A link between air pollution and Alzheimer's disease - <AUTHOR> http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-air-pollution-alzheimers-20170131-story.html <comment><USER2> Is the cause "air" pollution, or could it be "noise" pollution? I would think living near loud traffic areas might lead to less quality sleep for the brain. And a lack of sleep is linked with alzheimers. Just a thought.

<comment><USER3> Particles can traverse through the nose / olfactory bulb straight to the brain.

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26194036](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26194036)

<comment><USER4> I wonder if breathing through your mouth would mitigate these effects.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> What would be surprising to me is that they found air pollution makes Alzheimers less likely.

If it accelerates it that's unfortunately but I'm not surprised.

<comment><USER6> I think the default would be has no effect.

<comment><USER7> Why? I am not being trite. Why should we assume "no effect", or "no correlation", rather than "everything has some effect on everything else" and "everything is correlated with everything else"?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> What are examples of places with high levels of these pollutants?

Are suburbs generally ok? Should I limit exercise in urban areas? Would it be bad to live near a highway?

</comment><comment><USER8> I'm curious if this could be related to lack of exercise or lack of sunlight or perhaps poor diet. All would probably go along with living in a high pollution area?

Edit. They mention they control for a lot of those factors. I wonder how well they can do that?

</comment><comment><USER9> "surprising" as in "not surprising" \- way to go LA Times. You hit another one out of the park with backwards editorializing. Next, another "surprising" link between water pollution and cancer.

<comment><USER10> It is surprising that particles going into your lungs would have significant cognitive effects.

Although it's fashionable to assert that pollution causes every imaginable ill effect, there needs to be a causal chain. In this case, "air pollutants induced inflammation, cell death and the buildup of amyloid protein in the brain".

That chain is not intuitive (and not predicted), thus, "Surprising."

<comment><USER11> Err.. what?

Particles going into your lungs to produce cognitive effects is the basis behind smoking cigarettes, marijuana, meth, etc.

<comment><USER12> Uh, no.

Nicotine, THC, etc. are the active ingredients expected to cause cognitive effects.

The particles are regarded as particularly unwanted--especially by marijuana users.

This is the whole idea behind vaporizers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> latimes won't let you read the article with an adblocker enabled

<comment><USER14> And if you disable adblock the page becomes almost unreadable.

Here's a site which appears to have basically the same info without the bullshit - [https://www.alzinfo.org/articles/air-pollution-raise- dementi...](https://www.alzinfo.org/articles/air-pollution-raise-dementia- risk/)

<comment><USER15> Here's the paper [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3622279/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3622279/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Maybe this is a good thing. After Trump's EPA guts clean air regulations, we'll all develop Alzheimer's, and we can forget that he was ever elected.

<comment><USER17> Thinking he has early onset. From my medical opinion. Would explain how he can contradict himself in the same interview. All those years in NYC taking their toll.

<comment><USER18> What was your medical opinion when one of the candidates collapsed on 9/11/16?

<comment><USER17> Officially? My medical opinion is that she collapsed.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Why Is Node Being Forked? - <AUTHOR> http://dtrejo.com/why-is-node-being-forked.html

<comment><USER2> Mikeal's response:

" @ddtrejo @izs @piscisaureus it's a fork as in the GitHub fork button sense." [https://mobile.twitter.com/mikeal/status/520285400279965698](https://mobile.twitter.com/mikeal/status/520285400279965698)

This article acts as if they are going their own separate ways when this is clearly not the case.

Why did someone make a fork? Maybe to submit a patch? Maybe to have their own copy in case the origin decides to delete?

Please be accurate in your posts. Misreporting or misrepresenting puts you and your subject's professional reputations at risk.

<comment><USER3> I didn't find the actual content of the blog post particularly informative in itself, but there's plenty of indication that this is not just someone forking to submit a patch.

\- [https://github.com/node-forward](https://github.com/node-forward) is an organisation, not an individual and has put up various repositories centering around the forking effort.

\- They have set up a website, [http://nodeforward.org/](http://nodeforward.org/) \- which indicates (albeit with scant detail/background) that this is an independent effort to improve node.

\- as zzmp pointed out, there is a fair bit of discussion around indicating some political discontent: [https://github.com/node- forward/discussions/issues/7](https://github.com/node- forward/discussions/issues/7)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The link in the post to the fork is dead, which leads me to believe maybe they reversed their decision to fork it.

The nodeforward site discusses improving documentation, build and test tools: [http://nodeforward.org/](http://nodeforward.org/)

<comment><USER5> node-forward stated in their issues [1] that it's just politics. They've taken it private for the time being.

[1] [https://github.com/node- forward/discussions/issues/7](https://github.com/node- forward/discussions/issues/7)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Now I start to understand a coleague who don't recommend using Node before it gets mature.

It's kinda exciting for devs to use something that's actually still being built, but now we'll face different versions of the same tool. And, taking in consideration the _oficial_ NodeJS will still be the one owned by the current BDFL, I fear this split of ideas actually inject problems for developers getting introduced to node.

<comment><USER7> I took a very brief look at node for a recent project, but decided that Erlang was way more mature and stable, albeit less trendy and with fewer libraries for it.

<comment><USER8> Been using node in production at work for 6 months, and 2 years in general with zero immaturity issues. The only downside is userland modules which seem stable and active now days.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Maybe Node will finally get a free operator now:

[https://mail.mozilla.org/pipermail/es- discuss/2012-October/0...](https://mail.mozilla.org/pipermail/es- discuss/2012-October/026007.html)

<comment><USER10> Seems like a bad idea in a garbage-collected environment. Based on a scan of that thread, it seems like folks would really like debugging ("who is holding on to refs for this?"). Java doesn't have "free" and seems to do pretty well with GC (one can use profilers and what not to instrument and see where memory is leaking, heap dumps can be taken if things get out of hand in production).

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Node is going to be killed by politics and infighting, learn from what happened to craft bukkit.

</comment><comment><USER12> How can a guy be "former Benevolent Dictator For Life"? Is he dead?

<comment><USER13> It's just an expression, he stepped down: [http://blog.nodejs.org/2014/01/15/the-next-phase-of-node- js/](http://blog.nodejs.org/2014/01/15/the-next-phase-of-node-js/)

<comment><USER14> If it's just an expression than maybe "forking" is also just an expression with a random meaning? Either that or he never was a BDFL.

<comment><USER15> "For Life" is in the same way that SCOTUS justices have an appointment "for life". It just means they can't be fired or deposed, not that they can only leave in a box.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Because you can't do pull requests?!

</comment><comment><USER17> How's that Kickstarter and series A funding working out for ya?</comment>


Show HN: Postacard – Text a Photo to Send as a Postcard Anywhere on Earth for $3 - <AUTHOR> https://www.postacard.io <comment><USER2> As a fun thing at steampunk conventions, I have the Aetheric Message Machine Company, Ltd. People at steampunk conventions can send in SMS text messages, which are printed on an antique Teletype machine in a brass and glass case. Recipients get a yellow envelope and a message on classic yellow Teletype paper, delivered by costumed messengers who call out "Telegram for ..." . We set up a full telegraph office, with signs, props, and staff.[1]

The system uses Twilio. Twilio sends the messages to a web server which returns an immediate SMS reply to the sender, then queues the message for typing. We don't charge anything for this. I considered getting an SMS short code and charging for messages, but it wouldn't generate enough revenue to be worth it.

We did a thorough job on this, with a web site, videos, code on Github, a modest social media presence, and some press coverage. Zoominfo thinks it's a real company, with revenue of $2,400,000 and 12 employees.[2] One wonders where Zoominfo gets its numbers. They didn't come from us.

[1] [http://www.aetherltd.com/volunteer.html](http://www.aetherltd.com/volunteer.html)

[2] [http://www.zoominfo.com/c/The-Aetheric-Message-Machine- Compa...](http://www.zoominfo.com/c/The-Aetheric-Message-Machine-Company- Ltd/354259090)

<comment><USER3> That is very neat! What kind of volume do you get in a convention day? How do your couriers know where to deliver the message? It seems strange that the recipient doesn't need to visit the telegraph office; I imagine the best part of the experience would be actually seeing your setup.

<comment><USER2> Since someone asked...

 _How do your couriers know where to deliver the message?_

Senders have to send messages in the form "name@location : msg". "Location" has to be in a list of known convention areas ("VENDORS", "AUTHORS", "BAR", etc.) There's an autoresponder to help them get this right, and piles of postcards around the con with instructions. We didn't have that the first year we did this, and the messengers were run ragged calling out names over and over again in various locations. About 80% of the messages get successfully delivered now. We do about 200 messages a day.

 _It seems strange that the recipient doesn 't need to visit the telegraph office_

It's in a highly visible location. The first year we were in that location, we made the office look so official that attendees didn't think they should go in. We had to rearrange the place, adding a few chairs for visitors, a water cooler, and "please come in" signs. Now we're also an information center for the convention and get lots of visitors.

What makes this work are the two young people who staff the office. They're both experienced actors; one works Shakespeare festivals and the other is a stage combat instructor.

If you want more details, we have a manual for our operators.[1]

[1] [http://www.aetherltd.com/public/othermanuals/operatormanual0...](http://www.aetherltd.com/public/othermanuals/operatormanual05.pdf)

<comment><USER3> Fantastic! The tape printer is a nice touch, too.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This service is probably using the Lob API [https://lob.com/services/postcards](https://lob.com/services/postcards)

It actually costs $1.62 to do the exact same thing, of sending a photo with some text, international included.

<comment><USER5> Is it the exact same thing, though? Can I send Lob a picture via SMS with some text and an address and have a postcard sent? If not, then maybe that's where the extra cost comes from.

<comment><USER4> It most certainly does not cost $1.38/customer to subsidize (minimial) server costs of an SMS bot.

<comment><USER6> The brilliant part is that it does most certainly not cost that and that is the profit the site makes. I believe people will find it cheap enough to use this service. Buying postcards and stamps costs about the same.

I don't understand your issue with this. Are you opposed to making profit or are you jealous? I know that I am a bit jealous of not coming up with this.

<comment><USER7> Why are you jealous when you can easily create your own website that does the same exact thing. You can think of your own added bonus and charge a different price.

Too often we feel like because someone else did something first, or theirs already became popular, that the opportunity is over. That denies the world your variation, which might turn out to be much better.

<comment><USER6> True words. I think many of us, me at least, have a special appreciation of the original and part of the fun is to think of something yourself. That does not mean, as you say, that we couldn't do the same thing, if not better/more for you.

Maybe I will give it a go ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Seems similar to "thesimplepostcard" [https://www.thesimplepostcard.com](https://www.thesimplepostcard.com) but for a dollar more. I used simple postcard, but the photo arrived damaged. I'd be willing to give this a shot if I had some sort of assurance that the photo would arrive undamaged.

<comment><USER9> At risk of hijacking this thread...

Try my friend's app! [https://textmycards.com/](https://textmycards.com/)

<comment><USER10> I tried your friend's app but I bailed out when it was unclear where my payment details were being sent.

<comment><USER11> Thanks for trying it--it's my service, launched around Mother's Day of this year. I should make it clearer--it's secured with Stripe. All payment info is stored on Stripe.

<comment><USER10> That's what I figured but it wasn't obvious so I stopped. Could your payment page also use HTTPS?

<comment><USER11> Yeah, it does use HTTPS, but I'll definitely make it clearer. Thanks for the feedback! Cool to see multiple versions of the same underlying service being built. Competition on price, UI/UX (slight differences) , and marketing is what it will come down to. :) Good stuff, Postacard--seriously mean it! Fun little hack indeed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Main postal service in Sweden (government owned) have run a similar service for multiple years (could not find exact number but would guess 5+ years)[0]. Lower cost at 2.10 USD (18 SEK). They also have apps for the service [1].

[0] [http://rv4.posten.se/#page/index/sid=1473077144846](http://rv4.posten.se/#page/index/sid=1473077144846) [1] [https://itunes.apple.com/en/app/riktiga- vykort/id444458799?m...](https://itunes.apple.com/en/app/riktiga- vykort/id444458799?mt=8)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Hey everyone. I'd like to thank you all for the feedback and for using the service. There is a tremendous amount of traffic coming in right now (I really didn't expect this to be on the front page, lol) and it's pointed out quite a few bugs which I've since fixed. If the service wasn't replying, please try again and it should work now!

If you have any issues, please send me an email at firstname.lastname@example.com and I'll follow up with you asap. Thank you!

<comment><USER13> don't worry, the traffic will stop coming pretty soon.

<comment><USER14> Isn't HN great for pitching your app??

<comment><USER13> isn't milk white and sky blue?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Kind of a silly comment, but is this really anywhere on Earth? What about Death Valley? Antarctica? North Korea? Syria? Siberia?

I'd imagine they use the profit from domestic shipments to help subsidize more costly international ones, if it's really $3 regardless of destination.

<comment><USER16> Global forever stamps are $1.20 at retail, so that's the upper bound on their postage expense and covers all UPU countries[1] (incl DPRK, Syria, Russia, etc). Antartica actually only requires domestic postcard rates ($0.34) as it has a domestic zip code (96598).

[1]: [http://www.upu.int/en/the-upu/member- countries.html](http://www.upu.int/en/the-upu/member-countries.html)

<comment><USER15> I'm quite surprised to hear that! Thanks for sharing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> "The postcard will show up at the address within a week"

In South Africa if I send a letter from one city to another, it can take a week to arrive. For international mail, I usually work on time frames of about a month. I've known stuff to arrive 6 months after being sent. So even if they are able to dispatch post cards from SA, I'd be surprised if the could keep this promise. Going to give it a try though.

</comment><comment><USER18> At what stage and how do you supply payment details? I don't see that in the example.

</comment><comment><USER19> Neat offering at a good price. International message rates could be high. It'll be great if you could integrate Whatsapp/Telegram/WeChat :)

<comment><USER20> Seconding Telegram here. I recently learned that making a Telegram bot takes no time at all, and the custom keyboards make them great to use.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I've always thought there should be more sms based services. It would be a lot easier for me to text the pizza guy than to call...

<comment><USER20> The local pizza and shawarma* shops are always a pain to call. Half the time when they speak I don't understand their broken Dutch and they always sound impatient and don't repeat back, making me wonder whether they know what I want. When I ask for confirmation they sound exasperated, as if I'm asking them to spell out a fifty item order letter by letter.

So yeah, sms based service would be great here (or rather, something that doesn't cost money when done internationally). On the other hand, this postcard service sounds like it's going to cost me 20 bucks when I take a picture from another continent, which is exactly the use-case here. A 160 byte sms already costs like a euro to send from outside of the EU.

* This is what google translate tells me "shoarma" is in English. I've never seen that word before, not sure it's a thing in America. They're everywhere here.

<comment><USER22> Gyros (Greek version) is more common in the US, in my experience, but that may vary by region. Arabic -> shawarma, Turkish -> doner, Greek -> gyros -- all the same basic idea of meat cooked on a rotating vertical spit, sliced off and served on flat bread.

<comment><USER20> Gyros we get in greek restaurants; döner is usually sold in the same place as shawarma. Then you do have similar places, okay!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Sending pictures as "text", isn't that a MMS (multi-media SMS)? Which, as far as I know, is hugely expensive; I'd much rather upload a picture to a website, Telegram bot or email.

<comment><USER23> No, no.

When they say "text a photo," they mean "describe the photo in your own words," then somebody from their staff goes out looking for a postcard that matches the description and mails it for you.

TBH, I think they could just use Google Images to find a picture that matches the description and print that. No need to pay someone $3 to travel to the other side of the globe and buy a postcard of that Japanese temple, in this day and age. But what do I know of business.

<comment><USER20> On the website it clearly sends a picture via a messaging application, and it says "text message" above (I assume as opposed to imessage).

<comment><USER23> I think your sarcasm goggles are broken ;-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> A few comments:

Can you offer international numbers for this, or is your main market the US?

You don't specify on your site where the postcard is being sent from. I assume the US?

It may be an idea to ask specifically for a country to send to, unless perhaps it's in the US. You don't seem to mention this in the text instructions but have Surrey as an example, which is in the United Kingdom. Perhaps a bit confusing? :)

Photo examples of how the finished postcard looks (particularly the back - font, size...etc.) would be helpful I feel.

Just a few comments/ideas, feel free to ignore!

</comment><comment><USER25> Too bad I can't send it _from_ anywhere on Earth. Which is probably a more common use case.

</comment><comment><USER26> Let me be a bit of a stickler about your security statements. This assumes you have to text your credit card information to use this service, which it appears is true?

It's not correct to say it's "about as secure and encrypted as it gets". GSM/CDMA networks do employ encryption to and from towers, but it's weak encryption by modern TLS standards, and who knows what happens to it when it leaves the tower? It's certainly not end-to-end encrypted between your customer and your server and could be silently eavesdropped at multiple points.

And if you're receiving and processing the SMS that contains the card details it's disingenuous to say "[we] have no idea what your credit card numbers actually are". Yes you do. You may discard that information after you trade it with Stripe for a token, but you had access to it, and the customer has no guarantee that you've discarded it.

<comment><AUTHOR> We actually don't ask for you to text your credit card number. When the time comes for a first time payment, we send you a secure link and you need to fill out a form (card number, exp date). After that, we use the card on file unless you say otherwise.

Payment form and saved card details are all handled by Stripe, and the info never even hits our servers.

<comment><USER26> Oh, great, carry on then :) Might try to be clear about that on the website.

Is there some mechanism for instructing you to forget my credit card details (destroy the token on Stripe)?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Email would be better than text since most places have wifi/data and then it wouldn't matter if you are using your home sim or a temporary away sim.

It would also solve the "what if someone else inherits my phone number" comment also in this thread.

</comment><comment><USER28> Perhaps I'm just old and crusty, but the "joy" of a postcard is that I took the time to hand write something on the back of it. For $3, I'd rather the person sending me this share the picture over a cup of coffee.

</comment><comment><USER29> How is this different from [http://sharktankblog.com/business/postcard-on-the- run/](http://sharktankblog.com/business/postcard-on-the-run/)

and that closed last year.

<comment><USER30> Products like these mostly depend on marketing. Just because one of the similar type closed doesn't mean another product will fail, since the product itself is only part of the equation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> That's pretty smart! I can totally see myself using this service. Using an SMS interface instead of an app or a website is great, as it is inherently cross- platform, and reduces time to market and maintenance work.

</comment><comment><USER32> Neat! What's the tech stack? How do you parse the addresses?

</comment><comment><USER33> How do you text photos? By url? MMS?

</comment><comment><USER34> this is pretty slick! I like how the entire interface is SMS based

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Just tried texting a photo to +1 650 285 1713 - getting a "Message not sent error". I'm able to MMS photos to other people in the +1 650 area code, so not an issue on my side I don't think...

</comment><comment><USER36> It's basically a copy of [https://getcourier.co/](https://getcourier.co/) but through SMS instead of chatbot. Pricing is the same as well.

</comment><comment><USER37> nice work - I've been wanting a service that sends the picture in an envelope, instead of postcard style. I think opening an envelope is more fun and I don't like that anyone can see your picture when it's sent in the open.

I've been using Bill Atkinson's app for postcards (~$1.50/postcard) and it has worked great! [http://www.billatkinson.com/Pages/aboutPhotoCard.html](http://www.billatkinson.com/Pages/aboutPhotoCard.html)

</comment><comment><USER38> How do I fill in my payment information through a text message?

<comment><AUTHOR> For a first time payment, you will fill out a very short form. After that, card info is saved for later use.

<comment><USER39> (how) do you handle the case where someone gets a new number, and someone else gets their old one?

It's a bit far-fetched, I know.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> This is a great implementation. You should ask people to opt in and then robo tweet their photos as a they come in as a marketing tactic.

</comment><comment><USER41> Sent a MMS to +16502851713 from AUS and haven't received any form of response as yet (20 mins ago).

<comment><USER20> Just curious, what did that cost?

Also the owner responded elsewhere in the thread that they had some issues and you should try again.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> Are you related to a Dennis by chance? Cool service, definitely adding the number to my contacts!

</comment><comment><USER43> Anywhere? North pole? ISIS?

</comment><comment><USER44> What a great service!

</comment><comment><USER45> I can't find the source code.

</comment><comment><USER46> Are they going to add other planets as well?

</comment><comment><USER47> Awesome Article. Did not thought that it would be so cheap and easy to setup exit node. Thanks very much.

<comment><USER18> Wrong thread?</comment></comment>


Ask HN: HIPAA Compliant Hosting Providers? - <AUTHOR>

I have over a decade of experience in medical application development and support.  Recently, I've been exploring the possibility of establishing my own company based on an idea and prototype product I've developed for the medical community over the years.
Long story short, finding HIPAA-compliant hosting at reasonable cost with all of the features expected of a "cloud" provider is proving to be difficult.  It wasn't until recently that HIPAA amended it's rules related to hosting of PHI (protected health information) applications.  Though it did not state it directly, they now require Business Associate Agreements to be signed by hosting providers and they (providers) must also abide by certain standards and rules related to vetting staff and training and such (which isn't new, but the agreement is).
This is nothing really new, but it opens up the possibility of using "cloud" providers now, as far as I can tell.  Problem is, it appears Amazon won't explicitly state if they will sign the required BAA regarding their AWS platforms, which is a no-go as it could possibly be seen as an act of "Willful Negligence" on my part if that document is not signed by the hosting provider. They have "guidelines" on how to create HIPAA-compliant hosting setups with EC2 and S3 (http://d36cz9buwru1tt.cloudfront.net/AWS_HIPAA_Whitepaper_Final.pdf), but don't clearly state that they, themselves, are HIPAA compliant.  Apparently they even have their own interpretation of the guidelines and betting on them being right is not a risk I'm willing to take at this point.
So, tl;dr. That being said, Rackspace and Microsoft (when paid enough money) will sign the BAA, but is their Public Cloud, in anyone's (non-legal, obviously) opinion HIPAA compliant then?  Is there anyone out there with experience hosting HIPAA compliant applications using Amazon or another service? <comment><USER2> There's www.firehost.com that offers HIPPA compliant hosting. It's amazingly expensive (~$300/month for a 1GB cloud server), but the support is good and it impresses CMOs/IT heads of potential when you they ask you about it.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the advice. Yeah, my other option it seemed was to go with Rackspace dedicated managed hosting at over $1,000 per month, which is a little bit high for a startup's budget.

<comment><USER3> Is it possible to just prototype the service with non-sensitive data during development period and migrate to HIPAA compatible servers when you have customers?

If you already have customers, bake the hosting in to the price. They're almost certainly used to paying for things like that already, and I assume that if your app has to be HIPAA compliant, that it probably already has a $xx,000 price at a minimum anyway, so that should work out just fine.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's a good point. I just wanted to have something lined up from the get-go, but I see what you mean. Enterprise and health care customers are accustomed to paying large fees for compliant environments, so baking it into the price shouldn't be much of an issue. Thanks.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Just use Amazon. [http://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats- new/2009/04/06/whitepa...](http://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats- new/2009/04/06/whitepaper-hipaa/)

<comment><AUTHOR> That's the exact whitepaper I read, but it falls short of explicitly stating that they are HIPAA compliant. You see, HIPAA requires a certain amount of physical security (on premises at the data-center) on top of all of that electronic security, and Amazon won't publish it all in detail. It also requires the "hosting provider" to sign the aforementioned BAA, which Amazon won't do. Amazon is of the mindset that they are providing an "infrastructure" and not a hosting service, but that is a murky legal gray area that could see me fined hundreds of thousands, even millions of dollars if they are wrong.

They even put it in the disclaimer: "AWS and its affiliated entities make no representations or warranties that your use of AWS services will assure compliance with applicable laws, including but not limited to HIPAA and HITECH."</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Most memorable number between 2343 and 1147? (And why?) - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> 2000 - probably used the most in product names among numbers in that range. Also, why mention the top of the range first?

(Also wins Google compared to other numbers mentioned when this was written - 1234, 1337, 1776; but I think that's because it is a recent year.)

</comment><comment><USER3> 1337 - self-explanatory

</comment><comment><USER4> 1234, just like my luggage..

</comment><comment><USER5> 1248\. What else

<comment><USER5> Or either 1842. Also known as "one ate for two," pretty gluttonous indeed

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> 1776</comment>


Bontrager's WaveCel material more effective at preventing concussions than MIPS - <AUTHOR> https://pelotonmagazine.com/gear/bontragers-new-wavecel-bests-mips-at-concussion-prevention/ <comment><USER2> I'm going to comment with what seems to be the common sentiment here. It's really hard to tell how effective a helmet is at preventing concussions in real life. So we/they design a test of some hypothetical concussion cause, and lo and behold, their helmet is very effective in that test. Note that this is a different test than the ones used to prove that MIPS was better than a styrofoam helmet.

The real story is that marketing probably has a bigger influence than science in this case. Several years ago helmet manufacturers hit the practical weight limit for helmets with styrofoam and carbon fiber shells. I bought a Giro Atmos over a decade ago and never needed to upgrade because the top of the line helmets were only a couple grams lighter, after a decade of "improvement." The manufacturers noticed that helmet sales were declining, and all of a sudden "new science" appeared with a theory about concussions being caused by brain rotation and MIPS technology helps prevent that. How convenient that this appeared.

The dirty secret is that literally nobody has ever seen a brain rotate inside a skull and result in concussion. It's really hard to image a brain in motion (impossible with off the shelf equipment), so the brain rotation theory is just a hypothetical mechanism. There isn't an ethical test for blunt force trauma in real life conditions, and bike crashes are very rarely reported if they don't send the rider to the hospital. So the leading authority on product safety, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, doesn't even have good numbers on concussion rates for cyclists.

The bottom line is that MIPS and this new gel layer came at way too good of a time for the helmet industry for us not to be wary of the science. They can get away with it because it's such an easy marketing sell- most people think their life is worth more than $250, so any helmet tech is a bet on the order of Pascal's wager. If it's snake oil I'm just out $250, but if it really is better then I just saved my life in a crash.

<comment><USER3> > I bought a Giro Atmos over a decade ago and never needed to upgrade...

I'm sure you've heard this but they say to replace a helmet every two-three years even if it hasn't been in a crash.

It's up to you whether you think that makes sense, but I'd sooner believe it than not.

<comment><USER4> And your mattress doubles in weight every eight years....

That is just a way to sell more product by shaming people into "being safe".

Uncrashed styrofoam doesn't stop being effective and turn into a pumpkin after two years. But you can double revenue if you can halve the replacement cycle.

<comment><USER5> Guy in a motorbike shop told me it's UV that makes styrofoam lose its useful properties, a quick Google seemed to confirm that.

<comment><USER4> The guy in the shop wants to move helmets. The internet is littered with factoids that "everybody knows". It's on the internet you know.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The study cited is questionable. The best independent source for helmet testing IMHO is virginia tech's, which show that these are about as effective as MIPS, not 98% better as the headline suggests:

[https://www.helmet.beam.vt.edu/bicycle-helmet- ratings.html](https://www.helmet.beam.vt.edu/bicycle-helmet-ratings.html)

Here's their methodology:

[http://hdl.handle.net/10919/83760](http://hdl.handle.net/10919/83760)

<comment><USER7> This is great! Is there anything like this for other kinds of helmets?

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I got hit by a truck earlier this year while wearing a WaveCel helmet. The outer foam cracked in two places and the cell structure on the inside collapsed in several places. The CT scan of my head came out clean and the ER physician discharged me within the hour. I think my post-incident symptoms were more indicative of shock than concussion, since I did sustain several fractures in my hand.

[https://imgur.com/a/LdNQSRT](https://imgur.com/a/LdNQSRT)

[https://imgur.com/a/JL5ORlg](https://imgur.com/a/JL5ORlg)

<comment><USER9> Keep in mind that helmets are designed to absorb energy. In your accident it's clear that neither you, the bike, or your helmet had much traction. So instead of tumbling (caused by rotational acceleration) you just slide. I'd expect any good helmet to absorb that energy.

The unique claim WaveCell/MIPS is making is that they can absorb the energy that's trying to rotate your head. I've seen no indications that this is a problem. Tires have great traction, pretty much anything else (you, skin, bike, backpack, helmet, bike gloves, etc) have very poor traction so accidents rarely impart large rotational forces. Even if they did the WaveCell is only going to absorb a minimal amount since the helmet is strapped to your head.

Mips and WaveCel are claiming "Rotation causes injuries", engineering a solution to it, not proving it exists, and claiming they are safer because it.

Neither MIPS or WaveCel are claiming they absorb normal impacts better than normal helmets. Generally both ANSI and SNELL have picked an acceleration and penetration standard that's a compromise between rider comfort and safety. Helmets are tested against those standards.

MIPS and WaveCel have failed to prove any additional safety and instead of working with the safety standard folks are appealing directly to consumers to justify their 3-6 times price increase over other ANSI and SNELL approved helmets.

<comment><USER8> > In your accident it's clear that neither you, the bike, or your helmet had > much traction.

The impact that you can't see in the video that damaged the helmet was in the collision with the side of the truck after it hit my left arm, rotating my handlebars to the right. This caused the counter-steer that slammed me into the side of the truck. The truck was moving faster than I was, so that was the source of the rotational acceleration.

<comment><USER9> Helmets are usually worn pretty loosely, after all you don't want your jaw forced close by an overly tight helmet strap. As such you can typically move a helmet around on the top of your head, especially with say the force of a truck hitting you.

So both WaveCel and non-WaveCel helmets help absorb impacts and reduce the peak acceleration of your brain. Imparting dangerous levels of rotational acceleration seems wildly improbable. Maybe if your helmet strap got caught on the trucks lugnuts? Even then the MIPS or WaveCel would absorb maybe 30 degrees of rotation?

I'm actually curious if you still have a working WaveCel. If you try to rotate your helmet for a normal helmet how much extra rotation do you get? Is it damped as you rotate, or rotating freely within the range available?

For the Wavecel to make a difference you'd need a very high traction to allow high torque which is required to reach a high peak rotational acceleration _AND_ a very low total rotation. Even then I'd expect a normal helmet to rotate just as far.

Antanomically I just can't see it working. I've had my chin forced into my chest, landed on the wide of my head (forcing head onto the opposite shoulder), crushed the back my helmet. But generally there's not much friction between my hair and the helmet, or the helmet and the ground. So to transfer much energy requires an impact not a shear force or torque of any kind.

Can you propose an accident that would impact a sudden large torque to a normal helmet, but a low total rotation (compatible with keeping ones head attached)? Or really anything that allows a slippery layer inside the helmet to make a meaningful difference?

If WaveCel was actually better at absorbing impacts (which they show in their animation) than styrofoam I wouldn't expect them to make their helmet out of mostly styrofoam. If the WaveCel material is worse than the helmet is actually less good at absorbing impacts than a helmet of similar thickness and weight.

Seems safest to just buy the best styrofoam helmet you can buy and don't add cost, weight, and complexity to try to offset this theorized danger of peak rotational acceleration causing concussions that is somehow mitigated by Mips or WaveCel and not by a normal helmet worn normally.

<comment><USER10> It all happens during a split second of the impact, thr helmet won't be slipping while it is being pressed against your skull by the impact, hence the slip mechanisms. The strap is to make sure your helmet is still in the right place at the moment of impact and subsequent impacts not to stop it from moving during the impact.

Whether or not it's a marketing gimmick, it's the only good indicator we have as the research is inconclusive and I certainly don't have any better idea than the people making the helmets.

That said, what I typically look to for advice on what is a safe helmet is downhill mountain biking competition standards. If they think it will make the sport safer, and their insurance lower, then it's a good indicator that it is probably a good standard to have for my own head.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> There is some controversy about this: [https://www.outsideonline.com/2392896/trek-wavecel-helmet- co...](https://www.outsideonline.com/2392896/trek-wavecel-helmet-controversy)

Also, some people argue that MIPS is probably not as effective in real life as in tests because people simply don't fasten helmets tight enough for it to matter (and the same may apply to these helmets with respect to shear forces), but I don't know if this has been scientifically tested.

</comment><comment><USER12> A university website linked to in the article suggests that a helmet that costs half as much as the one advertised in the article performs slightly better: [https://www.helmet.beam.vt.edu/bicycle-helmet- ratings.html](https://www.helmet.beam.vt.edu/bicycle-helmet-ratings.html)

Look for "Lazer Cyclone MIPS".

Edit: Unfortunately it appears that this particular helmet has been discontinued: [https://www.bikeforums.net/general-cycling- discussion/117473...](https://www.bikeforums.net/general-cycling- discussion/1174734-lazer-cyclone-mips.html)

But there are others that perform about as well that are similarly priced.

</comment><comment><USER13> While the topic of discussion is concussion, there is some evidence that both fasting and ketosis are neuroprotective to some degree after traumatic brain injury.

[0] Fasting is neuroprotective following traumatic brain injury, [https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/jnr.21628](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/jnr.21628)

[1] Cerebral Metabolic Adaptation and Ketone Metabolism after Brain Injury, [https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1038/sj.jcbfm.96005...](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1038/sj.jcbfm.9600543)

<comment><AUTHOR> Interesting. Weed is supposed to be neuroprotective as well for concussions.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I was curious what MIPS stood for in this context, and apparently it's "Multi- directional Impact Protection System".

</comment><comment><USER15> The funny thing about helmets, any bike helmet, is that the don't protect against EVERY accident, but they do help protect sometimes. I raced for a few years and my helmet saved me some serious injuries at least twice that I know of.

They aren't perfect, and they don't need to be. They help sometimes and almost never make things worse, that's about all we can hope for. If someone made a helmet that's better sometimes, then that's a good thing. It'll help someone at some point.

<comment><USER16> I used to road race in my 20s. I never crashed in the handful of races I did as a Cat 5 amateur, though I had a few close calls like having to bunny hop onto a sidewalk to avoid someone that didn't hold their line through a corner (almost won that race, came in second) and facing terrible, rutted roads in the Chicago criterium with the prospect of around a 15 foot drop over a wall into grant park garage ramp.

That said, I've crashed innumerable time over the years, often at speed. As a teen, crashed several times on a dirt road at over 45 miles an hour without wearing a helmet. Been over the handle bars at least 6 times. Been T-boned by a car on a training ride.

Through all that, Ive managed to never hit my head. How? No clue. Just luck I guess. Didnt wear a helmet as a kid, but as an adult I wont get on a bike without on. Only injury above my knock I've had was when I dumped my road bike at 25 mph when I lost the rear end in a corner. Landed on my side, rolled onto my stomach and dragged my chin on the pavement for a bit. Broke my left hand and burnt my finger tips from that one, too. Got up and rode 5 miles home...

If I were still riding, I would definitely get one of these helmets. A lot of my gear is already Bontrager (helmet and 2 pairs of cycling shoes), and all 3 of my bikes are Trek (Bontrager is a Trek subsidiary).

<comment><USER17> Looking forward to the replies by people who did hit their head hard, but weren't wearing a helmet.

<comment><USER18> There is a whole country of serious bike riders who don't use bike helmets (the Netherlands). It turns out that if you design your biking infrastructure well enough, it isn't really a problem.

<comment><USER19> That is bad advice. It remains advisable to wear a helmet. What you are saying is roughly equivalent to, "If car infrastructure is sufficient, we will no longer need helmets." At best the need is reduced.

<comment><USER20> Do most motorists wear helmets while driving?

<comment><USER21> Does the fact that they don't mean that they shouldn't? Researchers at the University of Adelaide in Australia did a study and concluded that wearing helmets in cars would prevent many serious injuries: [http://www.copenhagenize.com/2009/10/australian-helmet- scien...](http://www.copenhagenize.com/2009/10/australian-helmet-science-for- motorists.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Amazing, now we just need to make a full body suit of this material so it works with the main type of urban collision, which is being killed by a reckless SUV driver, or pulled under a box truck and crushed under the back wheels.

</comment><comment><USER23> I wonder how's the Swedish "airbag helmet" doing these days. It sounds like a superior solution to any regular bike helmet, but perhaps the price and/or convenience just isn't there for the mass market.

</comment><comment><USER24> Not to detract from how amazing WaveCel might be. Any safety material advancement is great news. But this is assumes we need new head protection to fit the old moulds, so to speak.

OTOH, there are or will soon be options to replace our foam brain buckets with high-tech collars/airbags that may (?) be less sweaty and may (?) provide more coverage in a crash (chin, back, sides, etc.)

One example: [https://hovding.com/how-hovding-works/](https://hovding.com/how- hovding-works/)

<comment><USER25> Hövding is exciting because it's a new approach rather than an iteration on old helmet designs.

They claim you still have a 90% risk of head injury with a traditional helmet at 25km/h, but only a 2% risk with Hövding:

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

That's a pretty significant improvement if true.

The only reason I don't currently own one is that they say it's not as ergonomic for those using road/drop bar bikes. Presumably this is due to the weight of the air canister and battery in the pod that sits behind your neck, since the riding position is less upright.

If any road bike users wear Hövding, I'd be interested to hear about your experience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Nice helmet, however they rarely if ever protect the chin, why is that?

In my many years of riding I've fallen on the back of my head zero times and on my chin twice, as a kid.

<comment><USER27> These guys make full-face helmets and of course you can always just wear a motorcycle helmet.

[https://bike.kaliprotectives.com/helmets/](https://bike.kaliprotectives.com/helmets/)

But it's a tradeoff. Full-faced helmets give the helmet another point of leverage on which to break your neck. On the other hand they won't erase your face, which is nice.

<comment><USER28> Motorcycle helmets are just not ever to be worn while biking. They are designed for vastly different forces at vastly different speeds than a bike helmet.

Not to mention that they will breathe very very very poorly, though I'm a little unsure how these wavecell helmets will breathe. Like the Scott helmets, lots of tiny holes seems like not as good as big holes for airflow.

<comment><USER27> That seems like a bad take to me. There is a lot of overlap between motorcycle sports events speeds and bicycle event speeds. A bicycle downhill racer will be going a lot faster than a motorcycle enduro rider. That is why, as an example, Bell helmets marketed to enduro riders and downhillers are the same helmet.

<comment><USER28> This is incorrect. Most cyclists rarely sustain speeds beyond 20mph and will not regularly see speeds beyond 30-35mph. If going downhill on a road bike, amateur cyclists hit mid 40s occasionally on weekend rides. For reference the maximum speed I have ever seen (I have biked >1,100 miles this year) is 55.7mph for one brief moment.

Motorcycles on the other hand consistently travel at 30+mph and regularly see sustained 55-80mph on the highway. It's not the same problem at all.

If your helmet is likely to encounter a 60mph impact you will design for that. Most likely that means your helmet will be stronger, which means it won't break away as easily at lower speeds. This means when your head will take more of the kinetic energy in a 15mph crash than it otherwise would. Not to mention that the helmet will be heavier, which means there's more momentum on impact which may affect the way forces get dissipated.

If you compare with downhill mountain biking that's a very tiny segment of the population. It's true that some downhill mountain bikers may use motocross helmets. That's not what the average bike helmet is for, and it's not what the average bike rider should be using.

Don't use a motorcycle helmet as a bike helmet.

<comment><USER27> I don't know why you keep arguing this. You said that motorcycle helmets are "never" to be worn by bicyclists. I point out that there is not just one but -several- different companies cross-marketing DOT-approved motorcycle helmets for bicycle sports. Now you are talking about the "average" bike rider. I think you just have a narrow, inaccurate conception of the universe of all cycle sports and you've probably never been anywhere near a motorcycle. Look at these BMX kids, then look at the motocross kids.

[https://crazybmxer.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/bmx- racing.jp...](https://crazybmxer.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/bmx-racing.jpg) [https://i1.wp.com/www.njmotocross.com/wp- content/uploads/201...](https://i1.wp.com/www.njmotocross.com/wp- content/uploads/2019/05/1080px-x-608px-All-Sites-3-1.png)

<comment><USER28> I have in fact ridden motorcycles, you're still arguing a niche case. Fine, there exists some cyclist who wears a motorcycle helmet. It's a bad idea for the vast majority of cyclists.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I am reminded of this study [0] that claims that "Bicyclists who wear protective helmets are more likely to be struck by passing vehicles".

What's to be done?

Buy the helmet that reduces concussions by 98%?

Or don't buy a helmet at all, and trust that you won't get in an accident?

That's quite the conundrum.

[0] [http://www.bath.ac.uk/news/articles/archive/overtaking110906...](http://www.bath.ac.uk/news/articles/archive/overtaking110906.html)

<comment><AUTHOR> > What's to be done?

Wear a helmet, and don't ride on streets with cars.

<comment><USER30> > and don't ride on streets with cars.

In some cities in the US, which is just plain wrong. For example, in Portland OR you cannot lawfully ride a bicycle on the sidewalk unless you're avoiding some road hazard (cars do not count, unless it's on fire or something).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> I've looked at MIPS and Wavecell helmets for bicycling. When I looked at the analysis and research, it seemed that MIPS makes more sense for snow sports, where your helmet can get stuck in snow and twist. On asphalt, or when colliding with a car, this is less likely. So I passed on getting a MIPS helmet for biking (though I should probably get one for snowboarding).

When I looked at the literature on Wavecell, it seemed to be of the "up to 40x better" variety. To a lay person like myself, that seemed suspicious because I have no idea what the common accident types are, and the literature didn't seem to indicate that it was more protective in the common scenarios. The article linked here does seem to make that case, but as others have noted it reads a bit like an advertisement.

I am actually planning on getting on getting one of these helmets simply because its shape fits my head very well, and in talking with cyclists I've been told that having a shape that fits your head (mine is apparently more "circular" than "oblong") is the most important thing.

<comment><USER30> I was in a cycling crash earlier this year while wearing a new (2 week old) MIPS helmet. The helmet (with my head in it) hit the road pretty hard causing an indentation and deep scratches. The location of the indentation leads me to believe that the initial impact 'stuck' to the asphalt then slid as the coefficient of friction was quickly surpassed. I had absolutely no injuries to my head or neck (with that could be said about my elbow, which I apparently landed on full-force). I have since replaced that helmet with another MIPs one, but I haven't heard of the Wavecell helmets until now. I'll have to consider those the next time I'm shopping around for a new helmet, hopefully this time it'll be after the current one has 'expired' naturally.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> There is no market for safer bike helmets.

Bike helmets are sold on the basis of look, feel, and most importantly weight. Nobody is touting real safety. Compare motorcycle helmets, which come in two radically different safety standards: DOT, for harley riders who want something that is barely legal. And SNELL, for sportbike riders who actually want to keep their face on their heads after a crash. I have never seen a bicyclist with a full face helmet on the road. Bicyclists, like the harley riders, care far more about comfort and style than actual safety. At 50kph the asphalt doesn't care whether you just fell off a bicycle or a motorcycle. Please prove me wrong. Please find me a pic of someone riding a bicycle on a road in a snell motorcycle helmet. I have seen plenty of them in the downhill community, never among commuters.

My point is that this new material will not be used to make safer helmets. It will be used to make lighter and more stylish helmets that, like all the others, remain only slightly above the absolute minimum legal standards. That's the market.

<comment><USER33> Speed is a factor. A motorcycle can easily travel 60km/h - 120km/h. A bicycle is likely to be travel at 20km/h - 40km/h. 40km/h is pretty damn fast on a bike. Maybe the enthusiast guys riding the beach in the morning get up to 60km/h but that's a pretty small percentage riders.

<comment><USER32> An impact above 60kph is beyond the design of even a motorcycle helmet. They are primarily meant to protect the head falling onto the road surface and then sliding, an impact that it similar no matter the speed. Even when standing still, a head freefalling from 2 meters (ie bicyclist/motorcyclist tipping over) strikes the ground at 22.5 kph. That single impact is the US/DOT standard for bicycle helms. They don't accommodate sliding or repeated impacts.

<comment><USER34> Not true. Look at MotoGP crashes. They'll hit the deck at 150mph, slide off into gravel, slide to a stop, and pop right up with nothing more than a few scuffs on their leathers.

<comment><USER35> Keyword: slide. They don't impact their heads at 150mph against something.

Also BTW, their helmets have way more cushion/crumble zone than regular street helmets.

<comment><USER34> There are impacts.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDoi-5HTuwQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDoi-5HTuwQ)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> Any independent tests on the subject?

I've went to my goto source on the subject: the Bike Helmet institute: [https://helmets.org/helmet19.htm#bontrager](https://helmets.org/helmet19.htm#bontrager)

Their veredict:

when we sent a Specter model to a lab for conventional impact test results the results were very good but not amazing.

</comment><comment><USER37> There's a bunch of helmet technology in mountain biking in the recent years. MIPS is one, 6D ODS is another (I have helmets with both). I wish I could see them compared.

</comment><comment><USER38> Wasn't there an increase in serious head/neck injuries when Australia made helmets mandatory? I thought the only working protection was the Hövding airbag, which is quite expensive for one-time use.

<comment><USER39> Last time this was posted someone pointed out that this could be because when someone dies they don't bother to report "they died but they also got neck injurys which would have caused long term damage" so since less people died, the more minor reports could have been made.

<comment><USER38> Basilar/basal skull fracture is what makes helmets dangerous in general, i.e. landing face-first on motorbikes often led to cracked bones at the bottom of the skull, often fatally. There were reports about increased rates among cyclists when helmets were made mandatory. I consider that pretty serious and not minor. Nothing is without risks it seems.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> Knocked myself out back in the 90s on a road bike not wearing a helmet. Stitches in head. Concussion for a month.

Knocked myself out 2 years ago on a mountain bike wearing a MIPS helmet. No stitches in head. No concussion.

Last year wife went over the bars at whistler and took it on the face with the best carbon fiber full face downhill helmet money can buy. Pressure on her face was so much she had lines of blood under her eyes just from the pressure. Big scratches on the face-guard. But she was totally fine, not knocked out, walked it off and laughed about it later.

Completely unscientific data above, but when it comes to my budget distribution these days, it goes into helmet, then pads (D3O for downhill and cross country), then bike, camelbak and rest of gear.

Helmets are awesome.

For reference: [https://www.d3o.com/](https://www.d3o.com/) Various manufacturers use this stuff - Fox, Raceface, but my personal favorite are these TLDs. They're great for long sweaty rides and gnarly stuff. [https://shop.troyleedesigns.com/raid-knee- guard?color=7](https://shop.troyleedesigns.com/raid-knee-guard?color=7)

This is the helmet she was using: [https://shop.troyleedesigns.com/19f-tld-d3-midnight- chrome-c...](https://shop.troyleedesigns.com/19f-tld-d3-midnight-chrome- carbon-helmet?quantity=1&color=370)

I'll also add that I'm not a fan of Bell's Super 3R helmet with the removable face. It's MIPS these days, but I don't feel the chin guard provides enough space in case you actually take a face hit. The more DH specific helmets have more clearance. I guess now that I've seen one work and save someone, I'm a little more picky. Thisis the Super 3R I'm referring to: [https://www.bellhelmets.com/bike/p/super-3r-mips-mountain- bi...](https://www.bellhelmets.com/bike/p/super-3r-mips-mountain-bike-helmet)

For cross country rides that have some more challenging DH, I use this helmet which breathes way more than the TLD I linked to above and has more clearance than the Super 3R: [https://www.foxracing.com/proframe-helmet- matte-%5Bblk%5D-m/...](https://www.foxracing.com/proframe-helmet- matte-%5Bblk%5D-m/23310-001-M.html?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&gclid=CjwKCAjwzJjrBRBvEiwA867byrst9OjRtuAQMGVTjsGdFc2qBphbQ6BpD9J4ZX_- XzKoOs15U4171hoCkp0QAvD_BwE)

I'm sure there are tons of cyclists, XC and downhill folks on HN and we all have our opinions and experience. Would love to hear from others. YMMV considerably from mine. Stay safe!!

<comment><USER41> I crashed at Whistler last year, into several large rocks, going fast, wearing a full face and a neck brace and full body armor. I remember hitting the rock with the back of my head and wondering while it was happening how serious it was going to be. I'm certain that without the protection, I'd have been in the hospital at the very least. Walked away with no head injury, no broken bones, only some torn shoulder soft tissue and a really ugly hematoma on my hip where it was exposed in between two body armor pads.

Ditto: helmets are awesome.

<comment><USER42> Would you have put yourself in the same situation if you didn't have all that protective gear on?

iirc this is one of the theories about injury being higher in American Football vs. Rugby, the increased safety equipment leads to a cycle of increased hitting force which leads to increased equipment, etc.

<comment><USER41> I do put myself in similar situations with less gear, just for shorter periods of time, and when I'm closer to home. I don't wear all that gear when riding in traffic, and arguably the consequences can be much higher when hitting or being hit by a car.

The gear helps when I have much greater exposure (i.e. longer periods of time) to the risks, and part of the idea is when I'm taking a vacation and spending a lot of money to go up to Whistler for a week, fewer small problems will end my vacation early. The gear also helps when I run the risk of exhaustion, which is a major cause of mountain bike crashes.

BTW, I actually do think there's _some_ truth to the idea that gear increases risk taking. That doesn't mean that overall safety goes down though, so you have to be careful how you think and talk about it. If injury outcomes are on average lower when wearing gear, then that's that, it doesn't matter if people are taking larger chances, the protection is still outweighing the risk.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> OT: The pointless euphemism "unplanned dismounts" in the intro paragraph made me laugh out loud.

</comment><comment><USER44> I need this for hockey asap!!!

</comment><comment><USER45> Off-topic but it's really annoying to try to read an article with 30% of my mobile screen taken up by a sticky ego title. Please fight back against marketdroids who ask you to do this.

</comment><comment><USER46> People buy $300 bicycle helmets?

</comment><comment><USER47> How does this make 2nd place after 9 minutes? Is Hacker news pay to play ?

I mean this sounds great, and the contrarian version of me says, no way its all marketing.

Discuss

<comment><AUTHOR> I submitted this because I bought one of these today. Obviously I have no way of independently verifying whether or not they work as advertised. What I will say though is that if you get even a minor concussion, that means you can't look at any electronic device for 3+ months, which means that if you're a tech consultant or run a startup then you're basically out of a job. So in comparison paying $150 for something that lasts 3 years seems conceptually like a very good bet.

My general outlook, which is why I like this, is that it's relatively rare in life to find things where you can improve your health or increase your life expectancy just by swiping your credit card without needing to do any additional work or anything else unpleasant afterwards, so one should take advantage of these opportunities when possible. (Another good example is HEPA filters, where you just swipe your credit card and plug it in and that's it, and although there are limited studies on HEPA filters themselves there is a very clear link between air pollution and mortality risk.)

<comment><USER48> > if you get even a minor concussion, that means you can't look at any > electronic device for 3+ months

I had a concussion recently and my doctor said nothing of that nature. I would love to have had a helmet which was better able to handle the impact though! Definitely the least fun altered state of consciousness that I have experienced.

<comment><USER49> I've had concussions and never been told to abstain from screens. So, I did some quick googling... by the looks of it, screens (and other bright light sources) can exacerbate post-concussion headaches, but I didn't see anything that indicated screen use slows recovery or causes further damage.

<comment><USER48> The understanding I've gotten from reading about the topic and talking to a GP was that anything that makes symptoms worse will lengthen recovery time.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What keyboard do you recommend? - <AUTHOR> The new macbook keyboard is 'incompatible' with me. overall I think it's awful:
stuck keys after my first 12 days usage;
the arrows are too small, and even with the other keys I end up making typos all the time (way more than before)
So, I'm thinking about a new external keyboard. Any recommendations? <comment><AUTHOR> seem cool:

* [https://codekeyboards.com/](https://codekeyboards.com/) * [https://www.amazon.de/Filco-Majestouch-2-Profi-Tastatur-Tenk...](https://www.amazon.de/Filco-Majestouch-2-Profi-Tastatur-Tenkeyless/dp/B007XS7TXS)

</comment><comment><USER2> Kinesis Advantage helped me get over RSI ([https://codewithoutrules.com/2016/11/18/rsi- solution/);](https://codewithoutrules.com/2016/11/18/rsi-solution/\);) my hands hurt when I don't use it, probably because I'm an Emacs user with small hands so I stretch for combos.

Downsides: once you're used to it all other keyboards will feel clumsy and badly laid out. And it's big, so it's a pain to lug around.

</comment><comment><USER3> If you are feeling adventourus I'd recommend Ducky Zero keyboard. I have moved back to mechanical keyboard a few years ago for partially nostalgic reason but also because I like to hear when I type a character (which I find useful when typing passwords without echo).

</comment><comment><USER4> [https://www.daskeyboard.com/daskeyboard-4-professional- for-m...](https://www.daskeyboard.com/daskeyboard-4-professional-for-mac/)</comment>


TinyProj connects developers, designers, etc. with paid, short-term projects. - <AUTHOR> http://kylewritescode.com/post/10224111214/i-just-launched-tinyproj-the-latest-in-my-line-of

<comment><USER2> I've noticed this need as well, and launched something similar: <http://gun.io>

It's free for Open Source, and a 10% fee for non-Free projects. Winner-take- all!

Hopefully we'll both work to create a culture which helps independent developers help each other. Good luck! Email me if you're interested in collaboration.

<comment><USER3> This space is interesting. A friend and I have been doing a weekend project in the same space: <http://casualcontracting.com>. Similar idea, but listing a project is free and it's invite-only for developers.

We'd definitely be interested in talking with you guys as well. Email is in my profile.

<comment><USER4> Agreed. My friend and I also did FindAHacker.com, which looked to serve side projects and co-founding opportunities. Down to talk to you all also!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> How is this different than the ten thousand established freelance sites it's competing with? Everything from guru to odesk to rentacoder to scriptlance already does what this does, as well as handling payment and rating developers.

The Freelance game has plenty of problems, but frankly a shortage of places to post jobs is not one of them.

<comment><USER6> Maybe it is, maybe it isn't, though I'm focusing specifically on _short-term_ work. It's also a set it and forget it scenario for the talent -- they just get stuff delivered. At the end of the day, it's an experiment and something interesting to work on that could benefit my day job, Forrst, pretty substantially.

<comment><USER5> > I'm focusing specifically on short-term work

Exactly my point. So are those ten thousand bottom scraper sites I mention.

What I'm asking is how you intend to stop the same people who post their "Groupon Clone: $500 budget" nonsense on those 'lance sites off your list?

And how you're planning to stop the 100-500 "sir, we are professional A++++++++ software firm. we review your project and are ready to start immediately" responses that will be auto-spammed to every job on your list?

Those are actually good problems to solve, and a site that solved them would be a great win for the small fraction of freelance work that's actually conducted above board by talented developers and non-flaky clients. But a quick spin through what you've presented here makes it seem like your quick & dirty approach will actually amplify those problems.

<comment><USER6> Both great questions.

On the project side, I hand approve every post. Spam/recruiter junk/etc. gets deleted and the email address blacklisted.

For the talent side, yes, you're right; there's a good potential for A++++++++ firm nonsense.

The quick and dirty approach is probably not accurately reflecting the work I've put in/will be putting in behind the scenes, through methods we've developed at Forrst for dealing with reputation, throttling one's ability to mass-contact project owners, anonymizing email on both sides with a one-click "this is spam" function, and so forth.

Ultimately, I agree -- they're great (and hard) problems to solve, and I'm eager to do so.

<comment><USER7> > On the project side, I hand approve every post. Spam/recruiter junk/etc. > gets deleted and the email address blacklisted.

Do you have a plan for scaling that up? ("I'm gonna hire more warm bodies" is an acceptable answer, imo.)

<comment><USER6> Heh, honestly that's probably what I'll do. We (Forrst) can certainly share the load if/when it becomes necessary.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Kyle, huge fan, and we've talked via Skype in the past, so I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but I'm curious...why not create this as part of Forrst instead of as a separate venture? It seems like you could get some reach, while also adding value to the people paying a monthly supporter fee.

I think this service looks great, but I'm bummed that it was integrated as a supporter benefit.

Edit: I see now that it _is_ a benefit to Forrst members, but in the opposite way I had predicted. Any plans to allow the trading of acorns for job posts? Sometimes it's nice to have backup on projects :)

<comment><USER6> We can't really release the kind of quick, experimental MVP projects that I'm such a fan of on Forrst since we've got 40k people who will notice a lack of polish and so forth. I wanted to vet this idea quickly without the overhead of expectations from the community. That's not to say this won't be rolled back in somehow. That's a good idea about Acorns, I'll put some thought into it :) And no worries -- totally appreciate the question's directness.

<comment><USER8> That makes a lot of sense Kyle, appreciate the candor.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm pretty excited about this. If you submit a project, mention HN and I'll give you 50% off the first one.

<comment><USER9> Really neat interface. Also thanks for making developer/designer/copywriter checkboxes instead of radio.

Update: I just received an email with URL to edit my profile without having to create/remember password. Very neat but one problem: It's http. You really should make that https, especially when you start dealing with paying customers.

<comment><USER6> Heh, I literally just received my SSL certs a few minutes ago. Hang tight.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Hi. I added a project.

Few points:

      * Are Incremental Days Necessary(1-21)? 1,2,3,7,14,31 maybe? Also, up to 1 month?

      * The 1000 character limit thing was a pain.

Good luck on your project. Lets see if you are able to find someone for our project.

<comment><USER6> Thanks for the feedback! I actually had the first item written down, and the more I mull it over the more it makes sense.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I signed up. Loved the simplicity of it all. I also love how I can just sit back and watch what comes through passively without having to go search through stuff. No idea if I'll actually take any projects, but I'm definitely a fan of the interface.

</comment><comment><USER12> An odd comment I know but this is the second time Ive seen "made in NYC" today in the footer of a webpage. Don't know what to make of it. Perhaps I'll add made in Tijuana to mine?

<comment><USER13> clicking on the corresponding link on forrest yields this site <http://nytm.org/made/>

enjoy

<comment><USER14> Oh I like that idea, just registered sdcrafted.com to do something similar for San Diego.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> They send an email every Saturday? That seems somewhat.. not very useful. A site with a list of projects and the number of interested bids and such would work much better.

<comment><USER16> Captive audience they can push messages to. Also, only need to moderate once a week rather than live. Pretty smart.

<comment><USER6> Thanks. We'll see how it works out, but yes, that was the intention. I get 6 days to moderate and queue up projects for the next email. Plus, I like the idea of a low/no-effort set up for the talent side -- they get an email they can skim at their leisure, no browsing around and trawling for job listings on a site.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Congrats on this, very smart (you've kept it simple).

Is this a good way to get designers, I wonder? The alternative that seems that it might work better, browsing portfolios and contacting your favourite designers, as written by Andrew: [http://andrewseddon.com/post/3402344430/how- to-find-a-design...](http://andrewseddon.com/post/3402344430/how-to-find-a- designer)

<comment><USER6> Thanks very much. That was indeed the goal.

As to whether this works the way I'm anticipating, only time will tell! I'm predicting, though, that this works as a nice adjunct to directly contacting designers (or anyone else) -- you never know who you're missing, after all. If I've learned one thing from Forrst, it's that for every well-known designer (or developer) out there, there are scores of undiscovered, awesome designers waiting to knock it out of the park on your project.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Im in the mist of starting up a digital agency with friends. We are all creative and or technical people. Our weak point is a lack of strong sales skills to secure sizable business contracts.

I was thinking of creating a site like sales guy/gal meet development/designer team. Maybe this exists already?

<comment><USER6> Interesting idea. Happy to brainstorm about that - kyle at forrst.com

<comment><USER18> Cool I sent you an email. Cheers, Ryan

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Congrats Kyle and welcome to the world of very small projects.

Maybe we can help each other out :)

<comment><USER6> And totally. Email me anytime.

</comment></comment><comment> B-Scan Got my first mail. It's great! Nice job. Only one thing: it will be good that links in the mail open some preview page where you click on "Connect" button. Didn't expect CCing on link click.

</comment><comment><USER20> I personally like the idea of getting the listings on email. Having the list of jobs online seems more vulnerable for spam. Let's see how it evolves. Thanks

</comment><comment><USER21> I was about to use it for several projects when I realized I have no idea who I'm going to working with on the projects. Is it 1-on-1 all the time?

<comment><AUTHOR> Well, your request for work gets sent to all the relevant subscribers (i.e. if you need a developer, to all the developers on the list).

The ones interested make it known and then you can get in contact with them and decide who you wanna work for.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> What does TinyProj offer that WeekendHacker doesn't? The latter is free and has six times as many subscribers.

<comment><AUTHOR> > six times as many subscribers

For now. As TinyProj and when it taps into the Forrst userbase, you'll be looking at a solid, skillful, and numerous candidates.

<comment><USER6> FWIW we're about to hit 7k subscribers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> How confidential is it? If I submit a project: A) who will get to read about the project? B) will everyone who can see the listing also see my name?

I'm in semi-stealth. I want few people to know what my project is, and nobody to know that it's mine (except the designer).

<comment><USER6> Anyone can read about it, but you're free to use a pseudonym and generic email address. There is craigslist-style email anonymity, so you get to obscure your identity as long as you'd like to.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> It may also help to specify the currency(s) involved...yes we'll all assume it's USD for now.

<comment><USER6> Good catch.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> I like the idea, but I would feel a lot more comfortable about "1,000 rad folks" if the site gives an idea of what kind of these people are. For instance, these are top 250 users in the category on Forrst. Sample profiles would help as well.

<comment><USER6> You're totally right, and I'm working on that as fast as I can.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I'm interesting in submitting a project but I don't know how much to offer for it. In a "marketplace" you get to see what other people are offering and what's being accepted. I'd like to see this sort of information.

</comment><comment><USER27> Cool project. I have a similar idea but one that is based on hours, not cash.

</comment><comment><USER28> I like this idea a lot. I wish you could just view the listings on the site instead of having to wait for a weekly email. That's what I was expecting, and having to wait is just annoying.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's probable that this will be implemented in the future, depending on other users' feedback.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> I registered itppl.com YEARS ago for something similar to this but never got it started. Good job :)

</comment><comment><USER30> Cool just registered as a developer and should registering a project soon :)

</comment><comment><USER31> any geographical limitations ? (say I'm in EU, project is in the US, etc ..) I suppose it will have to be dealt separately for each project or ?

</comment><comment><USER32> This has a lot of potential -- signed up -- good job!

</comment><comment><USER33> i am confused as to why you just didn't take a screenshot...you actually "shot" your screen...

In any case, signed up :P great idea btw

<comment><USER6> Bad/inside joke. People are doing that on Forrst a bunch, so it was more of a nod/friendly jab at them.

Thanks btw! :)

<comment><USER34> It looks better that way anyway.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> How do you deal with spam?

<comment><USER6> All projects are approved by a human, and on the talent side fake emails that bounce are automatically removed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> Nice idea. Good luck!

<comment><USER6> Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> How is this different from elance.com and scriptlance.com?</comment>


Fortress - New Language for Supercomputers (Talk by Guy Steele) - <AUTHOR> http://www.infoq.com/presentations/fortress-steele

<comment><AUTHOR> I found this talk extremely interesting. Of note, he describes:

How they're making syntax close to that of mathematical notation.

How a huge number of programming statements can be modeled by a generator, a comprehension, and a reducer.

How they're using traits, a variant of multiple inheritance, to encode and test for algebraic properties.

How, knowing these algebraic properties, and knowing specifics of the hardware system, generators, comprehensions and reducers can derive a parallelization strategy.

I'm excited enough by this language I've actually started to use it, for numerical work. It's not mature -- there's no compiler, just an interpreter -- but the input method is easier than latex, so at worst I'll have well typeset pseudocode. :-)

<comment><USER2> "How a huge number of programming statements can be modeled by a generator, a comprehension, and a reducer."

I know, let's call it MapReduce!

<comment><AUTHOR> I think this is actually a little more general than that.</comment></comment></comment>


Review a Startup: YouCompete - alan-youcompete

https://www.you-compete.com
In short: Competition management meets social networking
Problem: Managing your own competition over the internets nowadays tends to boil down to one of a few broad categories:
- Write your own website - Buy a template site and tweak it to your needs - Send everything over email
Solution: A site for coordinating competitions which combines flexible administration with the social trappings of Web 2.0.
If that's all a little too abstract, a few concrete examples of what YouCompete does: - Aggregate player activity for a match (Who can attend?) - Notify you via email when a match is cancelled - Compute standings by Win Percentage, Points (Hockey, Soccer) or Rating (Chess) - Coordinate an N-team single-elimination tournament bracket
Sign up and create a league or check out a few of the example leagues we've set up to get a flavor for the site: https://www.you-compete.com/leagues?q=example
Thanks! <comment><AUTHOR> I agree with the other comments. Here it is with a different (no) background and different (no) logo:

<http://img243.imageshack.us/img243/392/ucompete.jpg>

</comment><comment><USER2> Too bright and your logo looks too cartoony. Combined with a small font size the site is unreadable. Redo your landing page in less garish colors, and that should be your top priority.

<comment> alan-youcompete Thanks for the honest feedback. After a while of looking at the same thing, you can easily lose perspective. We'll take another another look at how to redo the design.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> It's really, really difficult to read because of the font sizes/layout/design. I couldn't get past that so I clicked out. Looks like a useful idea though. Maybe hire a designer?

</comment><comment><USER4> my feature request:

allow an event coordinator to set up a bracket for an external competition, allow people to predict the outcome, have results be entered, and grade people on it. like march madness brackets but for any type of event that the app supports.

would make the app pertinent to fans as well as competitors.

<comment> alan-youcompete That's a cool idea for getting people more involved. I have no idea whether its an issue, but I think we'll have to take a closer look to make sure we wouldn't run afoul of gambling laws.

<comment><USER4> (ianal, but) you probably won't. there are other sites out there that do exactly this, except i've not found one that isn't messy/spammy/etc.. would love to see something clean, flexible, and easy to use.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Your Idea is great, small changes in look and feel will help a lot.</comment>


Google removes BeyondPod podcast manager from Android Auto - <AUTHOR> https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/android-auto/coUtN_D7pWU;context-place=forum/android-auto <comment><AUTHOR> What was interesting to me was...

\- Google removed BeyondPod based on problem reports from users of other Android Auto apps

\- Google removed BeyondPod without having to update Android Auto or BeyndPod. I assume it was a server side change

\- Google says they reached out to BeyondPod with no response

\- Users were not notified either from Google or BeyondPod of the removal

\- The removal exposed a Google bug where an empty 'Google' label appeared</comment>


Ask HN: What's Up With Green Usernames? - <AUTHOR> Anyone know why some users have their names appear Green while the rest of us are all grey? Just curious <comment><USER2> You do know that pretty much every page has a search box:

[http://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/all&q=green+usern...](http://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/all&q=green+username)

</comment><comment>==

Added in Edit ...

I know that here on HN it's generally regarded that if you start with "I know I'll get downvoted for this ..." then you simply shouldn't say it.

Having said that, there are times when unpopular things need to be said. I'm genuinely not trying to be snarky, I'm genuinely not trying to be rude, and I'm genuinely not trying to be superior. I genuinely think people really ought to do some homework before asking questions.

When we create a web site we often provide a FAQ, and we hope that people will do some homework and check the FAQ before calling the support line, or sending an email.

Why don't we ask the same of ourselves? Why shouldn't we ask that people at least wonder if the answer has been asked before.

So I'm not providing the fish, I'm trying to teach you how to fish. I'm not going to give the answer yet again, I'm telling people how to get the answers for themselves. It shouldn't be necessary, and yet it is.

So yes, downvote me, but understand that I'm actually trying to help the community. The question is, and it's a genuine one, how can we say RTFM without sounding snarky?

<comment><AUTHOR> I didn't downvote you, thanks for the reply :)

<comment><USER2> You're welcome, and just as a point of interest, I do know you didn't downvote me, because you can't downvote replies to your own submissions.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Those are new users. I forget _how_ new they are, but account names change from green to black (or grey or whatever exact shade it is) after some period of time.

<comment><USER4> If I recall previous mentions, 14 days.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! It was mystifying me</comment></comment></comment>


Silphium: Did Greek science die out because their elite discovered The Pill? - <AUTHOR> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silphium

<comment><USER2> Here is an interesting note from FuturePundit:

"Upper Class Fertility Rising Due To Competitive Birthing?" <http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/004462.html></comment>


Ask HN: What are your favorite freelance developer websites? - <AUTHOR> I'm in the process of creating a website for my development/consulting freelance work, and could use some inspiration. <comment><USER2> I'm about to complete my decade as a full-time freelancer. I'm not 100% happy about my own web site, so I wouldn't link it here. However, some pointers:

\- Have a blog. This is a common advice you have probably seen many times, but I can say this from first hand experience, that it works. I have received offers just because they came across some of my blog posts.

\- Papers and talks: If you have given talks or have written academic papers, have them front and center. They tell a lot about you in a positive way than a thousand words could ever have.

\- Unless you are a creative designer, I'd discourage you from reinventing the page design. So don't go for horizontal scrolling, splash pages, or those pie charts that tell everyone you are 90% good at Python.

Good luck.

</comment><comment><USER3> Saw this one on Twitter the other day. Pretty amazing: [https://bruno- simon.com/](https://bruno-simon.com/)

<comment><USER4> Saw the loading screen and was pissed that someone would link a website that tool so long...was genuinely surprised once it finished loading. This is awesome

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I personally hate the run of the mill "Portfolio" sites. I like freelancers who actually write about their work and talk about the interesting problems they have solved. Best way is to create content like Blog Posts, short videos/training materials etc. Heck, write an e-book if you can. Those are the things that will get you the best clients. I recently hired a freelance developer who literally wrote an e-book on Go and the moment I purchased his ebook and went through his quality blog posts, I knew what he could do. Didn't care about him showing me a portfolio site.

<comment><USER6> What is the ebook name?

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> How do you feel about this one? www.aladinbs.com</comment>


Street Legal Jet Powered Beetle (2006) - <AUTHOR> http://www.ronpatrickstuff.com/ <comment><USER2> _I was thinking of putting it into an import car show but the promoter told me that it looked too plain and recommended that I put some decals on it, lower it, and put on some aftermarket wheels._

/me boggles. This is either a joke or an incredibly sad commentary. "I built a jet car!" " _Yawn_. Where's the bling?"

</comment><comment><USER3> The sloppy layout made me think "blog spam"... quick Google search turned this up.

<http://www.ronpatrickstuff.com/>

<comment><AUTHOR> Nevertheless, it's pretty amazing.

<comment><USER3> Oh I agree, that didn't stop me from reading the entire thing :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This guy was on David Letterman some time ago. He did a test run and I believe caught some of the grass near the track on fire. :-)

edit: found it <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJyAA0oPAwE>

</comment><comment><USER5> This is so full of epic win. The scooter is better than the VW. lol

</comment><comment><USER6> I think a face-off is needed between this, and the Jet powered Minivan

<http://hackedgadgets.com/2008/03/03/jet-turbine-van/>

</comment><comment><USER7> I still prefer the engineer who lights a charcoal grill in 30 seconds with a piece of flaming paper and 4 quarts of liquid oxygen.

[http://gizmodo.com/5360234/lighting-a-grill-with-liquid- oxyg...](http://gizmodo.com/5360234/lighting-a-grill-with-liquid-oxygen-is- the-opposite-of-safe)

<comment><USER8> Both are neat to look at but lighting the charcoal grill is a cool chemistry demonstration, not really 'engineering'. Putting a working jet engine on your VW beetle is pretty serious engineering.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I just want to see this thing pass me, full after-burner on.

</comment><comment><USER10> I'd like to have that scooter. That one looks cool.

</comment><comment><USER11> Jet Powered Porche on Ebay [http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Porsche-928-Boeing- Gas-Turbin...](http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Porsche-928-Boeing-Gas-Turbine- Engine-Jet-Powered- PORSCHE-928_W0QQcmdZViewItemQQ_trksidZp3286Q2ec0Q2em14QQhashZitem3a5304b45aQQitemZ250500920410QQptZUSQ5fCarsQ5fTrucks)

</comment><comment><USER12> This really puts the Bat-mobile to shame.

</comment><comment><USER13> I'm thinking interesting project, but beauty of design points = fail.

For the ultimate in elegant, jet powered simplicity, I think Mr. Maddox and his pulse jet bicycle is leagues ahead:

[http://thekneeslider.com/archives/2009/06/02/pulsejet- bicycl...](http://thekneeslider.com/archives/2009/06/02/pulsejet-bicycle- continues-to-evolve/)

<comment><USER14> I didn't vote on your comment - your fail claim I would have downvoted, but I loved your link. Maybe you should have commented them separately if you wanted better feedback.

<comment><USER13> The point I was making was about beauty of design, not on the technology, which is where I think the Beetle/jet combo fails, and the handmade, beautifully crafted bicycle/pulse jet excels.

Although you could propose that the Beetle follows the Corbusian 'form follows function' ethos, the end result taking it's shape from it's purpose so elegantly illustrated by the original Beetle itself, strapping a whopping great jet to it does not.

The bicycle on the other hand, has obviously been lovingly crafted to be an aesthetic whole, even though two disparate technologies have been employed - therefore = win.

You could of course argue that Corbusier didn't follow his own ethos and 'fie rules' either though.

I actually think that the Beetle/jet combination is a very appropriate metaphor for many types of technology we use.

"Here's thing A, which only does X, if we add thing B to it, it now does XYZ, just not very efficiently, and it looks awful"

<comment><USER15> It's a lot easier to industrially design/engineer a bike than a car. The work you're suggesting probably would have dwarfed the actual jet-engineering. However, unlike jet bikes, we see real jet cars all the time—being raced for the land speed record. The fact that it's possible to add this after-the-fact to a car you own was the novel property here, not the combination of jet engine with car.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Sooo many photos and no video? Weird :)

<comment><USER10> <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=831375>

</comment></comment><comment> onreact-com It's a penis!

<comment><USER17> I have to say the shot of him in his Hawaiian shirt with the huge phallic turgidity of the engine held erect against him does look rather like an example from a Freudian textbook.

<comment> onreact-com So you agree that it's a penis? ;-)

<comment><USER18> You know, sometimes a jet engine is just a jet engine</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Use Emacs Org-mode Links for Absolutely Anything - <AUTHOR> http://endlessparentheses.com/use-org-mode-links-for-absolutely-anything.html

<comment><USER2> One nice org-mode feature is "Babel", the ability to embed snippets of code in documents, run them during export and insert the results (either values or stdout) into other parts of the document [http://orgmode.org/worg/org- contrib/babel/](http://orgmode.org/worg/org-contrib/babel/)

Since my blog is mostly about programming, this lets me write the code I'm talking about directly into the prose (using C-c ' to switch to the relevant Emacs mode for editing that language) and ensures that the code and results match up exactly (including graphs generated with GNUplot).

<comment><USER3> People even write their dotemacs in Org mode and use babel in their init.el to run it

[https://github.com/thomanil/dot- emacs/blob/master/thomanil.o...](https://github.com/thomanil/dot- emacs/blob/master/thomanil.org)

<comment><USER4> Even an "Emacs configuration template" (a la Prelude or emacs-starter-kit) that makes use of it (and `el-get` to retrieve and initialize packages):

[https://github.com/xiaohanyu/oh-my-emacs](https://github.com/xiaohanyu/oh-my- emacs)

Nifty.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> So I am trying to restart a blog using org-mode. I think it is the way forward. Right now, I meaning using it as one subset, a markup language to convert into other representations. I know org-mode is more featureful than that by a long shot. I am just curious for this use case for the reason below.

Having said that,I am more interested in why, despite the Church of Emacs and Its Holy Love of Parens (that is a joke from an admirer, btw), why pure sexpr is not the way forward for a markup language. I decided to look into them recently, including cl-who, Scribble (CL, Scheme, and now most popular Racket variants), and other sexpr markup languages. I did so thinking that, if you want to have a ground-up markup language to convert to anything, would not sexpr-based data be the best for the iconicity Lispers crave. Is it not that far removed from XML+XLST for this very reason.

Does anyone have full-bodied markup that uses sexpr as a source and translates to everything? I think this would be quite compelling, well maybe only to Lispers. Would there be a desire for such a thing?

<comment><USER6> In Clojure:

[https://github.com/weavejester/hiccup](https://github.com/weavejester/hiccup)

[https://github.com/cgrand/enlive](https://github.com/cgrand/enlive)

<comment><USER7> For XML/HTML, I'm partial towards the SXML notation: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SXML](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SXML)

<comment><USER6> Huh, cool. I haven't seen this before.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Is there a tutorial for using org-mode only for a simple TODO list that anyone can recommend? I had a brief look around, but don't have the time to read the entire manual at the moment.

<comment><USER9> The tutorial by David O'Toole focuses pretty much on TODO lists and simple outlines: [http://orgmode.org/worg/org- tutorials/orgtutorial_dto.html](http://orgmode.org/worg/org- tutorials/orgtutorial_dto.html)

<comment><USER10> As an indirect response to the OPs question the next step after that good intro tutorial is something like this, which is a medium level application of org mode once you get the basics down, in a well known format: (Edited to emphasize if you know the basics of GTD, and its not terribly complicated, this is a good example of applying org mode tools to a known problem, presumably this will help you in applying org mode to your individual problem, assuming its not just setting up GTD of course)

[http://members.optusnet.com.au/~charles57/GTD/gtd_workflow.h...](http://members.optusnet.com.au/~charles57/GTD/gtd_workflow.html)

I actually used this, or many ideas strongly borrowed from this, for some time until I was kind of forced into evernote in order to inter operate both mobile and with some evernote users (OK specifically the other user is my wife). It turned out to be easier to implement something like GTD in evernote than to teach my (techie, pbx programmer) wife how to use emacs. But emacs org mode did work perfectly and was quite effective and fast while I used it.

The mobile client for evernote a couple years ago was far superior to the mobile org mode client. As of years ago. This may have changed. The big problem from memory with the mobile clients is the mobile app model is inherently windows-ish where all the worlds features are in one self contained app, so you gotta make a good gui and a good sync in one app, where as the unix-ish philosophy of using a suite of tools perfectly designed for individual jobs is not permitted in mobile, so its a hard fit. Although the evernote guys got it to work pretty well, so its obviously possible.

<comment><USER11> slightly irrelevant, but since you mentioned GTD I'd like to add that there is quite a nice open source project for that workflow. It's called Getting Things Gnome [0] (there is also a version for windows, mind you)

That might be a good idea for people who are not living in emacs. The only thing I dislike about it is the fact that it stores your tasks in a single xml-files.

[0] [http://gtgnome.net/download/](http://gtgnome.net/download/)</comment></comment></comment></comment>