind exactly ? Why the shroud of mystery ?

<comment><USER20> For instance, it isn't hard to think of the Khmer Rouge or the fascist movements as political cults.

<comment><USER19> I would not make it so easy for the fascists to excuse them as cults. Fascists all know what they want (exterminating everybody not deemed worthy for their race), and they all owed their success to "conservatives" who would rather support them in their mission than to give up privileges.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> [https://www.trussel.com/f_mel.htm](https://www.trussel.com/f_mel.htm)

</comment><comment><USER23> > What I tell them is that, if you haven't heard of a cult, it's because it > didn't go down in flames. Its members are just quietly doing what they do, > which means that there are many more active cults today than we are aware > of.

100%, I personally have a story titled "how my grandmother got me involved with a Brazilian cult for a week", if you do a quick search for "John of God" you will probably immediately find it. It wasn't a doomsday cult or a massive incestuous orgy, but it was clearly one if these "oh this is actually a massive scam" with _extremely_ loyal followers. My grandmother and her husband actually went to something he hosted in New York a year or so ago iirc.

EDIT: Holy shit just looked now and apparently he was arrested in January for having a BUNCH of child sex slaves and other stuff

<comment><USER24> All kinds of celebrities and politicians went to John of God too.

<comment><USER23> Y'know, this is a story that I would always tell my friends in a lighthearted way cause its just a pretty absurd story... boy does this add some punch to it now

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> One of the best low budget cult/ sci fi movies ever made:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Endless_(film)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Endless_\(film\))</comment>


Show HN: A tiny mips 4kc emulator (boots linux) - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/andrewchambers/cmips

<comment><AUTHOR> Feedback or ideas on possible applications you can embed this in are welcome.</comment>