The 12" MacBook: A Web Developer's Perspective - <AUTHOR> https://optionalbits.com/the-12-macbook-a-web-developer-s-perspective-5cb6d2ffba15#.z37tc4hy0 <comment><USER2> I loved the size, weight, and screen of the MacBook instantly, but put off getting one after reading all the flak about it not being usable for "real work". Heck, I've even heard sales people at the Apple Store say it. But eventually, my love of ultra-portability and retina-displays won, and I got one anyway (to replace my rooted, Arch-running, ex-Chromebook.) And I love it. Sure, I don't expect as much out of it as my 13" Pro (work machine), and I spend most of my time in the shell and vim rather than post-processing video or 3D rendering, but this thing is a joy to use.

It's not for everyone (or every computing task), but if you have a preference for the smaller screens and portability, and are aware that you're willing to trade raw machine grunt for this portability, then I wouldn't write off the MacBook just because "someone on the internet" said it wasn't usable.

<comment><USER3> I've got an XPS 13 which has a similar form factor to the 12" MB (304mm x 200mm vs 281mm x 197mm) and love it as well for all my tasks. The key is the screen - pack in a reasonable number of pixels and it's perfectly usable.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I picked up a larger macbook pro last year. One thing I find myself doing often is loading images from a sd card from my digital dslr camera. The usb type c is still not my cup of tea.

<comment><AUTHOR> I honestly haven't tried working with large image files as I don't normally do that so I don't know how the processor would handle this. The problem I had with the rMBP... ...is that I was not taking it often with me.

<comment><USER4> For me it was really about not having to carry around a card reader that I would have to plugin with usb type c.

With the traditional Macbook pro, it has the card reader slot built in.</comment></comment></comment>


Nasa Set to Demonstrate X-Ray Communications in Space - <AUTHOR> https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2019/nasa-set-to-demonstrate-x-ray-communications-in-space <comment><USER2> Will be interesting to see what they use for a receiving antenna. 90 dBi gain is about the limit for single aperture reflector antennas at RF, as you contended with structure deformation at low frequencies, then surface roughness at high frequencies, not to mention tracking a fast moving object with that precision to keep it in the beam width.

At X-rays, I don't know how you would focus it as the roughness is in on a molecular scale. So going to higher frequencies has its limits.

I don't know what the equivalent gain of these large, optical telescopes are, but they seem to suffer from the same problems.

The plasma penetration must the the real objective. You can get thru the plasma with standard RF, it just takes lots more power, or lower data rate, but a low reset beacon is feasible, just not voice comms.

<comment><USER3> Even to x-rays, smooth surfaces become reflective at grazing incidence, so you can make mirrors that are constructed on that principle. Not simple to do, but not impossible either.

<comment><USER2> The gain falls off as the RMS surface roughness becomes a fraction of a wavelength; see figure 1 here:

[https://arxiv.org/pdf/1007.4600.pdf](https://arxiv.org/pdf/1007.4600.pdf)

So it would be interesting to see how that effects it. I suppose a crystal fractured along the lattice for an atomically smooth surface.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> As ever Scott Manley made me do it:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4nXU1xF_Tg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4nXU1xF_Tg)

</comment><comment><USER4> Are there any health concerns about using X-ray constantly for communications? For example, should astronauts performing EVAs take care to avoid the area around the antenna? Or is there enough ionizing radiation in space already that adding some X-ray in the mix won't make any difference?

<comment><USER5> That would depend on the transmit power, but in short, you wouldn't want to be outside the vehicle for a long time when the transmitter is on. A typical x-ray machine emits about twenty watts of x-ray power when in use with a typical shutter speed of 1/10 to 1/2 of a second. There's no data about how much power NASA is using in this experiment or how much a production model transmitter would use, but ground-to-ISS transmission over FM can be done with a 25-watt transmitter.

Now, the x-ray transmitter wouldn't be focused the right way to send maximum radiation into an astronaut and it would have a reduced duty cycle because it's not just a simple x-ray flashlight, but giving it an hour-long bear hug while it's in use would be a very bad idea.

Of course the most relevant point is that the vast majority of spaceships don't have humans on them.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> A wild idea I had never even thought of, X-rays are of high enough frequncy that they can penetrate the plasmasheath of high velocity vehicles. Seemingly this is for hypersonic transport, and rentry vehicles, my mind is quite boggled.

<comment><USER6> What is the mechanism by which a plasmasheath blocks radiowaves, and why would x-rays be an exception?

<comment><USER7> This is similar to how a metal box blocks radio waves, and how x rays can still penetrate it.

<comment><USER8> What kind of metal? I thought X-rays couldn't penetrate lead.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> NASA not Nasa. It's an acronym not a word.

<comment><AUTHOR> This a NASA article on a NASA web site

<comment><USER10> Yes, and (now, at least) the linked article has NASA capitalized in the title. (Unless you intended to reply to @tntn)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> CancerComm

</comment><comment><USER12> > XCOM

I love it (For those not aware, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XCOM:_Enemy_Unknown](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XCOM:_Enemy_Unknown))

<comment><USER13> Also

[https://www.xcom-labs.com/](https://www.xcom-labs.com/)

And of course

Https://www.x.com

<comment><USER14> Link for the lazy:

[https://www.x.com/](https://www.x.com/)

(just put a trailing / at the end)</comment></comment></comment>


Confuse people SSHing to your host with a redirect back to theirs - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/climagic/status/452079585665224704

<comment><USER2> This is kind of a bad idea because if the source address of the connection is being spoofed, your machine becomes a TCP port 22 proxy to any other host. Not to mention the fact that you expose yourself to denial-of-service attacks.

<comment><USER3> Have you ever tried to actually spoof a TCP connection?</comment></comment>


In His Own Words: The Story of Max Levchin [video] - <AUTHOR> http://gigaom.com/2010/11/08/in-his-own-words-the-story-of-max-levchin-video/

<comment><USER2> Here's another good interview of Max Levchin with Bob Cringely back in 2005: <http://www.pbs.org/cringely/nerdtv/guests/#l>

This is worth watching because it's pre-Slide.com acquisition and just barely post-Google IPO.

The interesting comment to me is his comparison at the time of Google to Alta Vista, specifically how Alta Vista was the huge search engine of its day and then just kinda faded away.

</comment><comment><USER3> If you follow a few people closely and read every article you can find about them, some characterizations in the press tend to be a bit dubious. I don't know Levchin personally, but every indication goes to him being a workaholic, and not exactly a "family man", as Malik writes.

I really don't like how many interview posts start.. It's often something like "Oh, look, this guy has it all and now he's coming clean on my interview! Watch him spill it all", which is obviously link-bait and just not true.

</comment><comment><USER4> I found it particularly interesting that Max created an incubator primarily to initiate an environment of creativity.

How do you come up with the best ideas possible? Easy! Just setup an atmosphere where great ideas are pooled together, then pick the best ones.</comment>


Stretch Goals Are Important - <AUTHOR> http://blog.launch.co/blog/stretch-goals-are-important-or-wizzywig-won-100k-in-48-hours.html

<comment><USER2> In this context, it sounds like he's using "stretch goal" to mean something like what Jim Collins calls a BHAG - Big Hairy Audacious Goal[1]. I like the concept, and need to make a note to myself to sit down and define what our BHAG at Fogbeam is. We've been so heads-down working on tactical stuff lately, there hasn't been much time to stop, back up, and think about BHAGs.

[1]: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Hairy_Audacious_Goal](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Hairy_Audacious_Goal)</comment>


How Much Did It Cost AOL To Send Us Those CDs In The 90s? "A Lot,"  - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2010/12/27/aol-discs-90s/ <comment><USER2> I have this theory that AOL warez/hacking/prog scene is the root of many startups that exist today. It's how I first learned to code by making punters. I had made the first punter for AOL 4.0, only to have my hard drive crash the day of release. This heavily demotivated me fyi.

A few buddies of mine got started here. I've also read Zuck used to mess around in the scene. Aol was my first foray into the internet at the age of ten or so (maybe younger?). My screen name was JediForce3 (Yup, i was a true geek). I think it was Aol 2.5?

Anyone else here used to mess around with AOL back in the day? Steve Case used to get a lot of crap, but I always respected him + looked up to him as the founder of AOL.

<comment><USER3> I found that AOL was nowhere near enough, wasn't 'true network' (I understood this at 10), was heavily criticized by the PC media because of this (which I also used to read) so I switched it off and discovered BBS's

The BBS's were the foundation of almost every person I have met in tech, every job, all dev, every startup I have been involved with and there is a very strong camaraderie amongst the early BBS hackers (most of us went on to become v early web hackers).

So I see from how inside AOL you think your theory might hold, but outside of it there was an entire larger network that was far more interesting

<comment><USER4> I used both in the mid-90s, sort of on the tail end of the BBS scene, and while I did generally like the BBS scene better culturally, I think I agree with the previous comment that AOL got me more into programming. The fact that people were trying to do so many things on AOL that it wasn't really intended to support led to a whole cottage industry of teenagers writing scripts and bots and whatnot, whereas my usage at least of BBSs was much more straightforward and "normal" (I used them in the intended manner). I don't think I ever really scripted anything in my terminal emulator, though perhaps others did.

I ended up _really_ getting into programming a bit later via mIRC scripting, though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> So Quora has become the place for tech journalists to fish for the next article, not that there's anything wrong with it :-)

(The Netflix postage cost question came up on Quora first, then you can guess which tech publication (<http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/04/quora-netflix/>) picked it up).

<comment><AUTHOR> Example:

[http://www.quora.com/User-Interfaces/Why-do-in-restaurant- re...](http://www.quora.com/User-Interfaces/Why-do-in-restaurant-reservation- and-ordering-systems-seem-to-have-such-bad-UI)

[http://www.juliansanchez.com/2010/12/27/why-are- restaurant-w...](http://www.juliansanchez.com/2010/12/27/why-are-restaurant- web-sites-so-bad/)

<comment><USER6> Those are not the same topic (reservation systems vs. restaurant websites) but there are indeed many, many examples out there.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> One thing I never understood:

My family has had an AOL account since v2.5 (1995?), but the discs never stopped coming. Always seemed like an obvious waste of money, with a trivial fix.

<comment><USER8> Satisfied customers can give their discs to friends and family. In fact, sending discs to existing customers might be more effective, since a disc given to you by someone you trust must have a significantly higher success rate.

<comment><USER7> Damn, that's a good point. Thanks, I've seriously been wondering about that for > 10 years.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The real question for me is, where did they get my home address? I don't care so much about the cost for them of mailing the CDs, but what annoyed me more was how they got my name and address.

Call them the first spammers of the digital age if you will.

<comment><USER10> If you're curious, run a public record search on yourself. The ones that cost money. It's all out there. From your mortgage outstanding (if you own) to your rental history (if you rent - to a lesser degree if you find rentals through Craigslist).

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> With the effectiveness of online advertising declining, I wonder if we'll start to see more physical promotions. Although, one could easily argue that physical advertisements are no longer used because the internet exists as a viable way to reach users.

On a somewhat unrelated note, the CD promo led to one of my favorite commercials: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OqQYk2TC-8>

</comment><comment><USER12> We got so many of them that my friends and I started using them as frisbees. Although the software was shoddy, the hardware provided some entertainment.

</comment><comment><USER13> Could the stunt be repeated today, using USB sticks perhaps?

<comment><USER14> Why not just send CD's?

<comment><USER15> Everybody has a USB port. Not all laptops these days have optical drives. Also, USB drives are a lot smaller, and can be just as thin (eg Crucial's Gizmo Jr.: [http://www.crucial.com/store/partspecs.aspx?IMODULE=CT8GBUFD...](http://www.crucial.com/store/partspecs.aspx?IMODULE=CT8GBUFDJNR000))

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> There is no way they spent $35 per CD, even including design printing, boxing, mailing and the "free hours".

Wouldn't a better question be how much they saved per employee by outsourcing nearly all their callcenter jobs? I would guess from $70 per person per day to $70 per month. And yet they are still hemorrhaging.

<comment><USER17> That's $35 _per acquired user_ , not per CD. So if you figure that the cds cost a buck to make and ship, they acquired one user for every 35 CDs shipped. That seems high, considering how many I had lying around.

<comment><USER18> The fact that some businesses will pay $35 per acquired user also explains how some of those "free iPod" and similar offers worked. A typical one would require you to essentially get 5 people to sign up for their clients in order to earn your free iPod. If their clients were paying $35 per signup, that is $175 for the "free iPod" company for every iPod they have to give out, so the iPods aren't costing them net anywhere near as much as many would think at first.

Also, it turns out it is a lot harder than people think to find 5 friends or coworkers that you can convince to sign up for one of the offers. The company still gets its $35 for each of the signups, without having to cough up an iPod.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What are the three most significant things you have learnt till date? - <AUTHOR> I had to answer this question recently and I realized how different life experiences reflect in your views. I asked some of my friends this question and it was really interesting to hear what others had to say. You can learn a lot from others life experience. You can answer here or on my blog.
My answers were:
#1 Always listen to your heart. It'll lead you the right way.
#2 Hard work beats Talent when talent doesn't work hard. #3 Time heals almost everything. Give time, time.
A much detailed answer can be found here: http://www.deepmusings.com/?p=263 <comment><USER2> Concept #1: Opportunity Cost: Everything has a cost. Everything. At a minimum, it is the foregone time you could have invested into other activities rather than the thing that you've chosen to invest time in. Even if you had unlimited funds, you still have to chose what to do with your time, and that's frighteningly finite. Realize, therefore, that you are always giving up something, and choosing to be weak in one area in return for being strong in another. No one is good at everything. No one has it all.

Concept #2: Labor-elasticity relative to wages/money can be negative, and that's ok. For those not keyed in on economic mumbo-jumbo, that simply means that having more money can result in people choosing to work less. First year economics people (and i'm assuming many young, and HN-types) assume that everyone will do more work for more money. But money is not the point, and unless you're neurotic and insecure (and most people who chase money are), there comes a time when you realise that maybe now that you've got money, you can instead use it on the things that really matter rather than trying to get more of it. And work, on the whole, is not the shit that matters...

Concept 3: Be humble and self-critical. Humble to realise how fallible and pathetically human you are, so that you don't beat yourself or others up too much, and how much luck had to do with any success that comes your way, and how much it has to do with a great deal of suffering that comes the way of others. Self-critical so you can deal with, improve upon and compensate for the flaws you realise you have.

Bonus concept 4: Learn from the things stupid people do so you don't do the things that make them stupid. Their sole purpose in life is to act as a warning to others.

<comment><AUTHOR> Agree with #2. After a certain point, money is no longer a motivating factor. The crappy part about this is you have to reach that point to realize this. #3 has been the best thing I've read so far today.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Good thread, though I can only come up with one thing.

# Good relationships are really important for your mental health

</comment><comment><USER4> 1\. Don't be too hard on yourselves. You tend to make mistakes, and there is no way to become better without making them. Put the past behind and move on. Easier said than done, though.

2\. Failure is the default state of any venture. Give your best to succeed, but remember that you're starting from failure. This way, you learn to handle the lows associated with failures better.

3\. Focus on the process as much as on the results. The idea is to master the process that's expected to return results so that you can keep using it to succeed at various things.

</comment><comment> alok-g 1\. Irrational behavior is much more common in humans than what I had imagined. The world seems to be running on it.

2\. If you are not experimenting, you are not learning. E.g., Don't be scared to share your thoughts with others, since if they are wrong that's your shortest path to get corrected.

3\. Need to figure how to undo childhood learning that is likely wrong but yet ingrained in our minds.

Plus a large number of technical things that the question does not preclude though probably does not intend to ask for.

</comment><comment><USER5> #1: Spend more money on experiences and less on things.

#2: Don't dread potentially poor outcomes because they are never as bad as they seem.

#3: Competence, confidence, and efficiency go a long way.

</comment><comment><USER6> 1\. Think bigger. Work on ambitious projects. You become what you spend your time on. And big visions attract money and talent. Think bigger.

</comment><comment><USER7> * There is no point in brooding over a decision we have made in the past. Given the circumstance and no prior knowledge of the future, we will always make the same decision. So we have to accept our shortsight/mistake, learn from it and keep going.

* I try to give the maximum I can for an objective, so I will not have any regrets later, whether it is achieved or not. Clear conscience.

</comment><comment><USER8> #1 Life is short, so make sure you'll have no regrets when you die

#2 Whether you think you can or can't, you're right

#3 Foolish decisions are often the ones you regret the less

</comment><comment><USER9> "#2 Hard work beats Talent when talent doesn't work hard."

Interesting. So which is more important, working hard or working smart?

<comment><USER10> "The highest paid job in America is thinking. Some people think, many people think that they think and the vast majority would rather die than think" \- Brian Tracey

Over the years I've seen that this is true. People avoid to think and make their own mind on a subject.

That's a discussion Brian Tracey in the podcast "The Miracle of Self- Discipline".

ps. By thinking of course I don't mean _think about it 5 minutes_ while running on the park with your iPod. I mean think thoroughly, spend some time alone with no abstractions, before taking an important decision: be it a product, partnership, etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> You can get (almost) anything you want, but you can't get everything you want.

</comment><comment><USER12> Work hard. Be strong. Don't complain.

</comment><comment><USER13> Just one thing:

1\. The importance of good grammar.

<comment><USER14> Jsut one tihgn:

1\. Teh iopmtrnace fo godo gammrar.

See, it's not that important.

<comment><USER15> Grammar != spelling.</comment></comment></comment>


Document Classification for Newspaper Articles (2009) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://web.mit.edu/6.863/www/fall2012/projects/writeups/newspaper-article-classifier.pdf

<comment><USER2> Training sets too small, film at 11.

<comment><USER3> I was not surprised that they didn't use larger training sets. They are comparing three different approaches, one of which maximum entropy they had trouble running without reducing the number of features used.

<comment><USER2> With the training set sizes they are using it is no surprise they did not get good results. They could have done better with them had they used some kind of dimensional reduction.

However, just from seeing a lot of systems that wind up on the wrong side of the "commercialization valley of death" I wouldn't start this kind of project unless I had a bigger training set and some latitude to adjust the categories to produce something more learnable.

<comment><AUTHOR> I don't know a lot about this topic as I started getting into it recently, but I think the purpose of this is more of a study than an actual solution ready for commercialization.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Observations While Living Without A Fridge For Almost A Month - <AUTHOR> http://lukas.zinnagl.com/2012/05/observations-while-living-without-a-fridge-for-almost-a-month/

<comment><USER2> Can you explain what you mean by "I've spent more money on food than usually (which is a postive effect imo)"? Most "average" people want to minimize food/living expenses.</comment>


The Net Neutrality Crack-Up – WSJ - <AUTHOR> http://www.wsj.com/articles/holman-jenkins-the-net-neutrality-crack-up-1425080173 <comment><USER2> _That's the cable industry, which invested to create the nation's high-speed broadband platform and now is being punished for it. "_ Oh, puh-leeze. The FCC has always generously subsidized phone company expansions, one way (tax breaks) or another (increased tariffs, a.k.a. bigger phone bills). It's easy to google up examples of this from the recent past:

[http://www.pcworld.com/article/2147360/fcc-adds-9-billion- to...](http://www.pcworld.com/article/2147360/fcc-adds-9-billion-to-broadband- subsidy-fund.html) [http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/ATT-Takes-100-Million- in-...](http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/ATT-Takes-100-Million-in-DSL- Subsidies-125474) [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bruce-kushnick/the-book-of- bro...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bruce-kushnick/the-book-of-broken- promis_b_5839394.html)

This is one of the rare times the FCC hasn't decided in favor of monopolies or duopolies, and the really big propaganda guns are coming out. This article includes the word "pusillanimous" \- I think the cable industry is really stung that one of their own (FCC Chair Tom Wheeler is an ex-cable-lobbyis) actually did something for non-corporate people.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> non-paywall through google: [https://www.google.com/#q=http:%2F%2Fwww.wsj.com%2Farticles%...](https://www.google.com/#q=http:%2F%2Fwww.wsj.com%2Farticles%2Fholman- jenkins-the-net-neutrality-crack-up-1425080173%3Ftesla%3Dy)</comment>


iOS 14 turns volume down if it is set to "loud" for too long - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/steipete/status/1306884214252613632 <comment><USER2> That's pretty stupid. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the device presumably has no idea what the impedance of the sink is, or what the sink even is. AUX port on your car that requires max volume out of your iPhone to have reasonable dynamic range? Doesn't matter. Audiophile high-impedance headphones that need a bit more oomph to be usable? Doesn't matter.

The angle on this tweet annoys me quite a bit, though.

> Here's my reason to jailbreak as soon as one is out. Do I own my iPhone or > does it own me? #patronage

Really? We're going to assign blame to the closed ecosystem here? Really? I love FOSS as much as anyone but the screenshot attached to the tweet shows clearly where the blame should go:

> In certain regions, these notifications cannot be turned off due to > regulations and safety standards.

The problem is Big Brother government, the bureaucrats who think that they need to impose on your life to improve your life, and the people who vote them into office and keep them there. Apple is just doing what they're legally required to do.

<comment><USER3> > That's pretty stupid. The device has no idea what the impedance of the sink > is, or what the sink even is. AUX port on your car that requires max volume > out of your iPhone to have reasonable dynamic range? Doesn't matter. > Audiophile high-impedance headphones that need a bit more oomph to be > usable? Doesn't matter.

Hmm, if this can be turned off in Settings (can it?), I think it's still a sensible default. Most people aren't using high-impedance headphones, and this little nudge could potentially save the hearing of a lot of people!

<comment><USER2> Going off the screenshot, I don't think it can.

> In certain regions, these notifications cannot be turned off due to > regulations and safety standards.

<comment><USER4> Someone who uses it told me that it can be disabled. Notifications are just notifications, that is fine if displayed only once when going above the threshold, but changing the volume is not OK.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


What 'overwhelmingly classified' technologies could the Space Force disclose? - <AUTHOR> https://sociable.co/technology/classified-technologies-space-force-disclose/ <comment><USER2> This is one of the convincing arguments for a Space Force, that the amount of assets related to space operations is so huge that inter-service or individual service mgmt is costing us even more.

The problem is that a SF will eventually begin defining their own missions and we will have situations like between the Army and USAF over CAS.</comment>


Abe Passes Controversial Bill Boosting Japan Surveillance Powers - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2017-06-15/abe-passes-controversial-bill-boosting-japan-surveillance-powers <comment><USER2> Apparently it is

> _needed to bolster counter-terrorism precautions ahead of the 2020 Tokyo > Olympics_

but:

> _Under the bill, terrorist groups or criminal organizations could be > punished for the planning of 277 crimes, which range from arson to copyright > violation_

 _Copyright violation_? Seriously? Copyright violation is a terrorist act or a part of _planning_ a terrorist act?

<comment><USER3> In the Japan Times article on this it says they suggest that pirated CD sales could be used to fund terrorism... yep..

<comment><USER4> The piracy/terrorism link has been used often before, an example: [http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/03/21/1047749921225.h...](http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/03/21/1047749921225.html)

<comment><USER5> > March 21 2003

Ah, back the in the MPAA hay-day when they still thought they had a chance:

> Motion Picture Association of America head Jack Valenti - a leader of > Hollywood's fight against piracy - continued the terrorism theme in his > written submission to the hearing.

> "September 11 changed the way Americans look at the world. It also changed > the way American law enforcement looks at Intellectual Property crimes," > wrote Valenti - borrowing from an November 2002 article in the Customs > Service newsletter US Customs Today.

Reminds me of this old comic: [https://s-media-cache- ak0.pinimg.com/736x/53/ed/12/53ed12786...](https://s-media-cache- ak0.pinimg.com/736x/53/ed/12/53ed12786da279fbe85c1b868f491e91.jpg)

14 years later and it's still a good political tactic.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> World politics seems to be shifting to the right in almost all the major economies. It's quite depressing (to me).

Are any of the major economies moving to the left? Does anybody have a good understanding of why this is happening?

In this instance, it doesn't appear to be fear caused by domenstic terrorism. Japan suffered domestic terrorism in the past and the response seemed far more measured then.

<comment><USER6> The election that just happened in the UK seems to indicate that things are going the other way. Young voter turnout increased substantially, and they're way further to the left. That age gap seems to exist in the rest of Europe & the U.S. as well.

<comment><USER3> The increased young voter turnout is great. But the conservatives won, and are moving further and further to the right. Corybns own party have been trying to force him out. And to be honest, the Labour Party supposed some pretty right bill legislation (the IP Bill).

There maybe significant (and even growing) resistance. But it doesn't seem very effective at creating political change.

<comment><USER6> But the right wing voters continue to die off at a pretty decent rate every year. So as long as the young actually bother to vote, I don't think it'll be very long for this trend to reverse itself. A lot of "left" parties do seem to ultimately answer to corporate interests though.

<comment><USER7> It's possible. Or perhaps Corybn will be pushed out and the Labour party will take a more authoritarian stance again.

And even if Labour get in, they still voted the IP Bill in. So they are pro- surveillance. So overall, I can't be convinced that "things are looking positive" from an individual liberties point of view, in the UK. Is there anywhere it's looking positive?

<comment><USER6> Oh yeah I agree, from an individual liberties point of view, we're totally fucked...and hardly anyone seems to care because they're easily distracted by shiny things & identity politics.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> Paul-ish > Despite public ambiguity toward his drive to change the constitution and a > probe into his alleged use of influence in helping a friend's school project

To anyone else who was confused thinking maybe the president was helping some kid on his school project, that is not the case. It looks like he gave money[1] and state land to build a very nationalistic school.

* [http://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/japan-pm-accused-of...](http://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/japan-pm-accused-of-giving-cash-for-nationalistic-school/)

</comment><comment><USER8> Abe is decidedly full of... no surprises. You know exactly his agenda and what he intends to do. And you get the media at his feet, which says a lot about "free press" in Japan.

</comment><comment><USER9> Watch the extant powers -- state and extra-governmental -- entrench themselves, one by one, step by step.

</comment><comment><USER10> Isn't Abe a conservative. Why is it that "small government" politicians always seem to be for more surveillance?

At least it would be nice if they dealt with the well known problem of organized crime in Japan, but I doubt it will be used for anything like that - just more screwing over the little guy.

<comment><USER11> Abe isn't an _American_ conservative. Even European conservatism isn't a one- to-one match with the American version, much less Japanese conservatism.

<comment><AUTHOR> Even American conservatives haven't actually been in favor of small government for a very, very long time. Roughly 40 to 50 years as a majority position (some of them still lie and pretend they are of course; they always flake when it comes to actions & votes).

George W. Bush nearly doubled Federal Government spending and built numerous massive new bureaucracy agencies. Reagan before him did likewise in regards to spending. They're almost all big government conservatives now, the only question is what they spend on.

There few conservatives in the US holding the political position of cutting government spending, and almost none in favor of cutting entitlements. The tiny wing of the Republican party that actually favors the free market heavily, is irrelevant and has zero power or influence.</comment></comment></comment>


Rate YC Hacker News Interface - <AUTHOR>

How much would you give it out of 10? I am not impressed with the user interface or home page of many startups. As a test of how the hacker community thinks, let's rate the hacker news UI. Mine: 9 out of 10. <comment><USER2> 8/10. Nitpicks:

No top button when viewing a comment - only parent. No way to undo/reverse a vote. Comment reply/edit is on another page instead of inline like reddit. No comment reply notification in the toolbar.

<comment><USER3> I don't think undoing a vote would be a valuable feature. One of the nice things about this site is that it is minimalistic.

Undoing a vote, even if it is useful, would add clutter to the UI. Because I always enjoy the sparseness, but would rarely want to undo a vote, I think the site is better off without the feature.

<comment><USER4> "Undoing a vote, even if it is useful, would add clutter to the UI."

No, it would just leave the arrows in place except highlighted when "voted". You could then click it again to unvote, or click the opposite arrow to reverse vote. Just like Reddit.

I'm not saying I want unvoting, as I don't really care, but I don't think it clutters the interface in any meaningful way. (Though it does make the pair of arrows multi-state, which could be confusing for some users. Doesn't seem to bother redditors though.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The people here is, by far, the best feature.

</comment><comment><USER6> I give it a 6/10 I guess. While I like the simple approach ... I am also missing a few basic bells and whistles. I'd love to see a search feature and/or a way to tag or categorize posts for later reference. Sometimes I think "oh, I remember reading about that on YC" but its nearly impossible to find again.

Also the text (as I'm typing this) in the form field is too lightly colored and the text area is too small for me.

</comment><comment><USER7> I'd give it a higher rating if it had a search UI. ;-)

</comment><comment><USER8> It works fine for me, the only thing that I miss is when submitting an url you can't write the text to be seen in the comments page.

</comment><comment><USER9> Overall 8/10. It does everything it needs to in a really clean way. It's reliable and consistent.

My biggest nitpick is reading the grayed out font on visited links, submission text, and a few other places. My brain wants to skip over grayed out text so much that it requires an almost conscious effort.

</comment><comment><USER10> Great and light weight. I would like a clone.</comment>


Join the Unofficial HackerNews Facebook Group for Discussion - <AUTHOR> https://www.facebook.com/groups/HackerNewsUnofficial/

<comment><AUTHOR> I have created the group as a social experiment. As Twitter have removed the discovery page it's now easier to discover content on Facebook. Please join :)</comment>


Stop asking Steve Wozniak what the next big tech thing is - <AUTHOR> https://www.techinasia.com/steve-wozniak-singapore-visit-paypal <comment><USER2> Whenever people are successful they hound them like that, as if he knows every future success story.</comment>


FNU – First Name Unknown - <AUTHOR> Over the last couple months, I noticed a few times that my Uber driver's name shows up as FNU.
Recently, I asked my Uber driver his name and he introduced himself as 'fanu'. When I asked him what it meant - he said 'First Name Unknown'. I was a bit shocked. He said that he served as an interpreter for the U.S. Armed Forces and felt glad that the U.S. accepted his visa. However, during his visa registration process - since he had only one name (moniker) - the government used it as his last name, and entered FNU as his first name.
I checked 2 more times, and I realized that this is a common situation with Immigrants from places with complex names (hard spellings / pronunciations) or single names. The name is hence directly carried forward from Visa to Drivers License and then to the Uber profile.
Do you think Uber and other service companies (where such names are entered) can take an effort to start with correcting the name in their Uber profile?
I would be really upset moving to another country and changing my identity to First Name Unknown. Especially at workplace as an Uber driver. <comment><USER2> Hospitals and other medical services.

Both doctors and patients don't always have names that follow the US conventions of first and last. That can definitely lead to issues of care in the future.

I hope more people adopt the idea of a "human name" to take name data: [https://www.hl7.org/fhir/datatypes.html#HumanName](https://www.hl7.org/fhir/datatypes.html#HumanName)</comment>


Common Problems in Hyperparameter Optimization - <AUTHOR> http://blog.sigopt.com/post/158968647258/common-problems-in-hyperparameter-optimization <comment><AUTHOR> This blog post is a followup to a talk at MLConf NYC. Hope it helps you optimize your hyperparameters!</comment>


The 15-Inch MacBook Air - <AUTHOR> http://parislemon.com/post/13462682469/the-15-inch-air

<comment><USER2> He mentions the poor battery life of the 11" to the 13" air, but IIRC a non sandy bridge 11" is comparable to the sandy bridge 13" as far as battery life goes.

I was pretty jealous when my friend bought a new sandy bridge 11", but in retrospect I enjoy the battery life of my C2D ULV.

</comment><comment><USER3> 15-in would be nice, but a MBA powerful enough to run Windows in Parallels would be my dream laptop.

<comment><USER4> What are you trying to run in Windows? I have a new 13" MacBook Air and happily run a lot of different apps (no games though) in Windows inside Parallels. Ordinary interaction with Windows is fast. Only a few tasks feel slow, mostly things that would be slow anyway—large scale computation in SAS and Verilog synthesis.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> To me, 13" seems the ideal size for a laptop. My Thinkpad E325 seems almost perfect.

</comment><comment><USER6> wow.. probably just me, but I cant believe people go for that size. Using my 11'' inch MBA makes my 15'' MBP feel oversized. I just love having a computer of the size of an A4 paper sheet.

<comment><USER7> It's not just you. I intentionally went for the 11" MBA because I want a portable computer to be...portable. I'd rather have an external monitor, keyboard, and trackball at home and work, and keep the machine itself as lightweight and compact as possible.

It does matter a little bit if you're in a hotel or something, but the minor inconvenience of the smaller screen is outweighed by the savings in bulk and weight, at least for me. Obviously others have the opposite view. Different strokes, I guess.

Hmm... there could be a business opportunity for the hotel industry here. How about offering nice monitors and keyboards as in-room amenities?</comment></comment>


Sh**T I Smoke - <AUTHOR> https://www.producthunt.com/posts/sh-t-i-smoke <comment><USER2> Sydney Australia came up with 0.4 cigarettes today,

Except that the closest air monitoring station is 504km away.</comment>


The Rainforest Is Teeming with Consciousness - <AUTHOR> http://nautil.us/issue/78/atmospheres/the-rainforest-is-teeming-with-consciousness <comment><USER2> | Panpsychism is an intellectually credible view that can transform our relationship with the natural world.

If that was the case the article would probably have contained at least a sliver of evidence. "Oh, but you just need a healthier relationship with evidence." Apparently a relationship which leads you to entertaining propositions for which there is none.</comment>


NSA Spies on International Payments - <AUTHOR> http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/spiegel-exclusive-nsa-spies-on-international-bank-transactions-a-922276.html

<comment><USER2> NSA Sunday.

<comment><USER3> Are you implying that this part of mass surveillance should be ignored?

<comment><USER2> No, I'm just noticing that Sunday seems to be the weekly day of revelation. And that the news just keeps on coming. And I absolutely don't think any of this should be ignored, sorry for that impression.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How to accept one job offer while keeping the bridges to the others open - <AUTHOR> I have a couple of very good job offers, though the roles are quite different.
It just so happens that the offers came in at roughly the same time, so I will have to pick one.
Since it's an apples-to-oranges case, I can't really be certain a priori which one will be the best long term.
So, while I will end up picking one and declining the others, is there a diplomatic way to keep the bridges open to the ones I will be declining, so that, if say the current one doesn't work out, I could approach the others again in say 6 months or so?
Not sure this is possible, but if you've done it in the past, it would be good to hear about your experiences.
What exactly did you say? <comment><USER2> Even if you know which job you want more, try to use other offers as leverage to get better salary/equity/bonus/etc. The best situation for you is where the employers get into a bidding war. Once you pick one, just politely say that you've accepted a job elsewhere, and thank them for their offer. Reasonable people won't be offended.</comment>


Thalmic (YC W13) introduces gesture control without the cameras - <AUTHOR> http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23210-armband-adds-a-twitch-to-gesture-control.html <comment><USER2> Just amazing! Hardware startups are beyond sexy. There is something so compelling about tactile devices... no amount of sophisticated software engg can come close to that feeling. Wipro's chairman was once asked why wipro still made soap & shampoos even though wipro was a billion dollar software services shop. He just picked up a bar of soap and said - its just very physical. Software, you can't touch, you can't see...

In the early 90s, there was this thing called a centronics port. You looked behind an old dot matrix printer, you found this large ugly parallel port with 25 pins ( <http://bit.ly/YT4xRh> ). I asked my professor "how does the printer print ? ". He took my question at face value, hooked up the centronics port to a CRT...soon I realized pins 2-9 would output any goddamn digital signal ! Literally anything I wanted. I wrote a quickbasic program to print square wave, sine wave sawtooth... and those waves started showing up on the CRT. So it got me thinking...if I feed that 8 bit output to an 8-bit TI DAC, I can make an analog function generator! ( <http://bit.ly/WmFy8o> ) My final version needed a 741 op-amp & a 555 timer, but it actually worked over a wide range of frequencies, and was about one hundredth the price of a real Kenwood function generator! Ofcourse, back in those days, there was no YC or startup culture, & that was the end of that device...:( But just thinking about that one hardware device gives me more pleasure than all the software I wrote after graduating.

<comment><USER3> Yes hardware startup are sexy, but most of them are also very software- intensive. Leap Motion needs a lot of processing power, even for a simple visualizer app, and I bet Myo does too.

Other examples: guidance of things like the Sphero or the Parrot AR Drone are very complex. Usually there's a lot of maths involved, which has to be translated into software.

<comment><USER4> I would think they just map muscle contractions to commands for the drones. No math required except to parse contractions.

<comment><USER5> The math behind this is actually rather complex. Heavy duty machine learning and statistical analysis.

<comment><USER4> Well of course. But that's DSP for parsing the muscle contractions, right?

I would imagine you guys didn't do any application-specific math like guidance of the choppers..? Just curious!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > The first generation can recognise around 20 gestures, some as subtle as the > tap of a finger

I wonder if it's able to distinguish between fingers. If so, it would be possible to create some sort of chorded keyboard, without the keyboard of course. Combine with Project Glass and you have awesome sauce.

<comment><USER7> _I wonder if it's able to distinguish between fingers_

From the FAQ (<https://getmyo.com/faq>):

"What sort of precision does the myo have?

The MYO senses gestures and movements in two ways: 1) muscle activity, and 2) motion sensing. When sensing the muscle movements of the user, the device can detect changes in hand gesture right down to each individual finger."

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I've worked extensively with sensored gloves in my job, both designing the gloves, and developing software to do cool things with them. By far the most difficult thing to do is make a compelling application that effectively utilizes the capabilities of the hardware. This is a very cool piece of hardware, but it's success is going to be defined on whether or not they are able to make it better than existing input devices, which tend to be quite good already.

<comment><USER4> That was my first thought too. The video game shot made so much sense though.

Good luck to these guys, hope they make it into a massively big company.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm terribly excited about this interface. I've been hoping that this is right path towards a Rainbow's End(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbows_End>) kind of interface.

I was worried that this kind of approach would languish inside MSFT research. [http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/133732-microsoft-demos- mu...](http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/133732-microsoft-demos-muscle- computer-interface-air-guitar-hero-now-a-reality)

Are you worried about the MSFT patent?

Having your arms hanging loosely or with the elbow support while gesturing seems to be the right way to take advantage of human fine motor control while manipulating a digital interface. It is a good workaround to Gorilla arm.

I suspect that the 20 year interface that Gabe Newell is expecting will use this kind of input.

[http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/07/26/valve_considered_ton...](http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/07/26/valve_considered_tongue_controlled_interface/)

</comment><comment><USER10> This is cool, but I couldn't believe their video included the skiing example. As an avid skier, I can't think of anything more life threateningly dangerous than messing with menus to share a video while you're sliding down a mountain.

I get that it has nothing to do with armband itself, it just seems like a very poor choice. I cringed.

<comment><USER11> It wasn't that cringeworthy!

The skier used it at the top of the run and once at the bottom of the run to Share when the jump was complete.

Also, you should note if it works as well as is claimed, it would be every bit as fast as every other gesture in the human body. So, its not like you're fiddling with a touchscreen or mousepad while moving on mountain...

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I haven't been so excited in a startup's product in a very long time. I'm constantly tapping out rhythms with my fingers - often quite pleasant and complex ones - and for whatever reason I've never been able to do the same onto any kind of midi device - a keyboard or a set of drum pads or whatever. I would _love_ to give this a try as a midi controller!

</comment><comment><USER13> Ok, this is what I think we will see a lot of. No talking, no vision, no touching, just some simple gestures.

Dave Rosenthal (former MIT/Sun/nVidia not archivist guy) and I talked a bit about gesture control when the first MEMS accelerometers came out. They allowed for a wide range of controls but they drifted horribly so it wasn't possible to do a sort of "hold for fast forward" kind of motion. You had to have a move to start and a move to end.

To some extent this is the same problem as the Leap which can know where your fingers are but you can't hold a gesture and move your hand (afaict, I've not seen the LEAP SDK in action yet)

<comment><USER14> It is nice to see some competition to Leap Motion[1], which made into HN's first page a few weeks ago[2].

Getting them integrated with Chrome/Firefox would be amazing.

[1] <https://www.leapmotion.com/>

[2] <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5179335> and was not the first time:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4250536>

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4170446>

<comment> alok-g <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5240089>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> First thing something would do with this: integrate it with Google Glass. While nodding your head or tapping a touchpad on the side by your temple might be awkward, discretely swiping up and down with your had would be more natural and less obvious.

</comment><comment><USER16> I wonder how well it can perform for amputees. I'm guessing there is HUGE potential here, one that a Leap Motion simply can't compete with.

</comment><comment><USER17> Just a thought in this field of motion controls - could be cool to use gloves/finger/points of contact tapping as part of the motion/gesture control aspect - ie: tapping my thumb and forefinger together is 1 gesture, thumb and middlefinger another, thumb and ringfinger etc. So on top of using motion and speed, you also detect commands when points connect together.

</comment><comment><USER18> Will you be offering the units for free to developers, like the Leap Motion, or should I just pre-order right away?

</comment><comment><USER19> I wonder how good this can be at spatial accuracy. With optical motion sensing, you can relate gestures to physical space: you can point _at_ something.

I love the concept here, but I wonder how it can go beyond "the user is wagging their finger" to "the user is pointing at an object on the screen"

</comment><comment><USER20> Depending on the sensitivity of this, the potential is endless. There are many multi-finger gestures that would work very well in three-dimensional space that have not yet been exploited with current technology. I'm excited to see what will come of this.

</comment><comment><USER21> Just preordered one, if it's as good as it looks on the video the possibility to build amazing things are endless. As stated in the the NewScientist article, this combined with glass and some home control equip. Oh the future is now ! :)

</comment><comment><USER22> I guess this could work well with Google Glass.

</comment><comment><USER11> Youtube video link of the MYO: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWu9TFJjHaM>

</comment><comment><USER23> Wow, not only is the product amazing, but so is the naming.

The product uses EMG, as in electro _myo_ graphy. And it's a personal armband, as in My 'O'.

<comment><USER24> Good observation! I always like these minimalist signature loadings.

I like the logo too, I see it as some kind of trans-binary trans-bi-state non- analog frequency peak-detector (0,1) state, not `ol tired familiar 0,1 on-off switch. Something new!

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> This is awesome. The Kinect has a ton of great applications, and this looks even better. I can't wait to play around with one.

<comment><USER26> This one indeed looks better, but the thing that caught my attention was their vision of enabling humans to do more with computers, to enhance their abilities (Finally no more of the BS that touch is the way forward...). I feel this vision is going to be their killer app (eventually); and one of the best ones to have come out of YC recently.

Best of luck!

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> this seems way cooler to me than the ones that use visual input.. looking forward to the dev kit!

</comment><comment><USER28> Amazing that I'm still thinking back to Minority Report over a decade later (released in 2002!).

<comment><USER29> Given that the technology in that film was designed by actual interface researchers, based on their research, it's no surprise that it continues to resonate so well. Also, sci-fi does have a tendency to inspire, or at least be inspired by, the leading edge of technology.

Said researchers now have a company, Oblong industries, that's basically making the _Minority Report_ interface a reality: <http://oblong.com/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Wow. This is the future of human/machine interface (until we get direct brain/machine interfaces (BMI) working with fidelity and no/little invasiveness). I really hope the actual product works as well and as smoothly as in those demos.

</comment><comment><USER31> Can you ensure that common activities such as typing, writing, stretching etc. won't be registered as intended triggers for actions? Anyway, amazing product! I can totally see myself using and developing with one!

<comment><USER32> From their faq[0], you have to perform an "unlock" style gesture to begin input.

0\. <https://getmyo.com/faq>

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> I wonder if they've looked into adding an NFC chip into MYO. It may seem crazy for a gesture control armband but it could add potential functionality to the armband and also improve communication among the masses.

</comment><comment><USER34> Very cool technology!

Honest question : Is this area a patent minefield? Or are the Myo guys busily sewing it all up? (I'm glancing nervously at the may-be-more-tricky-than- anticipated 3d printing field, for instance).

</comment><comment><USER24> `k people, I wanna see a coupla-three dev teams getting these patent specs sewn up before Myo flips behind Apple's iwatch wristband wall.

1\. Permute & Enumerate Discrete Associative Layer(PEDAL) Group. Enumerate all normative ergo kenesiologic mapping of discrete hapt events onto an associative array we can MTF onto task expectation frequencies.

2\. Dynamic Adaptive Nascent Cognitive Evolution(DANCE) Group. Get past the AA(Acknowledgment Annunciator), transparently and simultaneously entrain both user and device handshake onto evolving MTF surfacing situ specific command completion.

3\. Comparitive Haptics Integral Nuance Advancement(CHINA) Team. Collide Leap, Myo, Kinect, Oculi; onto mobile, glass, watch.

That's it. Git'er done like yesterday, fellas. Now!

Out!

</comment><comment><USER35> Very cool.

Just a heads up: At the bottom of <https://getmyo.com/faq>, the @ThalmicDeveloper <a> tag is being rendered as text.

<comment><USER5> Thanks, just took it out!

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Does it suffer `Gorilla Arm' as others? Is it necessary to keep one's arm aloft for hours to get in a day's work? It certainly looks exciting for momentary input.

<comment><USER5> That's one of the advantages of the MYO: You arm can be at your side, on your lap, an arm rest, etc. It doesn't need to be seen by a camera.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> I really hope these guys are in contact with the guys at Oculus. I feel like we're finally at the cusp of some incredible VR technology.

</comment><comment><USER37> black magic!</comment>


Google patches ads into Android TV home screens without warning - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2019/4/5/18296639/android-tv-home-screen-ads-google-sony-tv-nvidia-shield-xiaomi-sponsored-channel <comment><USER2> Previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19580362](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19580362)

</comment><comment><USER3> i wonder if pihole fixes this problem. seems like it's a necessity these days.</comment>


From Startup to Scale-Up - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@chrpopov/from-start-up-to-scale-up-1311b7ceb57b <comment><AUTHOR> I wrote a few lines to share my personal experience as a startup CTO in a UK gaming startup.</comment>


Demystifying Kyber Network - <AUTHOR> http://arete.vision/demystifying-kyber/ <comment><AUTHOR> An interesting read written by the team who interviewed with the people behind Kyber Network.</comment>


Google News app bug is using up GBs of background data witho users knowledge - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/22/18011028/google-news-app-bug-background-data-overage-charge <comment><USER2> The only question I have: is Google liable for overcharges caused by the bug? If not: _why not_?

<comment><USER3> In most countries no, all software licenses say "we are not responsible for anything", including Open Source ones. Also most countries have very reduced responsibility for free software and Google News app is available for free.</comment></comment>


POWER9 Talos II Secure Workstation - <AUTHOR> https://www.raptorcs.com/TALOSII/prerelease.php <comment><USER2> I have to say that I'm a bit confused by this. As far as I understand the crowdsourcing effort for the Talos I (based on the Power8) failed and they're moving on to other projects... So I guess this is where they are moving development resources to?

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14804878](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14804878)</comment>


A minimal business card - <AUTHOR>

3 quick questions:
1. how unique/cool/elegant/Apple'esque would a business card be if you strip away everything, except your name and a QR code? example: http://img62.imageshack.us/img62/6343/mincard.png
2. would you feel comfortable handing this out at conferences like sxsw & wwdc?
3. if someone gave one of these to you, would you bother scanning that QR code a few days later or just toss it? (assuming you forgot the context of your meeting)
Long story: I recently needed to print some new business cards before heading off to sxsw. My old ones were outdated in just 3 months (new startup, new google voice number, different title etc). As I was designing my new card I realized that the only static info on it is my name. Titles are pretentious and deceptive for startup types especially if you wear multiple hats. So I'm considering this idea of a "minimal card". All "dynamic" info is linked to an about.me/flavors.me page via the QR code.
good idea? thoughts? <comment><USER2> Truthfully, I don't understand the point of having a QR code on your business card unless someone has developed an app that will dial/email/SMS whoever you're trying to reach with one button press (and if they have, someone send me a link).

I wouldn't bother scanning it after the initial scan. You get added to my contacts list, and when I need to contact you, I'll contact you. IF (and this isn't a very big if, given the environment of great and talented developers in the mobile app community) someone can make a smarter QR code scanner, then maybe I'd take putting a QR code on a business card a little more seriously.

</comment><comment><USER3> It's an awful idea. It's too played out to be novel and it's completely nonfunctional. When someone hands you a card, they look at your name first to make sure they heard the introduction correctly, and then your title. Perhaps also your location. These convey information that can be important in the conversation. If a card is devoid of information you might as well just use Bump or a similar app and skip the card entirely. That's a stupid idea for another reason: pro-tip -- write notes about the person/conversation on the back of their card immediately after you finish talking to them. That way you can enter it into your CRM/PIM later and remember why you're doing it.

</comment><comment><USER4> Funny, I have just been looking into having something similar created locally. I would have had my personal email and personal phone number on it. The QR code would go to my about.me or flavors.me profile, whichever I decided I liked better. That in turn would have links to projects, LinkedIn and Twitter.

Some may say the QR code is gimicky or pointless, but in my case I was going to have the cards to give out while I networked with the local tech and start- up community. So it fits and it is a small differentiator.

It would be great if when you scanned the QR code, your phone automatically opened the default "new contact" screen with your info filled in.

</comment><comment><USER5> If the QR code simply links to a short URL, why not just print that URL in plaintext?

One of the problem with such a minimal designs is that "assuming you forgot the context of your meeting", the card itself provides no clues (and the "dynamic" info on the website might not match the context, if it really does change that often).

</comment><comment><USER6> I met some guys recently who had exactly this printed on their biz card.

But then they also wrote a bunch of stuff on it...

It looked really lame: Here are pics of it: <http://imgur.com/a/q6u0z></comment>


DataCouch: Free collaborative public data - <AUTHOR> http://datacouch.com/

<comment><USER2> This is great if they can sustain it. Is there a company and revenue model behind it or is it just someone's hobby? Also, isn't it similar to Factual and the like, other than fork and pull requests?</comment>


8 [Startup] Things I'm Better At Now That I'm 30 - <AUTHOR> http://deeringdavis.wordpress.com/2010/12/06/things-im-better-at-now <comment><USER2> The thing I am most improved at at 31 vs. 17 is satisficing or half-assing anything unimportant and non-core (but doing it quickly, and ideally with as little ongoing involvement as possible), and focusing on what is actually core.

aka pick your battles.

And, relatedly, only fixing problems as they become necessary to solve vs. trying to do everything in the order of how interesting it is, or how difficult. A lot of problems just go away if you're successful, and almost all problems go away if you fail to complete earlier goals.

aka "I'll burn that bridge when I come to it"

</comment><comment><USER3> Things I am worse at at 55 vs. 25: the 50 yard dash.

Things I am better at at 55 vs. 25: everything else.

Seriously.

Magic Johnson (great American basketball player) once described the difference of being a world class athlete at 30 vs. 20: you have to be a whole lot smarter about how you use your body and recover when competing with younger people.

We programmers OTOH get the best of both worlds: the ability to work smarter against a physical and mental landscape that doesn't degrade nearly as fast as a world class athlete.

Frankly, when it comes to work, I can't think of a single thing I "used to do better", not creativity, not work habits, not personal habits, not physical or mental toughness.

I believe that programming, like running, is one of those things where the performance curve can remain flat until retirement, providing you take care of yourself. I'll let you know if it does.

<comment><USER4> Things I am worse at at 34 vs. 25: Staying up late, coding until the wee hours.

Things I am better at at 34 vs. 25: Not needing to stay up late, or code until the wee hours, and yet accomplishing more.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> But what is the secret algorithm to small talk?

<comment><USER6> Three quick thoughts: 1\. Relax. It's not a test or a contest, it's more like solving a puzzle together: what can we discover that we have in common. 2\. Have a sense of warm curiosity about the other person. 3\. Share details from your recent experiences and your reaction to them.

<comment><USER7> OK but this is not an algorithm - I was a bit excited, thinking he had a 1-2-3 formula to come up with a topic that always works in any context.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> At 31, I've found that I've had sufficient opportunities to learn from the experience of screwing up to screw up less than in my 20s. I'm also fairly certain that the difference between success and failure is not screwing up enough for it to kill you.

</comment><comment><USER9> It's interesting, I know a few early twenties startup founders (plus just a lot of college aged people) and very few have the arrogance that you claim to have had. In fact most follow the majority of your advice without having read your post, although that doesn't make it any less valid.

But what I'm really trying to ask, is I'm wondering if in ten years the maturity of the average young founder has changed. Are the people who start tech startups at 21 a different type of people than those who started them in the previous bubble? What changed? Where did the arrogance go? Or am I just hanging out with the wrong crowd?

</comment><comment><USER10> When I was young I had an astonishingly good memory, and I could keep a remarkable amount of information in my head, so I never really had to write anything down. One wise manager warned me to be careful about relying too much on my strengths, so I did put effort into being more organized and to keep better records. I also worked on being more systematic, creating mini-project plans for everything I do. Now that I'm 47, I'm really glad I put in that effort.

Ummm, what was I saying? Sorry, I forgot. ;-)

</comment><comment><USER11> Everything about getting older is great, bar the actual physical ageing.

<comment><USER12> Up to a point, after which one's also at greater risk from various brain diseases.

<comment><USER11> Isn't that part of physical ageing?

<comment><USER13> Learning is physical changes to the brain, too. Reputation is physical changes to other people's brains.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> "So it turns out that getting older isn't all that bad. Sure, people say that 30 is the new 25 (or is it the new 18? I can't keep up)."

Ahem... well based on the fact that we're seeing "startup advice from the ripe old age of 30", I'd say it's more like 30 is the new 60. And my experience in the Valley would seem to reinforce this. :-)

</comment><comment><USER15> Being risky without betting the farm.

Nothing wrong with betting the farm at 21 & single.

Now, 27 & married, I've found that I'm much better at taking _calculated risks_ without betting the farm.

</comment><comment><USER16> No,getting older is not bad at all, life takes its own sweet time teaching us its hidden tricks/ secretes to succeed:)

</comment><comment><USER17> Seeing articles like this one makes me feel shameful about my country.

In Italy until 25 you're just a university student.

<comment><USER18> That shouldn't stop you from being an entrepreneur

<comment><USER17> You're right, on should not make up excuses.

But speaking about the future of a country, giving the young the opportunity they are given in silicon valley is surely a good thing.

<comment><USER18> No ways man, entrepreneurs don't look for opportunities to be mouth fed. They create them. It's more fun to create outside silicon valley and then take there and grow further. (IMO)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Great read. Now that I am nearing 25, this was a question I used to ask myself.</comment>


Cool Text Effects with CSS3 Text-Shadow - <AUTHOR> http://line25.com/articles/using-css-text-shadow-to-create-cool-text-effects

<comment><USER2> It would have been useful for the article's author to say which browsers support it.</comment>


Plug computers as low-profile security intrusion tools - <AUTHOR> http://blog.andrewcantino.com/post/3565673304/why-plug-computers-are-a-security-nightmare

<comment><USER2> This is a great companion to another paranoia-inducing post on HN recently (<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2267205>) because it suggests a way to create your own plug-in-and-leave-it proxies to do whatever on the Internet without leaving any tracks. As you know, most hackers attempt to do this by tunneling through one or more compromised systems, but here is a way that might actually be somewhat legal:

Go to any place where two public wireless networks overlap, and leave one of these devices in the overlap zone and connected to both networks. Arrange the networking so that you can tunnel out of one wireless network and back into the other. Do this in a few such places and you have a series of hops that can make it quite challenging to trace traffic back to you. Have your device retain no logs and include a remote power shutoff, so if somebody is chasing you from the destination network, by the time the physical plug is discovered (if it is at all, these things are easy to conceal) the router logs for the source network and ISP have long cycled.

If you are doing something really nefarious, do all of this on a battery- operated Gumstix and leave it in a trashcan between a Starbucks and a public library. The battery would probably last you all day, and then the garbage truck will dispose of all evidence by next morning without any intervention.

</comment><comment><USER3> This idea is as old as Phrack Magazine. Pieter Zatko demonstrated the L0pht's version of it in 1997: a Palm Pilot rigged up to sniff network traffic and phone it home via telephony.

The problem isn't small form factor computing. It's internal networks where MAC-layer connections aren't authenticated, and where there is no access control between desktops and data centers. It's been that way, in virtually every company big and small, since 1993 when networks cut over from IPX and extended TCP/IP to the desktop.

<comment><USER4> Just curious - in what way was IPX better than this?

<comment><USER3> It wasn't better; it was just different.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm not sure how this is really _new_. Everything he's describing has been possible for _years_ with a laptop. I guess "plug computer" might make it a little cheaper and a little easier to conceal?

If anything, I'd say plug computers are _good_ for security, if they're making people more aware of how god awful stupid the "eggshell" model of putting all your efforts into perimeter security really is.

Unfortunately, instead of focusing on security their internal servers and app, my bet is most "enterprises" will instead respond by just extending the eggshell with greater lockdown of end-user PC's. :-(

<comment><USER2> Yeah, it's all about form factor. If you see a laptop plugged in and leaning behind a desk, you think somebody lost their laptop and you pick it up. If you see one of these sitting in a socket, you don't look at it twice because it looks like one of millions of power adapters that are hooked into all the walls everywhere.

Personally, I want one that screws into a lightbulb socket and lights up :-)

<comment><USER6> Put one in an otherwise functional power strip and you'd have no problem getting it into place.

<comment><USER7> Put it in a power strip, and people working there will want to steal it for their own cube!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Plug computers are a serious threat, though the need for physical access and relatively easy discovery mean that it's not going to be that common. Pentest teams are currently using them, which means malicious users are too.

I'd definitely be worried about those POE injectors for conference room phones and other uses. Most of them already look like a cheap black box, have two ethernet ports and power and aren't out of place.

Practically though, I'd be much more concerned about penetrations in official clients. You can get most of the same functionality out of an employees mobile device and have the added advantage of more deniability. Client malware is so common that most is not assumed to be a targeted attack, whereas finding an unauthorized plug computer will raise alarm bells quickly.

Never the less, it's yet another strong argument for implementing 802.1x.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Someone on IRC just pointed me towards <http://pwnieexpress.com/pwnplug3g.html> which is scary as hell.

<comment><USER9> I'd be a little less concerned about this one, because it's riskier for the attacker: once you find it, you can probably get a court order to have Verizon tell you who's paying the 3G bill.

Although I suppose that just means Step 0 is to get service under a false identity.

<comment><USER10> <http://goo.gl/ouBta> . Would this work though?

<comment><USER11> This isn't Twitter, type out your URLs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> if this is a problem for you, then you're really screwed when we have fly sized drones just sitting on the walls in your conf room.

</comment><comment><USER13> "a budding industrial espionagist could buy the SheevaPlug..."

Stopped reading at that point. People can use technology for whatever they want, including nefarious purposes. That's not an issue which is specific to plug computers.

</comment><comment><USER14> Here is the Kickstarter website: [https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/plugbot/plugbot- mobile-...](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/plugbot/plugbot-mobile-pen- testing-and-hardware-botnet-pro)

looks like they have a ways to go.

</comment><comment><USER15> How does plugging a computer into a power socket compromise the network? Wouldn't it be the same if I, say, camped below the office window with my netbook? You still have to hack into the WLAN network, I suppose?

<comment><USER16> Because with you camping below a window - you will be seen, get hungry, get caught.

Imagine you get an interview at some company and you gain access to some area, like a lounge. You could potentially smuggle a pluggable box into the facility and plug it in behind some plant, or a copier, or even a coffee machine.

(Copier being the best option)

This machine could ideally auth with the local wifi and gain access to the internet, and provide you tunneling access back into the network.

When Aruba Networks first came out, the initial default config of their system allowed anyone to associate with the network and VPN OUT to the internet - while not giving them access to corporate resources. While we found this behavior at Lockheed Martin, and had them patch it - the same scenario could be found elsewhere today - where you could then connect to the pluggable and scan/hack your way into the network.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> FUD

<comment><AUTHOR> Explain.

<comment><USER7> I've worked on the software of a lot of big energy companies. A lot of those companies can make tons of money just because they are huge and have deals going on everywhere. This gives them a lot of information about what's going on in energy markets all around the world. In short, this information is highly valuable, and yet it often flies around corporate networks in plaintext. Just undetectably getting this information to an outside party would be a highly illegal act that would enable a great many other profitable and highly illegal acts.

(And it would also be very hard to do this without getting caught. Even harder than most people would think. Particularly at the point where you're trying to make money.)

<comment><USER8> Night Dragon:

[http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-02-24/exxon-shell-bp- said...](http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-02-24/exxon-shell-bp-said-to-have- been-hacked-through-chinese-internet-servers.html)

This is a serious APT that's been ongoing for 4-5 years and benefits chinese oil exploration.

<comment><USER10> wait, why are Greg Hoglund and HBGary still 'reputable' sources linked and quoted from in this article written 4 days ago?

<comment><USER8> A significant amount of the source material about Night Dragon came from the same email theft that outed the wikileaks and CoC issues. Since it sounds like you believe the latter, why would you say the former isn't credible?</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


I Left My Heart in San Francisco: The Exile of a Digital Nomad - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@danielkehoe/i-left-my-heart-in-san-francisco-272b36438a21 <comment><USER2> Don't ask for support/upvotes on this submission on Twitter: [https://twitter.com/rails_apps/status/648290452962152450](https://twitter.com/rails_apps/status/648290452962152450)

<comment><AUTHOR> Just for the record, I did not ask for upvotes or support. I asked for comments. And love. Considering how nasty HN readers can be, I think it's reasonable to ask for love. Heck, it's an article about how hard it is to survive as a full-time open source developer.

<comment><USER2> If that were the case, you would have linked directly to the submission, but you linked to the /newest page to utilize the non-direct-link upvote trick.

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh you're right. I didn't even think about that. Sorry.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I have personally used Rails Composer (kickstarter [http://kck.st/1KzZXVC](http://kck.st/1KzZXVC)) by Daniel and loved using it. Great thing is, if you think Rails Composer needs more added or run into a problem, he is very responsive.

<comment><USER4> I also use Rails Composer for new projects. I'm glad to see that the kickstarter has met its initial goal. Hopefully Daniel continues seeing support for his work.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the kind words!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm grateful for Daniel's work on Rails Composer. It's a great way to setup a new Rails project. Good luck!

<comment><USER6> Pet peeve (I expect downvotes), but "setup" is not a verb; "set up" is. (Same with "sign up" and "log in.") This is a weird orthographic quirk many developers seems to share.

<comment><USER4> I agree with you, and share this pet peeve. Also, can you downvote on Hacker News?

<comment><USER6> You eventually gain downvote permissions after gaining a certain amount of karma.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> It made my day when I saw @craignewmark of CraigsList fame tweeted the article and offered encouragement: [https://twitter.com/craignewmark/status/648143262281109505](https://twitter.com/craignewmark/status/648143262281109505)

He's got old school Internet values like it used to be.</comment>