How to get a job at a startup if you aren't a developer - <AUTHOR> http://estromberg.com/post/4778188872/how-to-get-a-job-at-a-startup-if-you-arent-a-developer <comment><USER2> "Any startup job you find on a job board will be one you don't want."

I wonder if this is true in areas where startups are not the in thing, like Houston Tx. There are some reasons why I think it may not apply, such as how conservative and big business the area is. But, I also know that I look to my network for partners and employees, so I am left uncertain on this point.

</comment><comment><USER3> Good article, especially #4 -- offer a concrete skill.

A good friend is applying for fashion retail jobs, and I've told her that showing your passion isn't enough. _Everyone_ is passionate about fashion--the goal is to shape your experience so teams can understand why you're better than everyone else.

Related to #4: what are some good books on online analytics?

</comment><comment><USER4> I imagine this his how non-devs feel when reading a lot of articles here. I have absolutely no idea what non-developers do at startups, and if I were having a dream where I was suddenly hired on in this position, it would feel like your average "showed up to class with no pants for final you didn't study for" nightmare.

<comment><USER5> "I have absolutely no idea what non-developers do at startups"

Disclaimer: developer at technology companies.

Well, they'd better know how to sell, and sell well, if they want to get a job in a lean business that simply doesn't have room for people who aren't contributing directly to the bottom line. Another position is that of business development. Soft skill, but really necessary to provide pre and post sales support when the company becomes large enough that the CEO/COO can no longer handhold each partner/client/vendor.

In my experience, marketing/hr/low-level product are always promotions given to the poor bastard who spent a year faking it as the office manager.

<comment><USER6> The last VC-backed startup I worked at, the marketing people were 3 Harvard MBAs that kept the sales people away from the developers, and they helped us figure out what product features were most relevant to implement. They also got us the latest and greatest sample ASICs.

<comment><USER5> That makes sense if you're not a technology-only company (see disclaimer).

The space is probably/could be crowded and they're going to need some sharp assets to get the word out and obtain customers, but in my case where every sale incurs more work from engineering, one has to balance it out or else we'll end up with a bunch of over-eager sales people signing low-end deals and a couple of angry, burned-out developers perusing HN wondering how their hacker dreams turned into biz dev nightmare.

Coffee is for closers.

<comment><USER6> Actually, we were a technology company. We developed embedded systems for RFID/ NFC technology to sell and license to OEMs. Firmware for DSPs and MCUs is some of the harder technology I've been involved with. I'm not sure I understand your point.

FYI, ASIC stands for Application Specific Integrated Circuit.

<comment><USER5> I thought you meant sneakers.

Again, it all depends on the maturity of the startup in question, the market and the need for highly-paid non-technical people whose contributions can bring home the bacon. If they don't, then they're just a drain on resources or could just be there to prop up the appearance of success in the eyes of the market or investors.

Did Dick Cheney actually run Halliburton or was he there to steer business to the firm? I think empirical evidence would point to the later. So when you do look around and wonder what exactly it is this person does in relation to their job title/description, there may be more than meets the eye and in personal experience nepotism has a lot to do with their presence as sometimes it's just hard to finding the candidate that's a perfect fit and you may have to just hire someone you know and hope they grow into the role.

I understand that a lot of people who read HN are young and tech-focused, but there's a lot more to it than landing a job at a hot startup out of school and the more one understands about their environment and how to apply their skills appropriately, the easier it'll be for them to succeed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I know OP means well, but this is some of the most misguided advice I've ever seen on Hacker News...

 _1\. Know the tech landscape better than anybody else_

This is like saying, "Know God" or "Know the meaning of life". You'll be chasing down something elusive and nebulous while the rest of us are learning, building, and growing.

Also, you will _never_ know _anything_ better than anybody else, so just get that self-defeating thought out of your head.

 _2\. Form an opinion and start a blog_

If you've been there and done that, please share your experience. We're eager to hear about it. Otherwise, you should be listening, not talking. There are enough worthless blogs out there. Please don't add another one.

 _3\. Be familiar with the startup culture - Each sport, industry, or college has a unique culture, with its own lingo, success stories, and taboos. Startup culture is no different._

2 things you can do with 4 possible scenarios:

a. Build stuff that delivers long term value to others and can sustain itself as a business

b. "fit in"

      - If you do both a. and b., great.
      - If you do a. and not b., no one will care that b. is missing.
      - If you do b. and not a., you're adding little or no value.
      - If you do neither a. or b., you're adding little or no value.

In other words "culture", "lingo", "success stories", "taboos", are all non- issues. Bullshit. They don't matter.

In the end, all that really matters (with rare exceptions) is a.

You can skip #3.

 _I'd also recommend hanging out on tech-heavy communities like Hacker News or Reddit. Observe how people interact. Pay close attention to which articles and comments get voted up or down. It will go a long way in figuring out what the startup culture sees as valuable. Decide if these values mesh with what you see as important._

Please don't do this. All you will learn is how a crowd behaves, which may or may not have anything to do with what really matters.

If you want to come to Hacker News to lurk and learn, welcome! But don't get caught up in what "the world thinks". This is a great recipe for the community to experience eternal September and for you to become just another poser.

 _4\. Offer a concrete skill_

99% of the work in a start-up is either building or selling & implementing. If you can do either well, great. If you can't, then learn how and forget all the rest of the bullshit in this post.

 _5\. Take an internship_

Good advice, actually, for #4 above.

 _6\. Send cold emails_

Please don't. Anywhere else that's called spam.

<comment><USER8> I agree with a couple of your points but I think you might be overreacting.

When the OP said to hang out at HN or learn all about the culture, that's really helpful for those who are completely unfamiliar with the whole industry. A lot of smart kids have never entered this world and it's a good primer. Just because they are new to startups doesn't make them hopeless -- I arrived a couple years ago and spent a few months just getting acquainted through tireless immersion.

Cold emails are fine, if they have an edge to them and are informed and targeted. If you get emails from people who clearly put there heart into writing it, I think it's at least worth a quick reply. You're not a celebrity.

And how else do you expect someone to get into the industry without some cold emails or calls? As someone who just got their foot in the door, I can definitively say one works at least twice as hard outside the industry than when one gets a job. Have some respect for that nonpaid effort, I say.

That said, one should always be building up a defined skillset concurrently.

<comment><USER7> _I agree with a couple of your points but I think you might be overreacting._

You're probably right and if so, I apologize. I guess it's just my way of venting my frustration with so many people talking when they should be listening. To me, OP's post just seems like feeding fuel to that fire.

I would never want to discourage anyone from becoming part of our community. It's just that some ways are much better than others.

 _And how else do you expect someone to get into the industry without some cold emails or calls?_

Networking. Better to get out there without an agenda, meet people, and grow. Most of us would much rather meet someone and get to know them than to just delete another unsolicited email among hundreds of others.

Whether you email, network, or do something else, here's the most important thing: have something of value to offer, and offer it. That will get you noticed.

 _That said, one should always be building up a defined skillset concurrently._

Definitely! This never ends.

<comment><USER9> _Better to get out there without an agenda_

This is the key to real networking. Agendas often spoil the opportunity.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I had to learn most of this stuff on my own, but it's a very good summary to pass on to my friends. Seems like startups are getting more and more mainstream.

The problem is most college grads in non-technical fields generally don't have skills beyond being smart, maybe. I was one of them. This wouldn't be too much of an issue but most also don't like or aren't any good at selling. The way I see it, you have to do something technically tangible or you have the sell the lights out of stuff. If you can't do either, sad to say, you're fairly worthless in early stage companies.

<comment><USER10> You could be a good writer or designer. Video skills can be useful. Research skills can also be useful.

<comment><USER8> I'd agree with designer and possibly video, but I count those as technical skills depending on the type of startup.

Writing and research, I think, have to be bundled with other skillsets at the very early stages. If you have 2-3 people, you can't have a pure writer or researcher.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Regarding #4, and in particular "If it's more of a product role, build something!"

How would that work for a non-developer?

By paying someone to do it? (not necessarily easy. Not everyone has enough entrepreneurial spirit to invest in their own idea, while still being valuable to a startup) By making mock-ups, specs and publishing them somewhere? It would seem fine to me, but I wonder if some could see that as being an "idea guy" for not having something tangible and working to show.

<comment><USER12> What I'm doing is relaunching an older website that's already been developed - but not promoted/maintained for the last two years.

This means I can work on what I'm good at (design and marketing) and use any money coming in to pay a developer to make any changes I can't.

Was it Neil from CrazyEgg that does something similar? I remember hearing something like that on a Mixergy interview.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> If you're not a developer, you should still learn how to code. At least showing that you're willing to learn goes a long way so you can help with even the little things, such as fixing pixels or checking in small bugs. Think of it another way: would you join a renewable energy startup if you didn't know some engineering (materials, chemistry, mechanical, electrical, et al) fundamentals? How do you think you would do if put into an interview?

<comment><USER14> Should developers learn how to do customer service? Sales? Biz Dev? Design? HR?

<comment><USER15> Sure they should.

A developer casually reading a few books/blogs could learn pretty much all those domains. The same can't be said of business guys doing the opposite.

<comment><USER16> lol, only on Hacker News...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Hmm.. objective of any startup is to survive. This requires hard skills:

-> Being able to build the product / service.

-> Being able to sell.

-> Being able to market creatively (on a low budget).

-> Being able to take care of operations, legal, accounting, hiring.

Want to work for a start up in a non-technical role? No problem! Show em' that you can do do one or more of the other essentials better than the incumbents, who are probably too busy taking care of the technical bits anyway.

</comment><comment><USER18> Just because you're not a developer doesn't mean you lack technical skills.

Startups often need to fill some non-developer, technical roles, like QA team members and sysadmins.

</comment><comment><USER19> I get a sense of a little non-developer hate going on below... so fair disclosure, I am not a developer. I am an aspiring entrepreneur, and yes, I am working on a web-based company. I also work on Wall Street, so I apparently chose the other option Eric to which alludes.

The value add of a non-developer to a startup is pretty simple--they bring a different perspective than a developer does. Diversity is a good thing. I'm working on building something that I believe would be enormously useful, and it approaches a problem in a way that hasn't been done online before. I think the reason I was able to come up with this idea was precisely because I'm not part of the "online" community. There are certain ways things are done when building an online business that have become part of the "culture" to which the article speaks. Being able to approach a problem from a point of view without a preconceived or subconscious notion can add enormous value to a startup. That said, I am becoming part of this community because I do need the technical expertise to help build the product and it is easier to find someone to partner with than learn to program myself (although I do know some).

It is the same as growing up reading and writing a western language. You don't even consider the notion that text would be written or read in another direction than left to right. Having a Chinese friend at a young age would keep you thinking in different and more creative ways.

<comment><USER20> In startups, perspective, ideas, point of view all pale in importance to execution.

<comment><USER19> Obviously execution is critical; however, I cannot agree with you that everything else pales in comparison to execution. You can execute "successfully", but if what you build isn't something the client wants, then you're wasting your time.

Depending on what you're developing, a business side perspective could be invaluable. The financial services industry is full of inefficiency, as an example to illustrate my point. I worked in equity research for a while and we published reports that were simply pdfs of excel files (there are some publishing tools out there like bluematrix). There are huge opportunities here for a better publishing platform that is easy to use for someone who is not technologically savvy (like research analysts). Having someone with the insight into the industry could be very useful and would help a developer identify and focus on developing and designing functions that would be useful to the client. I'm sure more than one developer has wasted time developing something only to get FEEDBACK (also know as perspective) from the client (often business related when not a developer end-product) that the functionality doesn't match what they need or expect.

I just cannot agree with your point of view here. In my opinion, ideas and perspective are important, but then again, I am new to this. Can someone explain to me why execution should be held above all else?

<comment><USER20> One example is Microsoft. They are often knocked for not being so innovative as others in the space. However, they do excel at execution.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> 1) Learn how to code 2) ..... 3) Profit!

</comment><comment><USER22> Great post, incredibly helpful.

Especially number seven on the list. I get the feeling that any online job posting decreases your chances of getting noticed by a significant amount. I know in my company we only post stuff online because we feel obligated, we don't give those applicants nearly as much credence as we would someone who is referred by someone in our network.

<comment><USER23> Which I'd hope you would state openly in the job posting. There is nothing more defeating for an applicant than to spend the time and energy putting together cover letters and tweaking the resume for your company, only to be disregarded from the start.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> A non-developer needs to have some skill, which can't be automated by a computer. Such things include: design, writing, managing people, talking to customers, investors, money and relationships. If AI becomes capable of automating such tasks, their job may become obsolete.

<comment><USER4> > If AI becomes capable of automating such tasks, their job may become > obsolete.

And factory automation and robotics have eliminated the needs for workers, yup.

<comment><USER10> The workers need to be able to automate stuff or manage people, who do. Many high-paid, unskilled factory jobs have disappeared. The jobs are doing things that can't be easily automated. The more automatable the lower the pay.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Step 1: learn to program.</comment>


Converting floats to strings - <AUTHOR> http://www.corsix.org/content/converting-floats-to-strings-part-1 <comment><USER2> > Often the problem is framed as "converting a floating point number to the > shortest possible decimal string representation", but this framing is > neither neccessary nor sufficient for implementing the %e / %f / %g formats > of sprintf.

This sentence is crucial for anyone wants to implement the float-to-decimal conversion. There exists a Grisu-inspired analogue for this problem but to my current knowledge it is not well described in any known literature. I had to fully analyze the analogue and recreate my (slightly improved) version of the algorithm for Rust [1]. It is not too complex once you understood but annoying enough to derive again.

[1] [https://github.com/rust- lang/rust/blob/f8d485f/src/libcore/n...](https://github.com/rust- lang/rust/blob/f8d485f/src/libcore/num/flt2dec/strategy/grisu.rs#L439-L683)

</comment><comment><USER3> The end of the post alludes to part 2 ("how to adapt nd_print into something which can behave like the %e, %f, and %g formats of sprintf"), which alas I've yet to get around to writing. There'll also be at least one more part after that detailing the bag of performance tricks which can be used to turn the described algorithm into something very competitive. Alternatively, you can jump to the conclusion by just reading the implementation I wrote for LuaJIT [1], though obviously that won't give you the narrative of _why_ things are the way they are.

[1] [https://github.com/LuaJIT/LuaJIT/blob/cf2dfaf3b4eef9b2de32d3...](https://github.com/LuaJIT/LuaJIT/blob/cf2dfaf3b4eef9b2de32d3be962b0336c3fe7dd1/src/lj_strfmt_num.c)

</comment><comment><USER4> Similar approach, I think, by Russ Cox: [https://research.swtch.com/ftoa](https://research.swtch.com/ftoa)

Starts with an int->string conversion, then does the rest with string manipulation - strings, of course, being bignums with a somewhat wasteful BCD representation.

<comment><USER5> _Why are some converters more complicated than this? Because you can make them a little faster. On my laptop, glibc 's sprintf(buf, "%.50e", M_PI) is about 15 times faster than an equivalent print using the code above, because the implementation of sprintf uses much more sophisticated mathematics to speed the conversion._

He missed an opportunity to name the article "Floating Point to Decimal Conversion is Easy and Not Fast" (in reference to [https://swtch.com/~rsc/regexp/regexp1.html](https://swtch.com/~rsc/regexp/regexp1.html))

(When did he start writing articles in Go? IMHO the syntax is close enough to C to make skimming through easy enough, but confusing to look at in detail for the majority who will have likely far more experience with C than Go.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> In 1986 I did that in Turbo Pascal 3.0 for DOS. Had a bug with the round function so I made my own nround that converted the floating point to a string then parsed the string to find the right rounding and converted it back to a float. I was the only person in class to get the correct answer and graded down by my professor and accused of hacking.

</comment><comment><USER7> musl libc also uses base-1000000000 bignums for float formatting: [https://git.musl- libc.org/cgit/musl/tree/src/stdio/vfprintf....](https://git.musl- libc.org/cgit/musl/tree/src/stdio/vfprintf.c#n179)

</comment><comment><USER8> I love learning about all the complexity behind things we do every day and never stop to think about.

</comment><comment><USER5> Interesting. This alternative algorithm is very reminiscent of conversion to [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary- coded_decimal](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary-coded_decimal) .

</comment><comment><USER9> I just have to whine that I have always hated the construct "convert to string".

You don't convert a car to a photograph when you take a picture, and neither do you do any "conversion" when you construct a string that represents the same value as is represented by the bit pattern of your double or float.

This sounds like some weird linguistic pedantry, and perhaps it is, but I suspect this usage causes confusion for a number of beginning programmers.

<comment><USER10> Maybe a better phrase would be "project to a string", similar to how taking a picture is projecting something from 3D to 2D?

<comment><USER11> How about "transmogrify"?

<comment><USER12> OP's complaint seems to be that "convert" suggests changing in place, which "transmogrify" suggests even more strongly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Now, in Python3... :D

<comment><USER14> [https://github.com/python/cpython/blob/5d75f441ef0a3cfe7af0d...](https://github.com/python/cpython/blob/5d75f441ef0a3cfe7af0d865db2530528e424818/Python/dtoa.c#L2272)</comment></comment>


Google Domains – domains.Google - <AUTHOR> https://domains.google/ <comment><USER2> Cannot stress enough how happy I've been since moving all my domain names to Google. Also, sometimes I've had questions and their phone support has been spot on. Side note (my 2 cents): In the past, I was happy with using Hover.com and thought their support was top notch, Google blows them away.

<comment><USER3> What do they offer for DNS management? Can you do geo-locatization or latency based routing to different IPs?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> FYI - when I tried Google Domains, I ran into a lot of issues with their naked domain forwarding (i.e. if someone goes to example.com/123, it would not forward to www.example.com/123). I don't know if that has since been fixed, but their customer service wasn't that helpful.

[http://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/78481/forward-...](http://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/78481/forward- naked-domain-with-url-path-for-my-google-domain/)

</comment><comment><USER5> for a second I hoped I could register my .google domain... I like a simple interface, selecting many TLDs is a bit tedious though, I think they can do better in the next iterations.</comment>


A regex search engine for what? - <AUTHOR>

Just wanted to get the feedback of the community of potential disruptive application of a regular expression based search engine before offering my prof. to start researching the subject. <comment><USER2> There are lots of times that I wish that I could use the wildcard in Google inside word tokens instead of just between words in a multiword string, i.e. search on googl* to get googlefight and googling as well as the expected. It could be a powerful way of capturing a set of alternatives easily. But its utility is limited for search if the user needs to know the order of tokens in the search (i.e. searching on a single regex globally on the rendered page).

I'd like to see a regular search engine interface (tokens, strings of tokens, and an exception operator) with the ability to make any token in it a regex by surrounding it with a specific marker, like bang or slash.</comment>


Ask HN: What sites do you use to find Tech Jobs? - <AUTHOR> 	What types of websites have been the most effective at getting software development jobs or related tech roles?<p>What job searching techniques have been most effective for you? <comment><USER2> This is roughly how a job search for me would go if I were to do it right now:

I would probably go directly to the companies I'm interested in once I've done a ton of research into the companies and their trajectories/teams. There'd probably only be a handful of companies that I'd be interested in joining. Luckily I'm in the Bay Area so there's a lot of great ones that wouldn't require me to move.

I could get my foot in the door at most companies just based on my resume (nothing insane - a consistent trajectory with good performance at a string of top companies/startups helps). But after that, I'd be royally screwed by the interview process if I didn't prepare thoroughly for the algorithms puzzles for a solid month or two. LeetCode (online coding practice) and Cracking The Code Interview (book) are popular review material for exactly this so I'd review those after work and on the weekends. Even after preparation there's still an unnecessarily big element of luck built into the standard tech interview process. With luck and preparation hopefully a couple of the companies from my shortlist work out and that would be that.

</comment><comment><USER3> YouTube. Watch conference talks. Apply to represented companies.

Meetups for same reason as above.

Also Craigslist has surprising yield, despite lack in diversity.

</comment><comment><USER4> In Australia, I think there's probably just the one main website (seek). Although Indeed look like a close-ish second.

I can't say I'm experienced at job searching techniques. I get most of my work through personal referrals. But I'm pretty free with advice and like helping small businesses get their basic IT stuff sorted. It's not really my day-to- day Software Dev role, but I enjoy it. And it's surprising how often it results in decent projects down the line. (although that's never the intent)

</comment><comment><USER5> LinkedIn is probably the most direct. I don't like stack overflow although you get contacted for available jobs, no recruiter spends more than 10secs to watch you profile and see if you remotely match the position. 8 out of 10 that contacted me were about positions that were simply bad the requirements were an total mess ( like that doesn't happen everywhere, but whatever ) and lets just don't get started on the startup culture of every company with an profile on that site.

</comment><comment><USER6> dice.com

I'm not saying the jobs will be good. But you will get recruiters calling.

I like to play a game with dice.com. I will leave my profile stagnant for a few months. Then I will log on and then add an extra period some one in the resume. Then the next day, the phone will start ringing with recruiters thinking I'm looking for a new job.

<comment><USER7> Are you serious? What are you 12 years old? Not cool to just mess with recruiters and waste people's time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I mostly don't find tech jobs. I'm quite lucky to have one otherwise I'd be screwed. Sites I've tried that have most return are hired.com and underdog.io but you need more than 3 years experience to be accepted to a round most likely.

</comment><comment><USER9> websites are door which is wide open for many and you get lost in the pile of resumes if you apply through them. You need to standout somehow. show your work in some blog and add it to linkedIn profile and connect with people for reference and still you need to prove your worth.

</comment><comment><USER10> StackOverflow, LinkedIn, HN, Google.

<comment><USER11> Seconded. Found my last job on HN. Found my current job on LinkedIn via recruiter.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> angelList.</comment>


After 45 years, FBI closes investigation into unsolved 'DB Cooper' hijacking - <AUTHOR> http://komonews.com/news/local/fbi-officially-closes-its-investigation-into-famous-db-cooper-hijacking <comment><USER2> Most DB Cooper references I've read consider him to be some cross between a folk-hero and lovable-rogue due to the audacity of his crime, lack of harm to civilians, and the idea that he might have actually gotten away with it.

But fascinating to read the Wikipedia entry and realize that DB Cooper, and the no less than 15 copycat "parachute hijackings" he inspired in the same year, created a watershed moment in Airport Security that accelerated our steady march to today's over bearing TSA:

"In all, 15 hijackings similar to Cooper's—all unsuccessful—were attempted in 1972.[130] With the advent of universal luggage searches in 1973 (see Airport security) the general incidence of hijackings dropped precipitously.[131]"

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D._B._Cooper](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D._B._Cooper)

<comment><USER3> _our steady march to today 's over bearing TSA_

Before all those hijackings, there was _no_ airport security screening. None at all! I know that's hard to believe, but we've all gotten used to it since we've had _something_ in place now for about 40 years.

There has to be something we can do to ensure safety, but that's less overbearing than today's TSA.

<comment><USER4> I think at this point we have all the technology to replace most air travel with a network of autonomous family-sized aircraft hopping between cities within a few hundred miles, probably not costing much more than a Greyhound ticket.

Then the big security threat shifts from what a hijacker can do with a jet packed full of humans and fuel to what a hacker can do by seizing control of the whole network, but the travel experience itself wouldn't need such invasive screening.

<comment><USER5> Errr ... how about no?

All my family lives in Europe. I live on the US west coast. "hopping city to city" would turn a 1 day nuissance into an arduous journey.

No thanks. I already see my family only once to twice a year.

Considering there are multiple flights per day between SFO and Paris and other EU hubs, I think my case is far from being a corner case.

<comment><USER6> NB the word "most". By your own admission, you make this journey once or twice a year.

<comment><USER5> And if it took any longer, I'd make this journey even less.

302,382 people flew from SFO to Europe in May 2016. That's a lot of people. Almost 5% of the Bay Area population and there are 2 more international airports in the region. [0]

[0] [http://media.flysfo.com.s3.amazonaws.com/media/sfo/media/air...](http://media.flysfo.com.s3.amazonaws.com/media/sfo/media/air- traffic/as201605.pdf)

<comment><USER4> Collectively far more people are flying from San Francisco to Los Angeles, San Diego, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Salt Lake City, Portland, and Seattle each month. If they could all show up at the airport 5 minutes early, hop in a tiny drone- jet with 3-4 other passengers and take off, not having to deal with security would be icing on the cake in terms of convenience.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Admittedly, this is not a high quality comment, but I've always liked The Far Side's 1988 speculation of Cooper's fate. [http://imgur.com/snDErQi](http://imgur.com/snDErQi)

<comment><USER8> That may not be far off. It seems to me like the simplest explanation is that he was injured during the jump and died sometime later, with his body never being found. So he managed to conceal himself and died where no one could find him.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> "She said staff time and manpower devoted to the case is diverting from programs that more urgently need attention, so the FBI decided to close its active investigation."

I'm surprised they don't have an (even unannounced) THX-1138 style limit on how much effort they spend on a single suspect. My wife had her purse stolen and about $10,000 extracted from various accounts a few years back, and the amount of effort they spent on the case is far less than a 20th of this one.

<comment><USER10> I cannot imagine it would be "career enhancing" to be an FBI agent assigned to DB Cooper in the 2010's.

<comment><USER11> Unless, of course, you are Fox Mulder.

Then it would matter not that it isn't quite career enhancing. And, it's exactly the kind of case you want to be on.

<comment><USER12> "It turns out DB Cooper was a shapeshifting alien hybrid, and that most of the incident was a false memory construct implanted by the Men In Black to hide the fact that he didn't escape using a parachute, but a teleporter."

<comment><USER13> Already better than season 10. Bring it on.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> He's dead, and he died in or shortly after the jump. Other than the money that the kid found near the Columbia River, none of the bills given to him as ransom have ever been found in circulation, anywhere. Whatever fortune he received from the FBI was not beneficially used by him, or anyone else he could have paid with it.

<comment><USER15> >none of the bills given to him as ransom have ever been found in circulation, anywhere

How extensive really is surveillance of bill serial numbers? I mean, sure, he couldn't show up to close on a house with suitcases fully of those bills, but if it's not every routine deposit at every bank, seems possible that he could have spent it slowly.

<comment><USER16> I don't know how often serial numbers are checked, but I imagine that if those bills had been in circulation, they would have been retired by now (banks will take damaged/worn-out bills out of circulation to be replaced). I'm sure that the serial numbers are recorded when bills are taken out of circulation, so if the DB Cooper money was circulating, the FBI would have heard about it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> For the ones who's unfamiliar with this case, there is a very detailed wikipedia page with close to 200 references for this topic: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D._B._Cooper](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D._B._Cooper)

</comment><comment><USER18> I remember hearing about this case towards the end of Mad Men: [http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2014/04/16/don_draper_to...](http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2014/04/16/don_draper_to_become_d_b_cooper_in_mad_men_finale_a_skyjacking_expert_weighs.html)

</comment><comment><USER19> For those of you interested in the technical details of the hijack, USPA's magazine Parachutist published an interesting and thorough series of articles on the topic back in 2010: [http://parachutistonline.com/feature/secrets-db- cooper-part-...](http://parachutistonline.com/feature/secrets-db-cooper-part- one-notorious-flight-305)

</comment><comment><USER20> Anyone else not terribly convinced about the FBI's insistence that Dan Cooper didn't survive the jump when all the copycats who also parachuted, in similar areas (Utah, Nevada, etc.) all survived? In fact, one of the copycats is pretty much the exact same jump aside from the location (Utah instead of Washington), same 727 aircraft and everything.

<comment><USER21> One death out of sixteen jumps is about the fatality rate I'd expect for parachuting out of an airliner like that.

<comment><USER22> While it is a DC9 not a 727, the dropzone at Perris kind of proves that wrong:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3TtL2cmlcM&t=3m30s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3TtL2cmlcM&t=3m30s)

<comment><USER23> Was just about to come on here and post this. I've got 5 jumps out of the Perris jet (while it was still flying).

Interestingly, all the DB Cooper stuff was one reason Perris shut it down. It cost them an inordinate amount of money to get through the red tape to be able to allow sport skydiving out of it (courtesy of the 'Cooper Lock' modifications), that once the engines came due for maintenance, they opted not to throw more money down the drain. It was a sad, sad day for the skydiving world.

<comment><USER24> Damn, I'm jealous.

What's it like to jump the jet?

The most impressive (for me) aircrafts that I jumped were the C-27J Spartan and MI8 helicopter, but I don't think they come close to the jet.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Newsradio had an answer to this mystery far before these other shows: [http://kentuckysportsradio.com/pop-culture/the-legend-of- d-b...](http://kentuckysportsradio.com/pop-culture/the-legend-of-d-b-cooper- in-pop-culture/)

</comment><comment><USER26> And just like that, Tommy Wiseau can breathe a sigh of relief[0].

      [0] https://xkcd.com/1400/

<comment><USER27> Clickable: [https://xkcd.com/1400/](https://xkcd.com/1400/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Comment/Story from the Widow of one of the Suspects:

[https://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/comments/3sdg9u...](https://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/comments/3sdg9u/db_cooper_examining_the_1995_deathbed_confession/cz2lk61)

No idea if it's really the 75yo posting to reddit, but the story is so elaborate, if it's a hoax I'd still like it.

and a picture: [http://cbsnews2.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/2000/08/22/ca3bd939-a...](http://cbsnews2.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/2000/08/22/ca3bd939-a642-11e2-a3f0-029118418759/thumbnail/620x350/d259a147e1f2e21d1d7a295a4a155b42/image227044x.jpg)

</comment><comment><USER29> They apparently have some DNA from the tie he left behind. It'd be interesting to add it to GEDmatch.

<comment><USER30> They talk about it in the article. It may have been run surreptitiously.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Original source: [https://www.fbi.gov/seattle/press-releases/2016/update-on- in...](https://www.fbi.gov/seattle/press-releases/2016/update-on- investigation-of-1971-hijacking-by-d.b.-cooper)

KOMO seems to have misinterpreted the press release: the FBI is not closing the case, they're discontinuing active investigation. The case remains open, and new physical evidence is still accepted.

</comment><comment><USER32> I think about the DB Cooper hijacking every time I fly on a B717 (not the same aircraft model obviously, but has the same centrally-mounted rear emergency exit).

</comment><comment><USER33> Growing up in suburban Seattle in the 1980s, all of us kids had great fun speculating on whose dad could secretly be D.B. Cooper.

</comment><comment><USER34> In the sketches, he looks like Cary Grant.

</comment><comment><USER35> I thought this case was solved in Prison Break...

</comment><comment><USER36> If only they put so much work into investigating Hillary Clinton.

<comment><USER37> If a puppet seems astray, who is at fault? The puppet or the puppeteer?</comment></comment>


The Provision of Non-Strictness, Higher Kinded and Ranked Types on OO VM (2006) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://nerget.com/thesis.pdf <comment><USER2> This is from 2006; has there been any attempt in the .NET CLR or JVM to implement this? Haskell on those runtimes sounds like a practical path to wider adoption.

<comment><USER3> There is an implementation of Haskell for the JVM[1], although I don't know how much its implementation has in common with the techniques discussed in this thesis.

[1]: [https://eta-lang.org/](https://eta-lang.org/)</comment></comment>


Mapped: The world's coal power plants - <AUTHOR> https://www.carbonbrief.org/mapped-worlds-coal-power-plants <comment><USER3> Proud of my country for once (Nuclear France)

We decarbonated our electricity in a 20 years timeframe (while the consumption was rising) thanks to nuclear power. I always wondered why no other country went that road and why they are still hesitating.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_France#/...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_France#/media/File:Electricity_production_by_sources_in_France.png)

<comment><USER4> Same for Switzerland. And even better: We're privileged to have the Alps in the middle of our country making hydroelectricity a very viable and renewable option.

<comment><USER5> Is Switzerland ready to destroy the nature for cheap hydroelectricity?

<comment><USER6> I'm not sure about all hydropower in Switzerland but Grand Dixence is very high up. I've been there myself and the nature doesn't seem to be disturbed. I don't think there are any salmon swimming up from the Pacific like in a lot of rivers in the US. What exactly are your concerns about wildlife being disturbed?

<comment><USER5> Where did I mention wildlife?? One just needs to flood lots of area to build hydropower plants. Please look at this picture: [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_Norway...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_Norway#/media/File%3AAlta- damm.jpg)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> In Vietnam the plan to build a nuclear power plant was shelved due to the lack of fund and opposition from the people. Guess what replaced it? Three coal power plants! As if that is any cleaner! Russia being embargoed isn't helping either, as we intended to use Russian nuclear technology.

As a developing country, Vietnam's electricity consumption will triple around 2030, overtaking Great Britain around 2027. Coal will provide half of that, as renewables alone is not enough. But what else can us developing countries do? Stop developing and stay poor forever?

<comment><USER8> > But what else can us developing countries do? Stop developing and stay poor > forever?

This is sad to see, because many of the environmentalists that I've talked to seem to expect that this is the path that the developing countries will actually take.

It's totally unfair that the developed world was able to bootstrap themselves into their current state using dirty power sources, _continue_ to generate a lot of dirty power themselves, and now expect the developing world to somehow leap-frog them and build clean generating capacity from the start. But it just seems to be human nature – just like how the social safety net in the developed world is being pulled out from under the younger generations, now that the older generations no longer need it.

<comment><USER9> Solar panels weren't commercially viable until the mid 20th century. Nuclear power the same. Lithium-ion batteries came even later. None of this stuff even existed when first world countries were industrializing.

Now it's cheaper than coal. Look at the map and notice how many new coal plants are being built in Europe or even the US -- none. The only reason it still even exists is the existing installed base of power plants that have already sunk their capital costs, and half of those are still getting shut down because they can't compete even then. Coal is garbage. Building new coal fired power plants is nonsense even _before_ the environmental impact is considered.

Pretending that first world countries burned coal because it was in some way better is revisionist. It was because the better alternatives we have now didn't exist yet. The path to modern power generation doesn't inherently require building a bunch of coal fired power plants and then knocking them down to replace them with something actually good. They can just skip to the end -- there isn't even any good reason _not_ to do that.

<comment><USER10> They can't skip to the end, as solar, wind + storage is still not economically viable compared to burning things.

<comment><USER11> This a) clearly isn't true, b) goes against parent's claims, and most importantly c) is contraindicated by the fact (as per parent) that 'first world nation states' are _not_ currently building power plants that, as you put it, burn things. This is because it's economically more viable to go solar, wind, storage - than coal now (and perhaps, if not today, then clearly within a year or two, gas).

<comment><USER10> > This is because it's economically more viable to go solar, wind, storage

Sorry, but this is just ridiculous. If you need power all year long and only have say 250 sunny days and even less predictable winds, you are really looking at an order of magnitude higher price here than burning fossils. If you only use a little bit of that power able to directly satisfy a little bit of demand without storage, then it's not as expensive, but still overall significantly more expensive than burning fossils. The only reason it can even be deployed is if governments promise massive returns of investments and let investors get rich, which of course ends up hurting consumers with huge electricity prices. The rest of the non first world simply cannot afford that.

If it was economically viable, investors would just invest into solar and wind farms everywhere in the world on their own to undercut all those fossil competitors.

<comment><USER9> You're assuming that countries with no existing infrastructure would build it the same way we did.

If you're a small African village, having a couple of solar panels is way better than a coal power plant. You don't need roads and trains to continuously ship in coal or the lights go out. You can get more buildings electrified before you have a stable power grid because you have decentralized generation. You can have small/cheap storage batteries because you build infrastructure to begin with that demand shifts to during the day -- pressurize a water tank during sunlight hours so that you have running water through the night with no nighttime power consumption. Use high efficiency LED lighting to minimize how much battery you need. And so on. All of which is cheaper when you design for it from the start.

Whereas if you're at the stage of India or China with a real power grid where you have to start worrying about baseload, that's when you build nuclear. Assuming that declining storage costs don't eventually make even that unnecessary.

About the only thing fossil fuels are still good for is as an emergency battery for long periods of low generation from renewables. But then you're not building them as baseload power generation and they only get run one week out of the year. And even then it's _still_ not coal, because you can do that with natural gas, which is currently cheaper (and cleaner and emits less carbon).

<comment><USER10> Ground up infrastructure can only recoup some of the energy storage costs and mostly for home use. It's not going to help a steel factory, for example, or help with industrial use in general which ultimately has to compete on cost globally.

<comment><USER9> When you're at early stages of development you don't have steel factories. When you reach later stages you build nuclear. To the extent that an intermediate stage even exists, it's very short, because once you have roads and ports and a stable government you get foreign investment.

To get the first aluminum smelter the first world had to invent it. To get one now you just have to build it -- or have someone else build it for you. Then you power it with a ton of cheap solar panels and only run it during daylight hours.

So why would waste money building a bunch of coal fired power plants that you won't even need in a couple of years?

And why would it be uncompetitive on cost globally if everyone else stops burning coal too?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The Huntly power plant in New Zealand is mainly natural gas now. It does maintain the last two coal generators in New Zealand but the intention of these are to be used as an emergency supply when there's a shortfall from hydro and wind. It's not fired consistently and it's usage fluctuates renewable generation in NZ from ~95% when it's off to ~80% when it's running. It was supposed to be shut down in 2016 but that was pushed back to 2025 when NZ is supposed to be above 90% renewable generation consistently.

</comment><comment><USER13> This does not include other industrial users who are burning coal.

For example the use of coal in Swedish steel industry (and steel industries around the world). This energy use in coal is significant, the statistics in the following link show that it is using around 13 TWh per year in Sweden, which is approximately equivalent to 20 years of power consumption for Stockholm's municipality.

[https://www.jernkontoret.se/en/the-steel- industry/industry-f...](https://www.jernkontoret.se/en/the-steel- industry/industry-facts-and-statistics/energy-use/)

</comment><comment><USER14> Let's see...

2024100 MW (2018) of coal power would translate to roughly 1,76 Gt of CO2 emissions (ballparking an average of 870g CO2 / kW produced). That's 1,76 billion tonnes of CO2 - a hefty environmental price for electricity.

If the same power was produced in nuclear power plants that figure would be something like 0,02 Gt of CO2 (calculating at 0,012 kg CO2/kW) a 98.6% reduction of emissions.

Sure nuclear is more expensive, but what is a global ecosystem worth?

Food for thought.

</comment><comment><USER15> I live in Poland which is one of the notorious coal using countries (roughly 0.5% of world's population and 1% of world's CO2 emissions). For Poland this list of coal power plants is not complete - it does not contain smaller CHP (combined heat and power) plants. However these facilities are cleaner and more efficient than burning coal at individual households, so their environmental impact is probably positive.

<comment><USER16> "than burning coal at individual households" wait, what? who's burning coal at home? :) can you imagine the discussions in those households?

<comment><USER17> What do you mean? There's still plenty of houses in Poland that use regular coal for heating. There's been a lot of movement towards banning it but there's always the "but what about poor people" argument. Sometimes you can get funding for replacing a coal fired boiler with either one that burns eco- pellets or a gas one, but people are often unwilling as both fuels are more expensive than just buying a tonne of coal at the beginning of every winter - the argument that made my grandparents switch(and only last year!) from a coal fired boiler to a gas one was purely one of convenience, grandpa is too old now to go to the boiler room every few hours to add some coal to the fire, so a gas boiler makes it easier for them. But of course they complained about the absolute fortune that gas will cost them over coal.

<comment><USER16> "What do you mean? There's still plenty of houses in Poland that use regular coal for heating."

you mean directly burning it? or indirectly from a coal plant that produces electricity and/or heating? why not use wood? why coal of all things?

lived in a bunch of european countries. first time i hear about it.

is this common in poland? or more of an outlier?

<comment><USER17> >>you mean directly burning it? or indirectly from a coal plant that produces electricity and/or heating? why not use wood? why coal of all things?

Directly in coal fired boiler. As to why - because it's very cheap. Like I said, my grandparents would usually buy a 1000kg of coal for the winter, it would cost them.....800PLN? So like.....200 euro? And that was for a big 250sqm house. Wood would be easily quadruple that, but the bigger problem is that it burns too quickly. With coal you could load up the boiler and it would last a good 6-8 hours, so if you loaded it up just before going to sleep it would keep you warm all night. Wood or eco-pellets burn much quicker, that's why boilers for those usually use some kind of auto-feeding system, but obviously it makes them much more expensive.

And no, it's still very common, I'd say on my residential street 2/3 of all houses will be coal fired, unless someone renovated recently and put a gas boiler in(but then we don't live in a city, small town of maybe 20k people).

<comment><USER16> thank you for the reply!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Was initially happy when looking at Australia (my home country) - <USER2> circles and no planned stations (maybe Adani in Queensland).

Then I realized that the large circles in China and India almost certainly burn Australian coal.

<comment><USER19> They will, but if it makes you feel any better mostly they will burn Chinese coal [0]. Australia is disproportionate.

[0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_coal_prod...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_coal_production)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Interesting map to compare with: [https://www.meteoblue.com/en/weather- maps/?variable=cams_so2...](https://www.meteoblue.com/en/weather- maps/?variable=cams_so2&level=surface&lines=none&mapcenter=39.5718N19.1602&zoom=3)

<comment><USER21> That large high concentration area in Siberia. Is that permafrost melt?

<comment><USER20> Here's an article on that: [https://robinwestenra.blogspot.com/2019/05/sulphur- dioxide-e...](https://robinwestenra.blogspot.com/2019/05/sulphur-dioxide- emissios-in-siberia.html)

And another one from NASA: [https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/36063/sulfur- dioxid...](https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/36063/sulfur-dioxide-from- norilsk-russia)

<comment><USER21> I deeply appreciate your comment. Thank you.

Choice quote for others sourced from the first link:

>Whilst sulphur dioxide emissions are definitely associated with pollution from the mining of nickel these emissions that Dave and Margo have observed are far too extensive for this to be more than a partial explanation.

>It is simply much too large.

>Also of interest, the emissions are intermittent just as methane emissions are.

>One very reasonable hypothesis is that there have been geological changes which is leading to magma coming to the surface much as it did in the Permian extinction.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> They seem to have a very optimistic view on "closing" coal plants. E.g. all the plants in germany are colored as "closing".

Germany has a vague plan for coal phaseout in 2038, which is a) still almost 20 years in the future and b) not in any way binding yet, it's jut a vague plan.

(I do hope and actually believe that coal plants in germany will be closed much earlier than 2038 though...)

<comment><USER23> They will be closed earlier. Renewables and batteries will be cheaper than existing coal before 2038, meaning replacement will cost less than running these old plants.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> How many of those grey dots representing "closing" plants are actually just converting to another type of petroleum? Like natural gas?

Certainly an improvement but it's not like we're replacing them all with renewables or nuclear.

<comment><USER12> I'd say a good chunk of them, but hopefully at the same time other gas stations are being decommissioned and replaced with sustainable generation.

If I look at NZ then in the last ten years pretty much all coal generation has moved to gas but in the same period about the same amount of gas generation was decommissioned and replaced with wind with thousand more MW of generation from wind and tidal consented to be built.

<comment><AUTHOR> Natural gas is likely as bad or in some cases worse than coal from a climate change perspective (mostly due to pipeline leaks and leaks at the fracking sites). Switching from coal to nat gas may be better for air pollution deaths, but it's just as bad for climate change.

[https://scienceblog.com/509512/fracking-prompts-global- spike...](https://scienceblog.com/509512/fracking-prompts-global-spike-in- atmospheric-methane/)

<comment><USER12> The article I read in NZ showed that natural gas had about half the emissions of coal overall. New Zealand is very seismically active so there's a lot of gas and most probably it's close to the generators. The intention is to move from coal to gas to tide the country over until it can be replaced by wind and tidal. The goal was recently raised from 90 - 95% renewable generation by 2025. Right now on average it sits at 83% renewable but in summer when electricity usage is lower it can be more than 90%.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's roughly half as bad as coal nominally, as in when combusted. It's when you look at the whole system, including pipeline leaks and fracking-site leaks that it starts getting bad. So changing infrastructure from coal to gas is approximately worthless from a climate change perspective.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I feel as if my nation has been the dumbest if not the most left behind country in the world, Pakistan.

The nation is riddled with annual energy crisis and just falling behind in world economic growth. Not only is the energy crisis with black outs an occurrence but electricity itself is expensive. Far more expensive what the end consumer ends up paying compared to nations here in the West or China.

et the nation's politicians continue to popularize the use of solar which is stupidly expensive for scale of energy we need and far less reliant on local resources.

It does indeed saddens me.

<comment><USER26> How much does electricity cost for you? What sort of blackouts/brownouts did you experience?

It's around 10-20 cents per kWh in my state, for reference.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> So what can be done about China?

They are going the wrong way and account for a sizable percentage. All reductions done by the rest of world have been offset (and then some) by their grown

</comment><comment> lota-putty Are there any statistics on cumulative coal burn estimates by countries till date? (let alone per capita & country's resources)

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

I'm sure adoption of coal along with petroleum was well praised in the west during onset of industrial revolution.

</comment><comment><USER28> Those purple circles are pretty depressing.

</comment><comment><USER29> Meanwhile in South Australia ... : [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_power_stations_in_Sout...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_power_stations_in_South_Australia)

</comment><comment><USER30> Where can I find other datasets like this?

<comment><AUTHOR> This is ok but not as nice of a UI: [https://www.eia.gov/maps/](https://www.eia.gov/maps/)

This one is incredible: [https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=map&solar=false&remote=...](https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=map&solar=false&remote=true&wind=false)

<comment><USER31> Tomorrow, the team behind Electricity Map, has a Slack team available to the public. Also, anyone can contribute a parser to an electric grid not yet being scraped for tracking and display.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> India and China output a lot, but to manufacture items for the west. A lot of Chinese and Indian government officials would turn around and say, show this map 50 years ago when your industries were growing and you had the fast economic growth. Now its their turn the are being curbed.

The solution is to help these countries build better infrastructure, rather than blame them for our own demands.

</comment><comment><USER33> Coal plants in Australia, the UK and Germany are "closing"? Yeah, sure. They'll be "closing" for several decades to come, because neither country has a solution for its energy needs.

There should be a financial instrument to bet against governments making good on their grandiose plans for green energy. That might raise the odds of them actually succeeding.

<comment><USER34> > There should be a financial instrument to bet against governments making > good on their grandiose plans for green energy.

Effectively, there is: you purchase securities relating to the industries that would be negatively impacted if the plans were realized (e.g., for the things you are talking about here, coal industry stocks.)

<comment><USER33> This isn't quite the same, because governments can simultaneously ruin these businesses while still failing on their goals.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> Is there any relevant difference between the subcritical and supercritical ones?

<comment><USER36> Higher temps which means better efficiency and cleaner emissions. Ultra- supercritical is the current latest technology, though there aren't many of those.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> It mentions the German plants are closing, but the plan is to do this in 2038...

</comment><comment><USER38> Why does China continue to lead the world in so many terrible categories. Biggest polluter, tons of human rights violations. Just a terrible country with awful leadership.

<comment><USER39> Imagine a world where China split in two, East China and West China with each having 50% of the population. Each of those countries would have half the pollution, half the human rights violations of the current China. Just as much suffering, just as much pollution overall though.

If you want to make an informative comparison you have to do it on a per- capita basis.

<comment><USER40> Indeed. Worth remembering that for these issues, China should be compared not versus another country, but vs. all Europe, or whole North America.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Don't bother about it. Now, blame is all on Brazil.</comment>


Tilda, the Arduino-compatible wireless conference badge - <AUTHOR> http://blog.emfcamp.org/post/28558155390/revealing-tilda-our-camp-badge

<comment><USER2> I've seen people use IR to re-program Arduino boards before, and I think it would be pretty cool if someone wrote a self-replicating program that could be passed on just by standing in front of another attendee for the length of a normal short conversation. I'm guessing someone could come up with a pretty interesting/artistic use for a botnet of a few hundred Arduino badges in one location.

<comment><USER3> what if someone writes a virus and passes it via IR?

<comment><USER2> I guess you could always disable the IR receiver via a pretty quick hardware or software hack once you got your badge if that was a concern.

<comment><USER4> Quick hardware hack == piece of dark/thick tape.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I want to see a simple mesh network running across the badges, or maybe some stationary base stations that use signal strength to real time track each badge at the conf - and a big map overhead showing you where everyone is. Page a badge and it shows up on the map for approx location. That is going to be a fun conf.

<comment><USER6> We'd love to do something like this - we're placing "beacons" around the site to provide uplinks for this kind of thing. We'd also like people to be able to see who they met up with or spent time with. But time's pretty tight, as the badges only arrive a week before the event, so submissions will be welcome.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Brilliant that it's being manufactured in Scotland, ( live in Edinburgh ) Can you reveal who the manufacturer is?

<comment><USER8> It's European Circuits: <http://www.european-circuits.co.uk/>

We really should have mentioned them in the blog post as they're sponsoring us. It's obviously a big plus to have these being fabricated in the UK instead of China due to our really tight lead times.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Curious as to how much these cost to produce? I have been playing around with some Arduinos and it seems like getting something set up with wireless and a rechargeable battery is a lot more expensive than it should be. Would be cool to have an all-in-one solution for this.

</comment><comment><USER10> Cool... reminds me of DEFCON's ninja badge which used 2.4 GHz zigbee to talk to other ninja badges at the conference.

<http://ninjas.org/badges/defcon18.html></comment>


OpenBSD MitM attack against WPA1/WPA2 - <AUTHOR> https://marc.info/?l=openbsd-announce&m=148839684520133&w=2 <comment><USER2> If I'm reading things right, this sounds like a vulnerability in WPA itself kept open for backward compatibility. It's fixed by implementing the "4-way handshake", which a comment in the patch says is not in the standard. I'm pretty sure it is in 802.11i (published by IEEE), so maybe it's not in WPA (published by Wi-Fi Alliance)?. I don't know where to find the actual WPA version of the spec to check; maybe it was never public.

<comment><USER3> No, the standard is secure. This is a vulnerability in the implementation. The comment in the code merely says that the explicit definition of the _state machine_ behind a 4-way handshake implementation is not in the standard (but it's described in prose). Most standards don't provide explicit state machines.

The 802.11i is the official standard. WPA1 is based on a draft of 802.11i, while WPA2 is based on the final version of 802.11i. All of them contain the 4-way handshake.

<comment><USER2> Okay, thanks for the clarification. I guess my main point of confusion is why it would work (edit: that is, why an OpenBSD client would be able to connect pre-patch), but I guess if there's no actual state machine that makes it possible for an attacker to "skip to the end"?

<comment><USER3> Exactly, since there is no state machine, an attacker can immediately send the last message. The client will try to check the integrity of this message. But it will use an uninitialized all-zero key to do this! So an attacker can spoof the last message. And once the client receives this message, it will accept all traffic.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> If anyone has an AP in a repeater/client mode it might also be affected so better update.

</comment><comment><USER5> Does anyone know any Vendors that use BSD an their underlying OS?

most that I have experience with are some flavor of custom linux.

<comment><USER6> Here's a list for NetBSD:

[http://www.netbsd.org/gallery/products.html](http://www.netbsd.org/gallery/products.html)

<comment><USER7> Apple seems to use NetBSD as the base system for virtually all of the recent AirPort routers, and the Time Capsule.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I mean, if you were relying on WPA for security.. you have more important problems. As someone else pointed out, MitM attacks can happen at any hop on the Internet.

<comment><USER9> WEP yes, but AFAIK WPA/WPA2 with strong passphrase is still considered to be secure. Of course you need to have many security layers, but without described MITM, this layer doesn't seem to be broken.

<comment><USER8> WPA? No.

[https://marc.info/?l=openbsd- cvs&m=148224048415556&w=2](https://marc.info/?l=openbsd- cvs&m=148224048415556&w=2)

[https://marc.info/?l=openbsd- cvs&m=148455931602152&w=2](https://marc.info/?l=openbsd- cvs&m=148455931602152&w=2)

<comment><USER10> This is WPA-TKIP _only_. That doesn't mean WPA/2 is completely useless and broken.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Granting Anonymity - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/19/magazine/19FOB-Medium-t.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

<comment><USER2> "It seemed to frustrate Appelbaum, who has a vivid and compassionate way of talking _for a programmer_ , that Tor seems forbidding. [emphasis added]"</comment>


Don't comment your code. Refactor it. - <AUTHOR> https://critter.blog/2020/09/15/dont-comment-your-code-refactor-it/ <comment><USER2> The most important "comments" in your code are names. Taking a chunk of code and giving it a name gives you a small bit of free text to explain what it does. The function signature gives you a few more words to play with: foo(Bar x) -> Baz is a function that foos a Bar into a Baz. (Another reason why functions should have as few arguments as you can manage.) A well-named piece of code will often read almost like natural language text.

People tend to ignore comments anyway. The fewer of them you have, the more likely they'll take notice of one that's actually important.

</comment><comment><USER3> > Explaining why the most obvious code wasn't written. (Design decisions)

This is actually the most important thing in this article. The technical why of things are often overlooked in today's software development. It rarely is the problem until the original maintainer moves out to other project. Non- technical contributor sometimes won't or can't be bothered with it because either it is pretty complex, they have a lot in their plates doing non- technical stuffs, or both.

While commenting on the what is DISCOURAGED because 1.) comments can be quickly outdated and they are not tested/compiled 2.) they can be replaced with self-documenting code, commenting on the why must be ENCOURAGED, unless the software has a dedicated technical manuals / design document, which is pretty rare these days.

> The problem with comments is that they have no compile-time check and tend > to be forgotten. It's very easy to change your code but forget about the > comments.

I write a bit of Rust and they have partial comment check on compile time. We can write example in the comments and they actually runs and get converted into a documentation. Neat!

</comment><comment><USER4> agree...</comment>


Chrome add-on puts browsing data to good use - <AUTHOR> http://www.springwise.com/chrome-add-on-puts-browsing-data-good/ <comment><USER2> This looks fantastic, I've just enabled it and it's nicely grouped the things I was looking for yesterday.

To quickly answer the first thing I looked into here, it doesn't send any of your data on (there are some google analytics stuff, but it doesn't send on your browsing history).

</comment><comment><USER3> I'd give my right arm for something that did this auto-magically for my bookmarks.

[http://cottontracks.com/](http://cottontracks.com/)

</comment><comment><USER4> Are there any plans for a Firefox extension?

<comment><USER5> Ditto. Slightly annoying that Firefox isn't even acknowledged on the blog or website. Pretty sure that must be a FAQ?

<comment><USER6> When a man cuts my lawn for free, I try not to complain that he doesn't also do the hedges.</comment></comment></comment>


Free second generation Android phones for qualifying developers - <AUTHOR> http://sites.google.com/site/developermarketandroidgiveaway/

<comment><USER2> I understand the point of rewarding developers... but I think they could have gotten more out if it if they had the exact same reqs but for the iphone... meaning they were recruiting successful iphone devs to develop for android by offering a free android phone.

I have an iphone and have some iphone apps in the app store. If I also had an android phone, I would make apps for android. I am sure a lot of developers feel similarly... this would have been a good way to increase the size/quality of their app store.

<comment><USER3> Yes it would seem that a developer who had successfully developed an Android application wouldn't need a free phone...?

The other way 'round though (as the comment above describes) would be a killer strategy.

<comment><AUTHOR> I think a lot of us are still on first generation Android devices. I use the emulator to make sure everything runs smoothly at higher resolutions and on newer releases of Android, but such details simply don't get as much attention since I don't interact with them day-to-day. I'm sure that when my Nexus or Droid comes, I'll focus more on those little details.

So this is a way of ensuring that the most popular apps work beautifully on the flagship phones, as well as creating some positive publicity and developer goodwill.

And of course, I'm delighted. I thought I had another 18 months to wait before I would get a better phone.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> That page wreaks with scam/phishing.

<comment><USER5> It is a bit weird looking. I guess they're just dogfooding Google Sites.

Mark Murphy (popular android book author) says it's legit:

[http://groups.google.com/group/android- discuss/browse_thread...](http://groups.google.com/group/android- discuss/browse_thread/thread/3c7864430ead206a/845248e80590eb52?#845248e80590eb52)

Also, this:

[http://techcrunch.com/2010/03/02/google-handing-out-free- nex...](http://techcrunch.com/2010/03/02/google-handing-out-free-nexus-ones- and-droids-to-top-android-devs/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Wow, I'm surprised to hear this is legit. That site is extremely shady looking, and there's nothing stopping me from making an exact copy, coming up with a similarlongnamelikethis, and stealing peoples' addresses. Very scary!

They should at least reverse proxy from something that Google obviously controls and that has an SSL cert.

</comment><comment><USER7> > Developers from Canada ... will receive a Nexus One.

Does that also mean that some day soon I might be able to _give you money_ and in exchange you would send me your product/service?

</comment><comment><USER8> It's quite legit. Thanks Google! Hopefully they'll mail them out soon.</comment>


Introducing the New Commodore 64 - <AUTHOR> http://www.commodoreusa.net/CUSA_C64.aspx <comment><USER2> Cramming a modern PC into a vintage C64 reproduction really is a terrible idea. But as an old Commodore / Amiga fanboy I have to admire Barry Altman (CEO of Commodore USA) for attempting to reawaken the brand.

After the sad bankruptcy spiral and eventual shutdown of Commodore the trademarks ended up in the possession of a company based in the Netherlands called Tulip Computers (Now Nedfield) who makes commodity PC workstations. The did a little cheapo licensing of the brand here and there but basically showed no intention of breathing life into the brand again.

Mr. Altman appears to have incorporated Commodore USA with the sole purpose of attaining trademark licenses and attempting to tap into the large and very latent Commodore enthusiast market.

It doesn't feel like he's going to succeed. But I applaud him for trying. Now that Steve Jobs' face has taken the place of Big Brother in that 1984 ad, it feels to me that the landscape needs a new "creative computing" competitor. The Commodore brand could be such a cool fit, if they only had a decent product.

They should reproduce the 4000 / Video Toaster combo: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nymVNhy4dw8>

<comment><USER3> > the landscape needs a new "creative computing" competitor

I hadn't really thought of it this way before, but there is one. Arduino.

<comment><USER4> Yeah, Arduino does have that same spirit.

The nearly direct access to the hardware was what made the C64 so cool. This new C64 has none of that, unfortunately.

<comment><USER5> > The nearly direct access to the hardware was what made the C64 so cool. This > new C64 has none of that, unfortunately.

Every PC has near-direct access to the hardware. There's nothing stopping you from writing your own BIOS, bootloader, kernel, or anything else -- it's easier than it ever was before. Many people (including myself) really do this, and enjoy it.

<comment><USER6> This may be true, but the C64 booted into a BASIC interpreter with PEEK and POKE commands, making it possible to read and write to all of the system's memory, including mapped IO ports, from the command line. Plus, monthly magazines like COMPUTE'S Gazette offered in-depth tutorials on just about every sub-system, from audio to video to disk I/O. System-level programming was incredibly easy on the C64 -- I was doing it as a teenager, whereas I have yet to write a device driver for a Linux PC.

<comment><USER7> I practically wet myself with joy the first time I changed the colours of the border and main screen with, erm, peeks or pokes; I can't remember.

<comment><USER8> POKE 53280 and 53281. Values 0 to 15.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> The PC guts seem boring and will inflate the price. Why not do a reissue with functionality closer to that of the original, based on the C64 DTV [1] which cost $20 or $25 when it was on the market, and sell it at a $50-to-$100 price point?

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C64_Direct-to-TV>

<comment><USER9> Anyone who is interested in this stuff that hasn't heard Jeri Ellsworth's Google Lecture about her life and her experience designing the C64 DTV 30-games-in-one joystick must watch this.

[http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1053309060448851979...](http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1053309060448851979#)

<comment><USER10> You may also like Michael Steil's awesome "Ultimate Commodore 64 Talk": <http://www.pagetable.com/?p=54>

Amazing technical overview of the C64, including the latest in demo effects, in 64 minutes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> OK, when in doubt about any C64 stuff, the only place to go is the Lemon64 forum, and this seems to be real...

IN 1982, BOTH THE ORIGINAL COMMODORE "C64" & DISNEY'S BLOCKBUSTER "TRON" WERE RELEASED. ALMOST 30 YEARS LATER, THEY BOTH SIMULTANEOUSLY RE APPEAR ON APRIL 5, 2011.

[http://www.lemon64.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=37431&highl...](http://www.lemon64.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=37431&highlight=)

And if you are like me an Unbeliever, check out Disney's TRON partners page:

<http://disney.go.com/tron/index_flash.html#/partners>

</comment><comment><USER11> A terrifying website, with lots of renders, few _photos_ , and a non- functioning store. That's pretty "meh" in my book, and it even gets a Raised Eyebrow of Questioning.

<comment><USER12> maybe a smart MVP ;-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> From the FAQ:

"10. What is Commodore OS? Our new Commodore operating system, will be a unique Commodore and AMIGA centric Linux distribution, that will grow over time into something far greater. Commodore OS will not be your run of the mill Linux distribution."

<http://www.commodoreusa.net/CUSA_FAQ.aspx#Q10>

Judging from the website's fondness for the long deprecated bgcolor tag and animated GIF's, my confidence them producing such an OS is not particularly high at this moment.

<comment><USER14> I'm not sure I follow. Are you claiming that unless one is well versed in css and html5, one is incapable of creating a decent linux distribution?

debian.org gives the lie to such a notion, methinks.

I suppose you might counter that the good old Amiga was a feast of multimedia technologies, and that somehow the modern equivalent is a pretty web page. Again, I'll disagree with you; creating a media-centric OS is a pretty far cry from making a pretty web page.

Heck, a slick-looking commodoreusa.net page might turn off potential customers who'd otherwise be drawn in by the nostalgia stirred by the "ancient" look and feel. That was certainly my reaction.

<comment><USER13> Debian? debian.org is a million times more modern, with RSS feeds, translations in around 30 languages, decent looking markup, etc.

I was just making an observation about the 90's style source code, and said nothing about slickness, or prettiness. This seems a bit of an oddity for a tech company, since one would have to search for hours to find anything similar in 2011.

Of course, writing an quality operating system and coding a simple website are nowhere near the same level of difficulty.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> This is a lost opportunity. They could have revived the brand by putting out a _new_ Commodore. Modern hardware, super-slim, "the keyboard is the computer", inexpensive. Maybe with a very simple and fast OS, like a light Linux or BSD or whatever became of the Amiga OS.

<comment><USER16> If you click around their website a little, you'll find that they're doing more or less exactly that. Most of their products are modern "computers as keyboards," and they say that they are working on a Commodore/Amiga-flavored Linux distro with a heavy emphasis on emulation for backwards compatibility with classic Commodore and Amiga software.

I'm a little skeptical about the "inexpensive" part, though. No prices are posted, but from the pictures and specs I don't think that they've driven costs low enough to tap into the netbook market.

<comment><USER15> > _If you click around their website a little, you'll find that they're doing > more or less exactly that._

I tried to, but the server was overloaded...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> If this had a SID chip (or multiple!) in it, I'd buy one in a heartbeat. As it stands, it's just a straight up PC with... a C64 emulator.

<comment><USER3> If your primary interest in the C64 is to play with the SID, why not forgo the C64 emulator and form factor and use a dedicated SID based MIDI synthesizer (e.g. <http://www.midibox.org/dokuwiki/wilba_mb_6582>)?

<comment><USER10> I bought a HardSID 4U because I'm not a soldering kind of guy: <http://www.hardsid.com/>

Awesome little box.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I think this should have been re-imagining of the C64 as a first computer for a new generation of hackers.

I'm thinking of a high-level, empowering, introductory programming environment in the vein of Hackety Hack or Love2D (because lets be honest, kids want to make games), running on a Linux with an easy-to-use desktop environment (Ubuntu/Unity?).

The hardware would be netbook/mobile type stuff and internet oriented with SSD storage, Wifi, and HDMI for video output. No optical drive. Oh yeah, and a gamepad, the modern equivalent of the joystick.

I'm too young to have grown up with a C64 myself, but to me this would seem like a more worthy spritual successor.

</comment><comment><USER18> How I wish I had a working 1541 disk drive! I've got scores of programs on floppy disk that I wrote when I was 11-14 years old that I'd love to read again.

I doubt the disks are still readable, though. They haven't always exactly been stored properly.

<comment><USER19> I found my old C64 in my parents basement. Just before I ebayed it, I hooked it up. The old disks were surprisingly resilient and my 300 baud modem still worked. I transferred many of the programs I wrote as a child in basic.

It was damn near a visceral experience to hear Renegade whistle out its ancient tune as my C64 connected...

I can now say that I have code I wrote when I was 10... and then goto _ashamed_.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is obviously an April's Fools joke, except they missed the deadline, which is typical Commodore ;-)

In other news, if you want to join 60,000+ fans of the REAL C64, there's a Facebook Page for that: <http://www.facebook.com/c64.fans>

<comment><USER20> If it's a joke, they've been at it for a while; it was supposedly going to be ready for Xmas 2010: [http://www.tgdaily.com/hardware-brief/51285-commodore- makes-...](http://www.tgdaily.com/hardware-brief/51285-commodore-makes-new- computer-with-very-old-looking-hardware)

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I may be the only one who likes this. I've recently been looking for an old commodore 64 for nostalgic reasons, there is no practical reason to own one unless you're a demo purest. But I'm also in the market for an HD media player and the specs look up to the task. I can get my retro gaming and media fix in one package and decommission my xbox1.

Sure the price will be inflated but I can imagine leaving this sprawled out on my lounge floor provided there are some decent retro usb/wireless joysticks to go with it.

</comment><comment><USER22> This is not a Commodore 64.

It is a cruel mockery.

The main appeal of the Commodore was simplicity and understandability. This is a PC, that is to say, a piece of junk overgrown with cancerous accidental complexity.

</comment><comment><USER23> Gotta break out all my old C64 casette tapes.

</comment><comment><USER24> I would love to buy a computer that is a modern upgrade of the Commodore 64, as if the machine had continued to evolve. In other words, the CPU would be a say 32 bit evolution of the original CPU with obvious changes to the instruction set as found in the C64.

The memory space would be flat 32 bit addressable up to a gigabyte.

The sound and video hardware would work in a similarly simplistic way as the original C64 did.

But the CPU would have similar performance to a modern CPU.

It would also have a modern (size) hard drive.

The whole thing could be done as an emulator. But the important thing would be performance. The virtual machine would have to convert one assembly language to the other by _compiling_ it on the fly, e.g. to say x86 code, and not by interpreting it slowly!

And of course the thing would have ROM BASIC built in and/or a simple Amiga style classic look and feel OS.

At the very least I'd buy one of these machines, especially if you put it in a C64 keyboard style box.

<comment><USER25> We don't have virtual memory because the evil Intel monopoly forced it on us. In fact they were late to the game. We have it because it's a good idea. We don't have mediated access to hardware because the evil Intel monopoly forced it on us. We have it because it's a good idea.

Had Commodore stuck around and continued to evolve some things may very well have been different, especially in the UI arena, but I think you'd find that by now the Commodore brand would have had to do the equivalent of the System 9 -> OSX upgrade by now at least once no matter what.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I like the C64 laptop much more ([http://benheck.com/04-05-2009/commodore-64-original- hardware...](http://benheck.com/04-05-2009/commodore-64-original-hardware- laptop\)---it) uses the actual old hardware.

</comment><comment><USER27> > Realtek ALC662 6-CH HD Audio

This should totally be SID, MOS 6581!

</comment><comment><USER28> These are the same guys that did the Phoenix[1] a while back, which was essentially a knock off import that didn't do very well.

The C64 looks like a refination of the Phoenix in a C64-style case. Strangely there's no CPU specs I could find.

[1] - <http://www.commodoreusa.net/CUSA_Phoenix.aspx>

</comment><comment><USER29> I wonder if it will play my Frogger cassette tape that I still have up on the shelf? :)

</comment><comment><USER30> I'd like to see a working prototype at least. Those who are fans know that seemingly starting with the success of the original product and then the Amiga, the company has always had some kind of problem delivering something new.

<comment><USER25> A "working prototype" of a bog-standard nVidia/Intel computer in a glorified case? I don't think this is rocket science here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Something more portable (iPad-ish) or more like a little toy with keyboard, or mini-usb where you can plug one, and HDMI on the out would've been better.

But I guess people cared about the keyboard. I did - for my Pravetz 8C (Apple ][/e clone)

</comment><comment><USER32> Where's the RF connector to hook up to the TV if need be?

I'd like to send one back in time to myself circa 1982 ... but what good is it if there's no capable display device?

</comment><comment><USER33> this is just a PC casemod. bleh.

<comment><USER34> It might actually do better if it were marketed that way. Make it whatever standard form factor will fit inside the plastics and spend the rest on an Ubuntu theme.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Wow. If those aren't too expensive, I'd love to get one. What a fantastic desktop machine. This kind of seems like a late April fool's joke, however.

</comment><comment><USER36> I'm not sure why I still feel so strongly negative towards Commodore for destroying the Amiga brand.... but I do. Even after all these years.

<comment><USER37> I'm not sure either, since I doubt there is one single person the same between this incarnation of Commodore that that one.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> Commodore USA have been promising this stuff for ages and nothing has materialised. It looks like vapourware to me.

</comment><comment><USER39> Maybe hosting the site on an actual C64 wasn't such a good idea...

</comment><comment><USER40> Anybody have a price on this?

<comment><USER41> Come on, it was one click away from the parent article: <http://www.commodoreusa.net/CUSA_C64Select.aspx>

<comment><USER42> Yeah, except the site is being crushed under high load.

I guess using a C64 as a web server was a bad idea.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> Still have my original Brown-Box, with Cassette player. . . I will ONLY buy this if MR-Z comes back onto the field to crack games!</comment>


Think Small - <AUTHOR> https://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/think-small/1677195 <comment><USER2> Dave Trott is a UK national treasure IMO Fabulous writing!</comment>


London to Host "STUPID **** NO ONE NEEDS and TERRIBLE IDEAS HACKATHON" - <AUTHOR> https://www.stupidhackathon.uk/ <comment><USER2> I just saw the pages for New York and Toronto and I literally laughed out loud. I'd love to attend one of these.

<comment><AUTHOR> It looks like a good time. I expect the London one will be hilarious.</comment></comment>


Want to be a true innovator? Teach a kid to code (TED Talk) - <AUTHOR> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etPnN5PpCBQ

<comment><USER2> ScriptEd is of the scrappiest, most awesome startups I've come across recently.</comment>


Tell HN: AWS Route 53 is facing issues while resolving DNS records [RESOLVED] - <AUTHOR> http://status.aws.amazon.com/<p>5:19 AM PDT We are investigating reports of problems resolving some DNS records hosted on Route53 using the third party DNS resolvers 22.214.171.124 and 220.127.116.11 . DNS resolution using other third-party DNS resolvers or DNS resolution from within EC2 instances using the default EC2 resolvers are not affected at this time. <comment><AUTHOR> Now Resolved:

5:19 AM PDT We are investigating reports of problems resolving some DNS records hosted on Route53 using the third party DNS resolvers 184.108.40.206 and 22.214.171.124 . DNS resolution using other third-party DNS resolvers or DNS resolution from within EC2 instances using the default EC2 resolvers are not affected at this time. 5:49 AM PDT We have identified the cause for an elevation in DNS resolution errors using third party DNS resolvers 220.127.116.11 / 184.108.40.206 and are working towards resolution. DNS resolution using other third- party DNS resolvers or DNS resolution from within EC2 instances using the default EC2 resolvers continues to work normally. 6:10 AM PDT Between 4:05 AM PDT and 5:56 AM PDT, some customers may have experienced elevated errors resolving DNS records hosted on Route 53 using DNS resolvers 126.96.36.199 / 22.214.171.124 . The issue has been resolved and the service is operating normally.</comment>


Breaching a 'carbon threshold' could lead to mass extinction - <AUTHOR> https://phys.org/news/2019-07-breaching-carbon-threshold-mass-extinction.html <comment><USER2> Well that's a horrifying new option for our impending doom that I wasn't aware of.

Happy Thursday. Eat Arby's.</comment>


Ask HN: What are some good free Jira alternatives for a team under 10 devs? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Here's a oldie; [https://trac.edgewall.org/](https://trac.edgewall.org/)

</comment><comment><USER3> If you look for strong tracking possibilities, you might want to consider Tuleap: [https://tuleap.org](https://tuleap.org)

</comment><comment><USER4> Redmine, openproject.

Gitlab community edition for all in one.</comment>