Drone believed to have hit British Airways flight 'may have been a plastic bag' - <AUTHOR> http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/04/21/drone-believed-to-have-hit-british-airways-flight-may-have-been/ <comment><USER2> Wow, this is an elected official?

> Transport minister Robert Goodwill admitted authorities had not yet > confirmed whether what struck the Airbus A320

> Mr Goodwill also dismissed calls for tighter rules on drone use to protect > against terror threats insisting current rules governing drone use were > strong enough. He said it would be much easier for terrorists to attack > airports on the ground with rucksacks or car bombs than orchestrate the > attack from a drone aircraft.

> He warned that any moves to enforce geo-fencing rules would be vulnerable to > being hacked by "somebody who could get round that software".

> "And indeed the early reports of a dent in the front of the plane were not > confirmed - there was no actual damage to the plane"

> "the pilot has a lot of other things to concentrate [while landing] on so > we're not quite sure what they saw so I think we should maybe not overreact > too much."

This is a sane, rational response.. I am just not used to hearing it come from government officials. This should be a model for the type of responses that government officials have to these types of situations.

<comment><USER3> > He warned that any moves to enforce geo-fencing rules would be vulnerable to > being hacked by "somebody who could get round that software".

Indeed very impressive that an elected official understands this.

Someone with a little reverse engineering talent can patch something like that without much work for near-free (think bypassing those FCC regulations turning up TX power in your router firmware). Someone with a little regular engineering talent can spoof or jam GPS for relatively cheap.

<comment><USER4> I think the geofencing has the same value as a door lock; it keeps the honest people honest.

<comment><USER5> So we'll only really have to worry about dishonest terrorists and or plastic bags

<comment><USER6> Right, as opposed to also worrying about a careless teenager flying their drone too close to an airport to get a sick camera angle of a landing plane.

<comment><USER7> Why worry about something that hasn't happened? Why not worry about a careless teenager wanting to get a sick Camera angle of the inside of your fridge? It's as valid a concern.

<comment><USER4> Normally I would agree with you, I often chide people for inventing problems to solve. But it is a little different when it isn't a hypothetical as much as an inevitable future occurrence.

As for refrigerators, I am just as worried about people trying to fly drones around my house as I am about people flying drones around planes, yes. I have it on good authority that anyone with the funds can purchase access to 3D drone-generated map of my city, my house included. A gentleman here in town who replaces windows doesn't bother to measure them anymore; he just uses the drone photos.

<comment><USER8> [https://www.google.com/maps/streetview/](https://www.google.com/maps/streetview/)

<comment><USER4> Now imagine that without Google Privacy, better cameras, and shot from the air.

<comment><USER9> That's a public website, no Google privacy is relevant.

<comment><USER4> Google Privacy is the program which blurs (things that looks like) faces and license plates.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> What a level headed response by the transport minister. I love that he acknowledges that geofencing rules will easily be circumvented.

That said, I still think it's a good idea to implement. It will make it easier for casuals like me to quickly be warned when I'm venturing into forbidden areas. Sure, I could ignore it or hack around it, but at least it's an easy to implement safeguard that will keep most people away.

<comment><USER11> >That said, I still think it's a good idea to implement. It will make it easier for casuals like me to quickly be warned when I'm venturing into forbidden areas. Sure, I could ignore it or hack around it, but at least it's an easy to implement safeguard that will keep most people away.

Yes, it's definitely a good idea that will stop casual drone users from being somewhere they shouldn't be flying. Here is a good example (see the description):

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EH7y8-gkkN0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EH7y8-gkkN0)

The vast majority of drone users won't bother looking up the aviation charts to see if they are inside a control zone or other controlled airspace, and won't have any idea how far away they are from an airport.

<comment><USER12> I fly my quadcopter in the UK. It would be nice to have an app that told me about the airspace I was in based on my current position.

However, right now I am not flying higher than 10 meters from the ground.

<comment><USER13> Round up a team and put it in the ApplyHN sector - that could be a really useful, pay-for-app & updates type service. Definitely has value. The target market should be able to see the cost-benefit I presume. Good thinking!

<comment><USER14> Classic HN. Jumping from someone's annoyance to "create a startup" that "definitely has value" without knowing anything about the space.

<comment><USER13> > _Classic HN. Jumping from someone 's annoyance to "create a startup" that > "definitely has value" without knowing anything about the space._

Haha joke's on you buddy, I grew up around aviation and know that log books and maps are what pilots must always have at all times in all situations otherwise they'll get popped by the FAA. Only recently have digital devices been allowed anywhere NEAR professional cockpits, having been slowly tested in civil aviation. Thus I concluded that an expanding sector with limited knowledge of traditional expectations - airspace 'n shit - might be marketable. Watching your comment turn grey and then to vapor is more "Classic HN" to me.

<comment><USER15> To be fair to your parent, the feature is already deployed in popular drones (both dji and 3dr).

It's hard to see a market for something already built in for free (airspace restrictions) and anyone familiar with current drones would know this.

<comment><USER13> Considering the cost of both DJI and 3DR and the inevitable down-stream development and access, unless each and every manufacturer is mandated to include "smart" flight restrictions, then I would say the point stands. Making a useful application and product is fun to spit ball. Whizzing out some sanctimonious pontification is feeble.

<comment><USER14> Thanks for putting "Intellectual Wannabe Inventor" in your profile, it wasn't clear from that comment.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> k-mcgrady Slightly misleading headline. Basically they haven't confirmed it's a drone so they can't rule anything out, or as he puts it "it could have been a plastic bag or something". They don't seem to have any evidence suggesting it's a plastic bag and not a drone (and vice versa).

<comment><USER16> It's unclear to me why they think it was a drone or a bag instead of a bird.

This whole thing seems overblown. They have no idea what they hit, and it didn't cause any damage to the plane.

<comment><USER17> Um, the whole point of the article was that "they" don't think it was a drone. The idea that it was a drone seems to have come entirely from a single tweet by the local police force, which the media jumped on.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> "there was no actual damage to the plane and there's indeed some speculation that it may have even been a plastic bag or something."

This is an amazingly flimsy basis for a headline.

<comment><USER19> No flimsier than the original drone-claim headline.

Contrary to popular conception, most airline pilots are very poor at recognising anything that isn't in their company fleet. A few are aircraft enthusiasts, a few are bird spotters. The remainder have knowledge of unexpected flying objects no better than most laymen and a lot worse than a school-age plane spotter.

I used to run aircraft recognition training for a local cadet squadron. The 'pro-pilots' were uniformly awful.

<comment><USER4> Aren't they trained to judge size and distance by eye, though?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Ah. It's a drone discussion.

Is there any advance in drone tech to make it quieter? Any time I've been near a drone in operation, the loud buzzing hits a particular psychological frequency (probably the "it's a large flying insect!") that stresses me out.

I don't think I'm alone in this. Other animals seem to dislike drones.

I think most of us animals would mind them less if they were more pleasant- sounding, or closer to silent.

<comment><USER21> There's a way to spin each propeller at 180 degree phase so they would cancel/reduce each others noise.

<comment><USER22> How difficult is it to do while adjusting each propeller's speed for steering etc?

<comment><USER21> I've only heard about for wing based uav's , not quadcopters. Maybe this is a good sign for Google's drones, which use wings, but rotate their rotors for landing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Awesome RC pilot here(1).

Hitting a commercial jetliner with an off the shelf drone is impossible-- especially at that altitude. With $8K it becomes feasible, but I'd put the level of difficulty at about the same as driving a Bugatti Veyron at 70mph in reverse and executing a j-turn (think Hollywood 180 spin) into a tight spot between two SUV's at the grocery store--3 times in a row.

As rare as plastic bags are at 1700 feet, if it was a sunny day in London in an area with a lot of jet traffic, then it was in all likelihood a bag that was kicked up by a car, caught a massive thermal and managed to get blown around by jet traffic.

(1) Fly fixed wing RC in excess of 180mph weekly and have flown quads for 3 years.

</comment><comment><USER24> I'm happy that they're backing off the drone regulation but it's going to be pretty inconvenient for the locals when plastic bags are banned within 2km of an airport.

</comment><comment> awinter-py This wouldn't be a problem in california

[http://plasticbaglaws.org/legislation/state- laws/](http://plasticbaglaws.org/legislation/state-laws/)

</comment><comment><USER25> damn kids flying their plastic bags near the airport... there should be a law.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> If airports/pilots are really that paranoid perhaps they should install sensor system (low range radar?) to capture particular drones (and birds).

For drones, they have systems now that they can deploy to take them down immediately. [http://www.skysafe.io/](http://www.skysafe.io/)

And please, leave the rest of us who live/visit nowhere near airports alone.

<comment><USER26> To what end?

It's all but impossible to take evasive action, you'd have a second or two warning, and quite likely many false alarms.

Rain, bags, random ground echos. Too many targets.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> would be ironic since the number of plastic bags in the UK decreased dramatically since a 5p charge was introduced in October:

[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/environment/12034574/P...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/environment/12034574/Plastic- bag-5p-charge-cuts-usage-by-almost-80-per-cent-first-data-shows.html)

</comment><comment><USER28> That's 5p we'll never see again. What a waste.

</comment><comment><USER29> Now I want to see all those blowhards calling for a crackdown on the Drone Menace for a crackdown on the Plastic Bag Menace. Disgusting.

</comment><comment><USER30> What next? Were the geese Sully's plane nailed actually newspapers?

</comment><comment><USER31> Plastic bags, not thats one thing I won't mind being banned...

<comment><USER32> ...they should charge people to buy them in the supermarkets instead of giving them away for free.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> FAA issues new rules stating all plastic bag owners must register each bag with the FAA

</comment><comment><USER34> Maybe the bag was protesting being essentially a 5p class citizen.

</comment><comment> awinter-py Is 'plastic bag' not a derogatory term for drones anymore?

<comment><USER35> fucking toasters

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> If you weren't calling bullshit on the original articles you really need your view of the world examined.

This is just D&D is the devil panaroia for 2016

1000s of 'near misses' and no hits is a industry that plane lies.</comment>


Why Nadella's Second Year as Microsoft CEO Will Be a Lot Harder - <AUTHOR> http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-02-04/why-nadella-s-second-year-as-microsoft-ceo-will-be-a-lot-harder <comment><USER2> "He has changed the way engineering teams are structured, largely eliminating testers to speed software releases,... "

What could possibly go wrong?

Ok.. the sentence continues :

"and adding data scientists and designers to the engineering teams to ensure all features are informed by rigorous testing and good design principles. "

I don't quite understand, how can data scientists help to catch bugs? Automated testing?

<comment><USER3> This is probably why so many of the Windows Updates this year broke critical things, especially for enterprise. I feel Nadella is taking a "cheaper, faster" approach which is fine and dandy in the otherwise non-critical mobile space (mobile users are used to being treated like crap and having buggy releases) but in enterprise there's simply a higher standard of quality.

I'm not sure what this means for MS. At our shop we now have to overly-test all patches and then wait a minimum of 30 days to see what happens. This has saved our bacon several times under Nadella's MS when before we only had to do pretty casual testing of patches. This also means a lot of shops are no longer rushing to get security patches in because of his negligence and corner cutting. That means a less secure internet for all.

I really wish someone would step in and show Nadella that MS shouldnt just be an Apple-lite and that catering to enterprise should be MS's main goal, especially considering that's where almost all its revenue comes from. I'm sure playing Steve Jobs-lite is fun for Nadella, but its about time he grew up and started running with the big dogs. Frankly, I'm sick of the focus on mobile and other popular technology taking away from the core competencies that made some of these companies great. The recent actions and changes on OSX are disheartening as well. Or how the steam behind the Chromebook is more or less dead as Android eats the world.

Buying and updating an MS product shouldn't be a gamble. They're supposed to be the conservative and stable big brother to the industry. Ironically, its only now under new leadership that we have so much more incentive to move to FOSS products. Its the same amount of headaches, except with FOSS I have no licensing worries. Under Gates and Balmer, the commercial MS products were less headaches and delivered a fair amount of value. Now just installing an Exchange rollup is asking for a complete reimaging. We don't even bother with service packs anymore. Might as well roll out a new image with that cooked in. The fail rate on those is unacceptably high.

edit: why the downvotes? this echoes the sentiment at places like stackexchange and /r/sysadmin. testing at MS has gone to hell and everyone knows it. burying my comment does nothing to stop that reality. Its well known Nadella personally redid the QA and testing parts of MS and those outcomes have only gotten worse.

<comment><USER4> >Buying and updating an MS product shouldn't be a gamble. They're supposed to be the conservative and stable big brother to the industry

You can tell who's young around here. In the distant past you could have put IBM or Novel in that same blank 20 years ago. It wasn't till around the release of server 2003 that anybody thought that.

Next, every product is a gamble these days. If you're connected to the net, you're at risk. Before exploits may have taken weeks or months to fully circulate, now 0-days are very common and other vendors release the exploit information they have on your products in 90 days or less.

>Now just installing an Exchange rollup is asking for a complete reimaging

Again, I'm not sure when Exchange didn't explode in the past either.

<comment><USER3> My personal experience is that MS has been solid since Windows 2000. I have limited experience with the NT4 products but I remember those being just fine as well (i maintained two NT4 servers for my employer and used to host images for fark photoshop contests on one- shh).

Exchange has been SUPER solid. Its only 2010/2013 that we're seeing so many issues with what should be a trivial update process.

I think there's a real drop in quality lately. Heck, in the XP days we never bothered to test security updates. They all came in same day via WSUS. Nowadays? No way.

<comment><USER5> NT was even more solid before then, at least after the first 3.1 version which I don't think I did more than kick the tires of. The drop in quality really started after SP1 of NT 3.51, the 3rd major version.

Didn't Exchange have problems in the early part of this century, or earlier, with its database being easy to bork and slow to restore?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> "He's hit all the low-hanging fruit -- that said, these things were not easy to do"

I don't think low hanging fruit means what Brad thinks it does.

<comment><USER7> The lowest fruit can be 8 feet off the ground ;)

<comment><USER6> Low hanging != lowest hanging - But we're splitting hairs here, no worries- just thought it was funny typical analyst speak.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The obvious thing left out is that Nadella's second year involves the release of Windows 10.

<comment><USER9> Exactly. The second year is going to be a sales high just because of Windows 10, they'd have to try pretty hard to mess that up.

<comment><USER10> > they'd have to try pretty hard to mess that up

I agree, but I also think Microsoft stands ready to meet that challenge, if recent history is anything to go by.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> As things are going, I'm really pleased. This is the first time I've been excited about Microsoft since the middle 1990s.

<comment><USER12> Agreed. I feel for the first time that Microsoft is bringing something unique and even innovative to the tech industry

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Nadella has surpassed expectations to date, he has a plan, and is implementing it in a rigorous and competent manner. I expect the next year will be a good one for the "ruffians from Redmond." And I just can't stress enough how important it was for Balmer to yield when he did. Steeped in the past and his old ways, he wasn't the new leadership the firm required. Nadella is just that.

</comment><comment><USER14> I feel there is good and bad. I am glad he moved to a more data driven and agile culture. He is also empowering engineers in his organization. The bad is that they all suffer from the windows mindset and spend a great deal of time building for windows. With all the patents they own they literally own android and yet they are not willing to allow android apps on windows phone or surface pro 3. It feels like a slow march towards irrelevance.

<comment><USER15> It's not really a case of "allowing" Android apps. It would take a monumental engineering effort.

<comment><USER16> It wouldn't have been so monumental if instead of locking everything into Direct3D they'd used OpenGL instead. Here their own lock-in mentality will eventually bite them hard. If MS will outgrow their dinosaur lock-in approach, they can start supporting GL-Next on all of their platforms when it will come out.

<comment><USER17> When all you have is a hammer, everything starts to look like a nail.

Windows runs OpenGL just fine (look at anything iD Software puts out). It doesn't run Google's custom Java VM, it doesn't offer AOSP APIs and it doesn't offer Google Play Services. THOSE are the obstacles to running Android apps on Windows, not your obsession with OpenGL vs DirectX.

<comment><USER16> Is there OpenGL on their mobile platforms? It can run just fine in theory there, but it's not available. Applications are not limited to Java, and often rely on the graphics system a lot and there can be as well native code.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> MS $2.5B acquisition to attract youths?

<comment><USER19> The Mojang acquisition was likely a very smart move. I remember the day it happened was the same day that Apple announced the Apple Watch. While I was aware of the Watch, my kids were completely unaware of it, but both they and their friends were _very_ aware that Microsoft had purchased Mojang. They were very concerned about it and it was the topic of much conversation that night.

If MS is able to utilize the popularity of Minecraft in the <18 set to their advantage...</comment></comment>


Analyzing Hunger: perception and empathy - <AUTHOR> http://monkspie.com/hungersurvey?utm_source=hackernews&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=hackernewspost <comment><AUTHOR> Despite being among the top 10 percentile of fastest growing economies, India remains home to the largest hungry and undernourished population in the world. Almost 200 million people sleep hungry every night and around 7000 die of hunger everyday.

Hunger is India's (and the World's) greatest problem even today. Help us in our analysis by answering a few questions and we will FEED ONE PERSON for every completed response.</comment>


Unity, one gaming development platform to unite them all, up for sale - <AUTHOR> http://www.cnet.com/news/unity-one-gaming-development-platform-to-unite-them-all-up-for-sale/.

<comment><USER2> Unity is great and certainly has a lot of room to grow, and already has a monopoly on 3D engines.

It definitely needs to find a home in a bigger company. Despite providing so much value, they have difficulties with business model and bringing in revenue. The only worry I have is that the new owners won't keep it cross platform.</comment>


People who never get stressed out - <AUTHOR> https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg24532700-600-how-to-keep-a-cool-head-secrets-of-people-who-never-get-stressed-out/ <comment><USER2> Subscription required to read the article.</comment>


Ham radio operators are saving Puerto Rico (2017) - <AUTHOR> https://edition.cnn.com/2017/09/27/us/puerto-rico-maria-ham-radio-operators-trnd/index.html <comment><USER3> As was mentioned by tony-allan, this article is from last September. I'm living in Puerto Rico and situation is now stabilized regarding communications.

I want to take this time to thank everybody that has sent help this way, and those that have enabled for help to reach this.

Everybody from ham radio operators, to the electrical service brigades from dozens of States, to emergency personnel, everybody.

Thanks.

PS: I should start finally working on my ham radio license!

<comment><USER4> I suggest taking a bunch of these tests. You might be able to schedule one test and get both technician and general. I did two tests in one day (and missed like 2 or 3 from getting my general). But the technician is fairly easy, but there is some memorization that you need to do.

[http://aa9pw.com/radio/](http://aa9pw.com/radio/)

<comment><USER5> I recommend [https://hamstudy.org/](https://hamstudy.org/)

<comment><USER6> Seconded. I spent about two weeks studying with the mobile version of this site in my free time and managed to pass the technician, general, and amateur extra exams in one sitting.

<comment><USER7> Thirded, I used hamstudy to pass all of the tests and after a few years on the air I finally know enough to understand the ARRL manuals. I'm reading the extra manual and it's pretty incredible, they walk you through the theory of building a transceiver starting at doping silicone to make semiconductors.

<comment><USER8> Fourthed, I always recommend hamstudy.org to people. My wife and I both used it to study for a bit each night and easily passed our tests.

We live in an area that doesn't have good cell coverage, or some days the tower just goes down and there isn't any service where there was great service the day before. Even cheap, basic radios are very useful.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The importance of ham radio is that it's infrastructure-less. People are completely used to the Internet and mobile telephones working without thinking about the infrastructure and its maintenance.

With my radios I can talk to people all over the place point to point without any infrastructure at all.

<comment><USER10> After an article about the judge who did the case for Oracle vs Google and how he was a ham I got more and more interested in ham radios. The only downside is the cost of some of the equipment, but if you can reach a main city there's usually repeaters up on those buildings from what I've been told. There's so much to learn I feel and I don't know where to start truly, I've just watched a couple of videos and read a few articles. I know I need to get my license first for sure.

<comment><USER11> > The only downside is the cost of some of the equipment

What about the fact that everyone in the world who can receive your signal will hear and understand what you're saying?

<comment><USER12> I just saw your latest replies in this thread. Can I offer you another way to look at this?

Amateur radio is what it is. It has certain freedoms and certain restrictions. The restrictions include no commercial use and no encrypted communication, along with licensing tests, frequency and power limits, etc.

But the freedoms can be pretty great. You can help in emergencies. You can have a backup radio in case you get in trouble outside cellular coverage. You can explore electronics and antenna design. (I just saw a job listing for an RF/antenna design specialist to work on self-flying cameras.) You can build your own transmitter from scratch. You can talk to astronauts on the ISS or bounce a signal off the moon!

And that's just a tiny fraction of the things you can do. If any of them are interesting, then you just have to ask yourself, "Does it matter to me if anyone is listening in?"

If it matters to you, no harm, no foul, you just find something else to do instead.

<comment><USER11> I agree with you on all counts—I feel like you guys are massively misunderstanding my comment and somehow taking it as an attack on the notion of ham radio, as if somehow I feel like it's some kind of evil. I don't. I never did. It can be a great, useful, awesome thing. Where did I deny this? All I was saying was that _" no downsides except the equipment cost"_ is emphatically not an accurate picture—and I feel accurate pictures are important regardless of how awesome something is. In this case it matters because I don't want some poor soul to read this, go buy the equipment, and then discover (hopefully not the hard way) that his (say) encrypted communication is illegal, and everything he says must be public to the whole world. I don't get why everyone here is so quick to extrapolate from _" X isn't perfect, it has tradeoffs Y/Z"_ to _" X utterly sucks, I hate it, and it needs to stop existing"_. It isn't helpful; it's a real turn-off that just sucks the energy out of what could be a more meaningful/nuanced/informative discussion.

<comment><USER12> I'm pretty sure you are reading a lot more into the replies than anyone intended. Your reply to me has a lot of nuance that wasn't in your original comment, where all you said was:

> What about the fact that everyone in the world who can receive your signal > will hear and understand what you're saying?

The replies to that comment merely pointed out that this is how amateur radio works, that it is by design public communication. I don't see any indication that anyone interpreted your comment to mean _" Ham radio utterly sucks, I hate it, and it needs to stop existing."_

A long time ago I took a course in effective communication. I don't think of myself as a great communicator, and I don't remember much of the course. But one thing stuck in my mind: If you feel that people are failing to understand what you are trying to say, don't blame them for misunderstanding you. Instead, look to see how you can communicate more clearly so you will not be misunderstood.

<comment><USER11> In all honesty I find it borderline impossible to say things in such a way that I will not be misunderstood on HN, at least if I plan to get anything else done during the rest of my day. A lot of people here go out of their way to misinterpret and/or take the most extreme interpretation of every comment, or to just change the discussion topic to something else while ignoring the actual comment.

Case in point for _all_ of these was here: I was trying to replying to was _" there is no downside to X but Y"_, and I replied with _" what about Z?"_. A logical response could have ranged anywhere from _" Yes, Z is also a downside that is worth mentioning"_ to _" I'm not sure, because $reasons"_, to _" No, Z is not really a downside because it would cause problem W"_. But instead people just went out of their ways to just ignore the actual point and provide replies ranging from _" if you don't like it don't use it"_ (this was you, defending ham radio, as if me pointing out 1 downside is an attack on the entire concept) to _" feature, !bug"_ (as if I somehow thought Z was an accident, or as if something being intentional automatically implies it must be an upside) to _" that's how V behaves too"_ (which is wrong because, no, V doesn't force Z to happen, and even when Z does happen, it's far harder to exploit... and which, even if correct, would also be irrelevant to the point in the first place).

It's not that I _can 't_, it's just that it honestly sucks all energy out of me (and the time out of my day) to try to preempt all these kinds of misinterpretations or topic changes from my comment. Not just that, but even when I _do_ find the time and energy to do this, I just find that others come along who just cherry-pick the one sentence they disagree with and ignore all the rest of the comment explaining the nuances behind that one sentence. When I'm writing an article or a paper where the stakes are higher, I do find it worthwhile to try to do that (and it's still not easy). But over here, I just kind of always have this glimmer of hope that people will not go out of their way to start an uphill battle for me when non ever existed in the first place.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Apparently this exercise was not quite what it was made out to be:

[http://adam.curry.com/html/PleasecancelyourARRL-1508324966.h...](http://adam.curry.com/html/PleasecancelyourARRL-1508324966.html)

[http://www.kb6nu.com/weighing-puerto-rico/](http://www.kb6nu.com/weighing- puerto-rico/)

(FCC Amateur Extra class here)

<comment><USER14> That story on Adam Curry's blog was not written by Curry himself, but by a Richard Dougherty (NS0S) of Kansas City. The Reddit story it linked to was deleted, so take this all with a grain of salt.

That said, it doesn't surprise me in the least. There are a lot of wannabe-cop wannabe-military whackers in the amateur radio community, unfortunately.

(NW5W here)

<comment><USER15> Its one of the things that has kept me away from amateur radion. I'm interested in decentralized/emergency communications and have a good understanding of RF, I've even picked up a couple of Baofeng handheld units to listen in on things and get more familiar with that part of the spectrum but the other people involved in the hobby aren't exactly the kind of folks I want to hang around enough to learn from.

<comment><USER16> I'm a ham and I agree with you but you're missing the fact that the people you may hear locally aren't indicative of the broader hobby. Yes there are a lot of grumpy old elitists chatting up the airwaves every day, but there are also people who rarely if ever talk but still do things with the hobby (like myself). There are so many sub-genres in the hobby that someone can always find something they enjoy.

If anything we need more people like you to get involved so we can have more diversity of thought.

<comment><USER13> I like it for the electronics and hacking - like I said I've got an Amateur Extra class license and a 2x1 call sign, and I have literally NEVER keyed up - not even once.

<comment><USER15> Can you share some of the things you do in the hobby? It seems so much of it revolves around voice due to restrictions on traffic (encryption)

<comment><USER13> so far building electronic stuff - Arduino based CW gear, small antennas, just got some BITX stuff, etc.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The Finnish media reported last month how the government wants to collaborate with the radio hobbyists who have a network that is more resilient than the official networks. Any longer issue in the mains network causes an emergency and the official radio networks won't stay up long either in the countryside.

<comment><USER18> Interesting, but I couldn't find anything; link?

<comment><USER17> I can't find anything in English but here's a news item in Finnish (translated title "The fire department is interested in the amateur-built network in Northern Carelia"): [https://www.karjalainen.fi/uutiset/uutis- alueet/kotimaa/item...](https://www.karjalainen.fi/uutiset/uutis- alueet/kotimaa/item/174000-hs-pelastuslaitos-kiinnostui-amatoorien- rakentamasta-verkosta-pohjois-karjalassa)

EDIT: Tweet from the Defence Department in Finnish ("\--the backup network Varve is a great example-- --collaboration between the government and the civil society"): [https://mobile.twitter.com/DefenceFinland/status/96808789403...](https://mobile.twitter.com/DefenceFinland/status/968087894031290368)

One year ago in Finnish ("The role of radio amateurs growing in emergency communications"): [https://yle.fi/uutiset/3-9268716](https://yle.fi/uutiset/3-9268716)

</comment></comment></comment><comment> tony-allan Story is from September 27, 2017.

Great to see American Radio Relay League members doing this important work for the citizens of Puerto Rico in their time of need.

<comment><USER19> Thanks! We've updated the title to clarify.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> There was a lot of drama on this. Personality conflicts and such. But I'm glad the amateurs could help. I tried to go, but they filled the volunteer slots very quickly.

</comment><comment><USER21> If I remember the original request from ARRL one of the things they were looking for was HF operators who could use the data modes that exist in the ham world to allow communication to insurance company internet resources based in the mainland.

I thought this request was intriguing but wondered why they weren't able to deploy BGAN for this purpose. A surgeon friend of mine said that after Katrina sat phones were of minimal utility because the broadcast networks had contracts that were consuming virtually all of the bandwidth. I'd be interested to hear from anyone who can comment on this.

Some of the most interesting amateur radio technologies today are hybrid modes like DMR that leverage the internet along with traditional amateur radio technologies. With DMR it I have been able to speak from NYC to Malta with crystal clear signal from an HT. While this is fun and I like DMR, in some ways it is like a worldwide cellular party line. It would not be a go to solution for a situation like Puerto Rico.

</comment><comment><USER22> Another thing I want to point out to all those talking about the expense - <USER2> an SDR. The RTL-SDR is cheap, and with direct sampling and a length of wire can receive HF. Monitor stuff, find out how it works, and when you are bitten with the bug, you can get licensed and start shopping for transceivers.

</comment><comment><USER23> Radio can be a lifesaving tool in these kind of emergencies. A friend in PR told me that even the non hams were able to utilize radio when the power was down, by using CB units hooked to car batteries.

</comment><comment><USER24> To anyone interested in taking up the hobby, it's very easy to get started and if you get into the rhythm of studying it's possible to go from Foundation to Advanced in about a year. I was fortunate enough to go from M6 to M0 (I'm in the UK) in just under a year. Intermediate (2E0) isn't much of a stretch past foundation but the advanced (M0) took dedicated study time. The excellent bit about gaining Full licence is the ability to transmit in most other countries (providing you adhere to the local laws).

</comment><comment><USER25> Whatever happened to mesh networking?

<comment><USER26> pretty sure the main problem is distance on the frequencies and power ratings that are available to unlicensed users. Hams can use more power (because in theory we know how to do it without cooking nearby people) and we can transmit on wavelengths with greater potential for travel. [https://disaster.radio](https://disaster.radio) is one of the groups trying to address similar problems via unlicensed mesh networks but the problem they (and others) have is that you just need a boatload of nodes to get the signal across any distance.

You can't roll that out in an emergency, and it's a logistical nightmare to buy, setup, power, and maintain enough of them that in an emergency (including power outage) there will be enough of them to get the message from the people in need to the people who can do something about it.</comment></comment>


Hack your City [ Title Misleading Intentionally ] - <AUTHOR> http://mathalon.in/cityhack/

<comment><USER2> I have absolutely no idea what this is.</comment>


Only 8 of top global 25 companies in 1999 are still in top 25 in 2009 - <AUTHOR> http://aidwatchers.com/2009/12/the-triumph-and-terror-of-free-markets/

<comment><USER2> On the one hand, I like how companies like Apple, Google and Nestle have done well in the past decade (because I think these companies add significant value to the economy), I'm less enthusiastic about the other trend.

Microsoft got kicked off the #1 spot and Exxon Mobil has taken its place. New contenders in the top 25? Petroleo Brasileiro, PetroChina, Shell and Chevron. I see a pattern here.

And JP Morgan Chase, they made it into the top 25 with $25B of TARP money.

Not making any moral judgement here. It never struck home to me how the economy shifted in the past 10 years for the biggest companies, so I thought I'd comment.

<comment><USER3> You hit the nail on the head. This is really the effect of the massive credit bubble - natural resource companies and financials. Given the way things are going, we will likely see a lot more of this in the next decade.

<comment><USER4> I'm not sure how natural resources are a bubble. They might not compete in the same way companies which innovate on their products do, but they're certainly not under-valued. Financials, on the other hand, are a bubble in which major shareholders have complete control of the legislative process in the US. Consider the power of the federal government to bail out those "too big to fail", and that bubble seems pretty unlikely to pop.

<comment><USER5> > Consider the power of the federal government to bail out those "too big to > fail", and that bubble seems pretty unlikely to pop.

Every bubble pops. Trying to keep a bubble from popping makes the eventual pop significantly worse.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Original article (PDF) [http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents/wsj_DecadeSector...](http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents/wsj_DecadeSectors091220.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER7> It also seems that the US's share of top companies is in decline with non-US countries' shares nearly doubling in that timeframe.

I find it interesting to note how petroleum and financial companies now seems to be increasingly dominant. You could almost get the impression that the US has outsourced absolutely everything except harvesting oil and shoveling money around.

Although I'm sure the picture is a little bit more nuanced than that (as you can see the same thing for other countries too) it does show an interesting trend and makes you wonder how this may turn out in the long run.</comment>


South Korea justice ministry prepares to ban cryptocurrency trading - <AUTHOR> https://www.reuters.com/article/us-southkorea-bitcoin-law/south-korea-justice-ministry-prepares-to-ban-cryptocurrency-trading-exchanges-raided-idUSKBN1F00B7 <comment><USER2> When I first learned about crypto currency on HN back in 2012 I was excited. It sounded like a fun technical project that could do good in the world. I bought some along the way, followed projects. Along the way it changed. Yesterday I saw a spam post on Reddit about joining a "pump and dump group", which I had to research. It's groups of people who coordinate a buy of a specific currency, spread false news about this currency to create a mania, drive up the price, sell it at a profit. Not only is this probably illegal, it's immoral. Maybe this is how people who were in the internet in 1992 felt in 2000?

<comment><USER3> On the bright side, the idiots who join these groups hoping to scam others tend to lose their shirts as well. The person orchestrating the pump-and-dump scheme bought the currency at $X per coin in question long before, and he's using the people in the group as patsies. "Buy the coins at $X + $Y, and the rise in price will make it so that you can sell the coins to some other idiot for $Y + $Z!"

If there aren't enough "outsider" idiots to buy the coins for $Y + $Z before the correction happens, the "insider" idiots lose their shirts. The original person, of course, makes a tidy profit.

\---

I learned this the hard way playing Runescape as a 16-year-old. 2007 was an interesting time for that game.

<comment><USER4> >I learned this the hard way playing Runescape as a 16-year-old. 2007 was an interesting time for that game.

Playing that game over the years was the most thorough education in trusting strangers on the internet anyone could ever need

<comment><USER5> For me, it was an introduction to basic finance topics like abitrage and trading; also the enormous scope of scams people can pull.

I made my fortune in high frequency trading of rune sets after they introduced Grand Exchange and steel smelting prior to it.

<comment><USER6> I was one of those assholes that ran a bot farm to devalue your labour. RS was a great place to learn about the race to the bottom, economies of scale, and other random economic topics as well.

<comment><USER3> The most interesting part of RS was that the more raw the product, the more it was worth - you could get more XP out of it.

And before the Grand Exchange, buying in bulk cost _more_ than buying small amounts, because buying large amounts of materials required you to sit on World 1 spamming "buying iron ore whatever each" for hours.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> "In an official announcement, South Korean government reaffirms there will be NO TRADING BAN"

[https://twitter.com/iamjosephyoung/status/951428854085689344](https://twitter.com/iamjosephyoung/status/951428854085689344)

</comment><comment><USER8> Multiple tweets stating this is all FUD. Can someone contradict or corroborate this claim? Lots of

"I talked to my contact in South Korea who works for a major exchange, don't fall into the FUD. The ban is ONLY applicable to exchanges that are not following the previous KYC regulations."

<comment><USER9> [http://www.kookje.co.kr/news2011/asp/newsbody.asp?code=0200&...](http://www.kookje.co.kr/news2011/asp/newsbody.asp?code=0200&key=20180111.99099005003)

Basically the ministry of Justice announced they are working on banning exchanges between crypto and fiat currency in Korea, and they ultimately aim to close down all exchanges.

Few hours later, ministry of Strategy and Finance calls out that the ministry of Justice is announcing as if their words are final, but not all government bodies have agreed to that yet.

For reference, ministry of Strategy and Finance is one of the most powerful government body in Korea (they fund the ministries). After this news cryptocurrency value is starting to shoot up again in Korea after the crash.

<comment><USER10> From Reddit (r/cryptocurrency) - a friend messaged me this today:

       I'm a South Korean citizen. Let me just tell you what
       just happened. About 4 hours ago, Ministry of Justice
       issued a statement that the SK government is seeking
       to ban all crypto exchanges. They explicitly stated
       that this was a decision that was well communicated
       between various branches of the government. This
       caused the market to crash, and really caused a media
       firestorm among Koreans.

       And then 2 hours ago, the Ministry of Finance and the
       Blue House issued a statement that this decision to
       ban all exchanges wasn't something that was
       unilaterally agreed upon, and that the statement made
       by the MoJ was not their stance on this matter. Now
       here is my speculation on what happened.

       There was a unilateral agreement to shut all exchanges,
       but as you all would know, this is a very anti-democratic
       and anti-capitalistic thing to do. So they decided to send
       out a trial balloon.

       When the statement was made it caused an outrage, as
       there are approximately 2 million crypto investors
       in SK. National elections are held on April, so to
       control the damage I think the Blue House changed
       its mind and decided to throw the MoJ under the bus.
       A lot of Koreans are speculating that this is what
       happened under the hood, which is very amateurish. I
       just feel bad for all the guys who cut losses today.

<comment><USER11> Also, some of those politicians could be traders too and mixing the presage for profit ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Crazy how fast the markets moved on this news. The price crashed and bounced halfway back before I even found the article, and I was actively searching for the source of the panic.

But, perhaps that's because in the grand scheme, SK is small news and other traders who got there first knew full well that it'd rebound.

<comment><USER13> I'm not sure SK is that small news in crypto? Don't they make up a huge percentage of volume?

<comment><USER14> Their volume figures are pumped by some exchanges allowing larger traders to pay a flat-rate monthly fee rather than a percentage on trades, and are sometimes so large that it's hard to treat them as credible.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The exchanges got raided for tax evasion, I think we need to see the bill first before saying that crypto trading will be banned.

<comment><USER16> Banning the exchange of digital assets, in my opinion, is like banning the internet. It's not feasible in the long run. Would also be a disappointing move to see coming from a democratic country that has some degree of property rights.

<comment><USER17> It's more like banning a specific set of companies from opening legal websites in Korea. It's entirely doable, and has been done many times (e.g., porn). I won't comment on its morality: case by case, I guess.

The ban's purpose is not to stop the most determined, persistent crypto- anarchists from realizing their dream. Its purpose is to scare away your average retired dads and office workers from pouring their life savings into BTC, because otherwise the country will have to feed their children when the bubble pops.

(Unlike crypto-anarchists, most Korean people and the government believe that it's the country's duty to keep children well fed and educated, even if their parents are raging idiots. Whether we actually follow through is... debatable, I guess.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Right after the S.Korean Justice Ministry announced this, the Finance Ministry is like WTF? we were planning on taxing them. We can tax them if you get rid of it.

So far this plan doesn't have the full government support so it might not actually happen.

</comment><comment><USER19> It's a tough task to let the air of a balloon slowly.

On one hand SK probably has to do something because so many people are jumping on and eventually will likely get burned. On the other, they just removed a bunch of "money" from the hands of their citizenry by tanking the markets. Which in and of itself may be world wide good deed as it could dampen dangerous rampant speculation but it does make less "rich" people.

My guess is the decline continues into spring but picks back up come summer and into next year (although at a slower rate which isn't a bad thing). BTC isn't going anywhere any time soon and although the whole thing is overheated right now I believe more gains are likely in store in coming years. Shaking the weak hands out stabilizes a market and a stable market is what is missing at the moment.

</comment><comment><USER20> So I'm assuming SK doesn't want their citizens' money 1) exposed to the risk of a bubble 2) for which SK society will blame them 3) flowing through Chinese and Russian miners to 4) pad North Korean state finances?

</comment><comment><USER21> This is a money grab isn't it the South Korean goverment sees a lot of money moving about in crypto currency and they want to 'tax' it because why not?

The entire article sounded like excuses to me for why they need to be 'monitored' and of course if they are monitoring the might as well tax it right?

Baning it is no going to solve much so it sound more like a threat to me to make the exchanges more cooperative.

</comment><comment><USER22> _Bitcoin sank on Monday after website CoinMarketCap removed prices from South Korean exchanges, because coins were trading at a premium of about 30 percent in Asia's fourth largest economy. That created confusion and triggered a broad selloff among investors._

So counterparty risks is still something which is misunderstood in the cryptocurrency space?

With action pending against South Korea exchanges, higher prices were warranted.

</comment><comment><USER23> Are other states planning to follow the example of Korea? I would have expected that governments would not take it lightly that some entity is challenging the states monopoly to control the flow of value by means of emitting currency.

(sorry, now i am more informed, China is imposing similar bans; also South Korea wants more synchronisation with Japan and China on these issues: [https://cryptovest.com/news/south-korea-pushing-deeper- colla...](https://cryptovest.com/news/south-korea-pushing-deeper- collaboration-with-japan-china-for-joint-cryptocurrency-regulations/) )

</comment><comment><USER24> This was only a matter of time. Next up, IRS and US crackdown.

<comment><USER25> My prediction is that Coinbase will be raided by FBI/SEC for one reason or another in 2018. Leading reason IMO is a manufactured or actual link to terrorism financing they will use as pretext. Never ever keep coins in an exchange wallet.

<comment><USER26> Stop spamming this prediction in comments.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Was anyone talking about.com bubble blowing up before it actually did ? Speculation of crypto bubble blowing up may actually be built into the cost

<comment><USER28> Yes, there was extremely wide discussion in 1999 and 2000 about the dotcom party being typically somewhere between fraudulent and a giant bubble. The Buffett side of traditionalists won that argument, by a landslide. In the end, profits mattered, sales mattered, and something a lot closer to a traditional valuations model won out.

There was common discussion about junk dotcoms like TheGlobe.com, DrKoop.com, Geocities and dozens of others, and how they had no actual sustainable business (and often no plan for when they'd develop one). Scient, Viant, Razorfish, MarchFirst, and dozens of dotcom service companies were granted crazy valuations versus existing traditional peers (which is history rhyming re Ripple vs PayPal/Stripe/Square/Ant/etc).

The high burn rates, the lack of business models to actually make money, some that went public with practically no plans for how they'd make money at all, extremely high valuations on the few that were making money, and so on. These things were all very widely discussed, many skeptics were shouting about it, it wasn't popular to give them TV talking time (channels/sites like CNBC et al have a vested interest in pushing exuberence).

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Yeah, small dent for the crypto. S.K. crypto trading will just move to shadows. That's it. Missed chance to tax it.

</comment><comment><USER30> That is a criminally poor headline

</comment><comment><USER31> article is not correct and has been refuted officially by the government.

</comment><comment><USER32> Crypto is crashing badly right now because of this.

<comment><USER33> Actually as of now it's mostly recovered, ETH is back to around $1250 again.

Seems like the whole crypto is a lot more resilient than it used to be, or maybe I just jinxed it ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> Seems like the original post might just be fud: [http://m.ytn.co.kr/news_view.php?s_mcd=0101&key=201801111615...](http://m.ytn.co.kr/news_view.php?s_mcd=0101&key=201801111615246051&pos)

Using Google Translate: "Cheong Wa Dae said the Justice Minister Park Sang- ki's remarks that the virtual currency exchange will be closed is not coordinated by the government.

A Cheong Wa Dae official said in a telephone conversation with YTN that Park's remarks are the position of the Ministry of Justice and that other ministries have various positions.

In addition, the Ministry of Justice approached from the dimension of elimination of speculation, but the Financial Services Commission explained that the Ministry of Science, Technology and MIC is interested in nurturing core technologies of virtual money to prevent similar reception.

He added that virtual currency-related policies will determine the best time for policies to be effective while looking at market conditions. "

and edit: this post isn't a month old

<comment><USER35> The article you cite is a month old.</comment></comment>


The Poetry Network - <AUTHOR> http://poetrynetwork.xyz/

<comment><AUTHOR> Press P for additional options</comment>


Show HN: Hypatia 0.2, a 2D adventure game engine - lillian-lemmer Hello, Hacker News!
My name is Lillian (see: http://about.lillian.link/), and I just released version 0.2 of my MIT-licensed game engine, Hypatia(http://lillian-lemmer.github.io/hypatia/).
Hypatia is a game engine for single player 2D action adventure games. You can use it to make a game like Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages and Oracle of Seasons. Hypatia is aimed at non-programmers and programmers alike.
I'm seeking any sort of feedback.
Hypatia supports FreeBSD first, but has great support for just about any platform (https://github.com/lillian-lemmer/hypatia/wiki/Platform-Support). Maybe that fact should be more front-and-center? I'm not too worried.
Hypatia is currently in alpha. Though, the wiki does elaborate on how nonprogrammers can use Hypatia to make a game (https://github.com/lillian-lemmer/hypatia/wiki/Nonprogramer-Guide).
If you're interested in contributing, I could really use people testing it out, making their own scenes, tilemaps, and such, proofreading documentation. Here's a list of ways you can support/contribute to/help Hypatia (includes donations): https://github.com/lillian-lemmer/hypatia/wiki/Support-the-Project.
Website: http://lillian-lemmer.github.io/hypatia/
GitHub: https://github.com/lillian-lemmer/hypatia
Wiki: https://github.com/lillian-lemmer/hypatia/wiki
My major contact methods:
@LilyLemmer on twitter
email@example.com
There are tons of ways to get in contact with me, see what I'm up to, or just get personal with me. Here's a list of pretty much every online account I own for Hypatia or otherwise: https://github.com/lillian-lemmer/hypatia/wiki/Profiles.
Thank you for your time! <comment><AUTHOR> First off, Welcome to HN!

This is really cool, and... what an awesome first post! I'm probably biased, but I love seeing game-related "Show HN" posts!

Wishing you all the best!

P.S. _dang_ is one of HN's admins/moderators. dang, if you're out there, a kind request to add "Show HN" to this post, if possible.

@lillian-lemmer, just so you know, the latest "Show HN" posts will surface here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/show](https://news.ycombinator.com/show) . This link ("Show") is at the top of the page.

<comment> lillian-lemmer Thank you, Arjuna!

I'm really glad you enjoyed the post and the software. :) I'm sorry I neglected to utilize the "Show HN" feature. I'll be sure to utilize it in the future!

</comment></comment><comment><USER2> I like how this is aimed at beginners (non-programmers). Although I don't think it's really possible for a complete neophyte to pick up this project and make something, it seems like it could become a part of an even more basic course. I find a lot of "beginner" resources make far too many assumptions. Today I was working with some students who had never used a keyboard before and I tried to find a typing tutorial they could use but most of them assumed too much. It's OK to have intermediate resources but they should at least point to more basic information. For example, a typing program is far more useful with a picture of a hand over the keyboard in the home position. It's even better with animation to show the proper fingering.

<comment> lillian-lemmer You're right, I really need to have videos, and more in-depth instructions with pictures included! Not only that, but I really need to get workin' on my GUI-based editors. :) Thanks for your advice. I took it to heart.

It's aimed at nonprogrammers and programmers alike, actually. ;D

<comment><USER3> GUI-based editors/viewers should be your next goal if your want to capture non-programmer users. People who don't program are far less likely to be comfortable poking around in text files and matching numbers to pictures etc.

Seems like a nice engine though, I'll have a proper look later

<comment> lillian-lemmer Totally is my next goal! :D I agree whole-heartedly with what you're saying. :)

I'm really glad you think it seems nice. I eagerly await to hear what you think.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This brings back SO many memories of the earliest "programming" I ever did: RPG Maker 2000. The stuff I wrote could barely even be called 'games' (after all, I was about 12 years old), but it's where I first experienced that magical 'spark' where you realize "Oh, MAN. So, you're telling me I can just _write down_ what I want to happen, and the computer will DO it?!"

And from there, the rabbit hole just got deeper and deeper. :)

<comment> lillian-lemmer YES, EXACTLY, I feel like this project brings me full circle--OHRRPGCE got me into programming, and now I made my OWN game engine. :) Communities are beautiful like that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Is there any idea of what kind of performance a game framework like this gets on various platforms? I've been curious about PyGame for a long time, but it always felt like it wasn't capable enough for even a moderate indie game. I'd love to see some benchmarks (how big can maps be? How much memory does the average map size take? How many animations can happen on one map at once before things slow down? etc.). I've made game engines as toy projects in the past, and this looks super interesting. Thanks for sharing!

<comment> lillian-lemmer Don't worry, there will be the inevitable benchmarks, graphs, etc. :) Benchmarking is definitely an important component. The demo actually filled with animations (the water) and I have a color palette cycling animation generator which runs at tilesheet load, and just considering the way the system is built to use subsurfaces of a master tilesheet, and to use cached animations (so that tile x becomes animated when referred to), I don't think I'm too worried. So, so far so good! It runs on my computer pretty well: [http://www.microcenter.com/product/429997/vivopc_vm40b_deskt...](http://www.microcenter.com/product/429997/vivopc_vm40b_desktop_computer)

I should really try making an absurdly detailed and animated, large map. :)

Thank you for some really awesome questions! I'd love it if you were to tinker with it yourself. :) I'm really glad you got a kick out of it. Thank you for your time and thoughtful questions.

EDIT: Oh, just to clear something up, you know that Pygame is a Python wrapper SDL plus some other low level libraries, right? [http://www.pygame.org/wiki/about](http://www.pygame.org/wiki/about) reads:

"Uses optimized C, and Assembly code for core functions. C code is often 10-20 times faster than python code, and assembly code can easily be 100x or more times faster than python code."

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Neat! I like the idea of having both programmer and non-programmer customizability: it invites collaboration as well as people who start as non- programmers to expand their skills.

Side note: clever website domain ([http://about.lillian.link/](http://about.lillian.link/)), I like it. The site itself is nice too, particularly the embedded video of Hypatia is much better than a long description.

<comment> lillian-lemmer Oh, I developed/designed it in VIM myself, so thank you so very much! That really pleases me to hear that. It's also responsive. :D I'm really glad you like the giant GIF. ;3

Yes, I would have to agree with you regarding your point.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Very interesting at first sight. Brings back memories of good old games :)

Just one suggestion, I think you should avoid the installation scripts for distros, and leave them to package maintainers (I would for example love to see this properly in Debian). Also the windows zip in demo would probably be patched out (maybe you should make it a separate download on your website).

Keep the good work! All best.

<comment> lillian-lemmer I took your advice regarding the windows zip--moved to gh-pages.

[https://lillian-lemmer.github.io/releases/hypatia-demo- windo...](https://lillian-lemmer.github.io/releases/hypatia-demo-windows- current.zip)

Glad you enjoy! And thanks for the advice.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Loved the general idea and the non-programmer manual. Would also love if it will be ported to [http://www.pygame.org/project- Pyjsdl-2888-4709.html](http://www.pygame.org/project-Pyjsdl-2888-4709.html) in the future, so it could be played from browsers.

<comment> lillian-lemmer That's a tremendous idea! I'll definitely consider targeting the browser, what a fun thing to think about! I'll mull that over. :)

Also, I'm really happy you like the concept and I'm even happier that you enjoyed the non-programmer manual I wrote. <3 It feels really good to give back, full circle, with a game engine which can be used by nonprogrammers, after all, OHRRPGCE got me into programming. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Adventure and Action Adventure are completely different things in my book.

<comment><USER10> I agree that it's misleading based on the title. On the site and in the text above it's more explicit about being a Zelda-like engine for action adventure games, and it looks like an awesome project. I clicked the link expecting something like Adventure Game Studio, though.

<comment> lillian-lemmer Oh, thanks you two, I totally will make double sure to say "action adventure" in the future. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Looks good so far! Have a look at unity for inspiration for gui, I've seen plenty of non programers use it very effectively because of how user friendly it is

<comment> lillian-lemmer I'll make sure to sample the field. I'm kinda drawn to how OHRRPGCE works and looks. I guess it kinda scares some people, though. :) I'll definitely put a lot of work into doing research for the UI. I'll give Unity another try. Though, I'm not quite at the GUI/editor phase, yet.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Well done on your work so far!

<comment> lillian-lemmer Thank you!

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> good stuff indeed :) brings back fond memories of that class of game.

<comment> lillian-lemmer Thanks! You know I still play my Game Boy Color? I've been beating Oracle of Ages/Seasons for the billionth time lately.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> This should be a Show HN. If you can still edit the title, you can put "Show HN:" in the title. [https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html)

<comment> lillian-lemmer I can't still edit, I'm terribly sorry. :/

<comment><USER14> No reason to be sorry, it just may have benefited your post a bit. One of the mods may still make the change.

<comment> lillian-lemmer Ah, that's great to hear. :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Doesn't seem to support iOS, so I wouldn't recommend it for any development where you are hoping to earn money, but could be a fun thing to play around with and learn, maybe, I guess.

<comment><USER16> Honestly, PC is the best place for indies these days. Mobile (iOS included) is dominated by a few big companies churning out free-to-play titles...</comment></comment>


Fedora 32 is officially here - <AUTHOR> https://fedoramagazine.org/announcing-fedora-32/ <comment><USER2> So far this is release seems really good.

Most of my experience is with Ubuntu but I'm really liking Fedora 32. Specifically I like the changes they've brought into Firefox; it's now using Wayland widgets by default and GPU acceleration with the Intel GPU that I have.

Anecdotally there seems to be less latency than with my previous set up with Ubuntu 20.04LTS (don't put much store by that as it is just an anecdote for now).

I also like the flicker free vendor boot screen.

I carried out a fresh install. Everything was seamless and quick against an XPS13.

It will be interesting to see what else is different between the two.

<comment><USER3> Here here! I upgraded from 31 with dnf. It resolved several issues I've been having with power, including the system not going to sleep and running itself out of battery with the lid closed, and also generally running too hot. It seemed like the fan was on constantly!

I've got a newish Lenovo X1 Extreme, and I was starting to become frustrated with it before this release.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Running `dnf system-upgrade download --refresh --releasever=32` [1] now on a dev box, which leads me to a question:

In trying rolling releases, namely Arch and the Manjaro derivative, I seem to have more upgrade version conflicts than I do with regular Fedora `dnf upgrade` and the bi-annual system upgrade.

The Arch conflicts are often resolved by waiting a few days for the community fixes to the broken upgrade paths, because I don't use anything too rare.

But given the relative popularity of the Arch approach, and the frequency of people who state anecdotally "I have never borked a system with pacman", but I seem to have the opposite experience, what are the real advantages to a rolling release compared to the Fedora approach?

[1] [https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/quick-docs/dnf- system-u...](https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/quick-docs/dnf-system- upgrade/)

[https://fedoramagazine.org/upgrading-fedora-31-to- fedora-32/](https://fedoramagazine.org/upgrading-fedora-31-to-fedora-32/)

<comment><USER5> I like that things might break two times a year, when I can prepare and set aside time for it, instead of randomly. I also like not having to check a website for any issues like one does with arch.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> The changes I actually noticed: new versions of `zsh`, `curl`, Python, GCC, LLVM, kernel, and dnf. If you arent' using rolling modules, then you'll get a much newer version of Sway as well.

The new version of DNF features colored output for more commands.

The purge of stale python2 packages continues at a good pace.

EarlyOOM has also arrived.

</comment><comment><USER7> A bummer. Fedora was one of the first to begin a RISC-V port, but there's no mention of it here, unlike for Ubuntu Focal.

</comment><comment><USER8> Still wont boot properly on Uefi whereas Ubuntu can. Why is that?</comment>


Cahokia's Monks Mound May Have Been Built in Only 20 Years, Study Says - <AUTHOR> http://westerndigs.org/americas-largest-earthwork-cahokias-monks-mound-may-have-been-built-in-only-20-years-study-says/ <comment><USER2> > "They are cut sodblocks turned upside down and stacked like bricks," Lopinot > said.

Can anyone explain what a sodblock is in this context? I'm wondering why they would use this construction method. Do the roots of the grass hold enough soil together to make it viable for taller mounds like this?

<comment><USER3> In the Euro-American settlement of the plains, sod construction was pretty common. They would cut the sod and stack it like bricks to make a house. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sod_house](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sod_house)

<comment><USER2> Thank you. Was it normally placed upside-down?</comment></comment></comment>


LibriVox: free public domain audiobooks - <AUTHOR> https://librivox.org/ <comment><USER2> University of South Florida has an amazing program called Lit2Go, in which they have public domain books narrated by professional voice actors[0]. I have had mixed results with the quality of librivox recordings, though I very much respect and appreciate people who are willing to attempt it. Lit2go is wonderful quality.

[0] [http://etc.usf.edu/lit2go/](http://etc.usf.edu/lit2go/)

<comment><USER3> I've listened to a few pieces of audio in this Lit2Go and also had some mixed quality. This is a very good one: [http://etc.usf.edu/lit2go/220/a-defence-of- free-thinking-in-...](http://etc.usf.edu/lit2go/220/a-defence-of-free- thinking-in-mathematics/5550/a-defence-of-free-thinking-in-mathematics/)

This other one seems to be missing a pop filter during recording, there are a lot of awkward mouth sounds, and the audio is muffled: [http://etc.usf.edu/lit2go/168/common- sense/2961/part-1/](http://etc.usf.edu/lit2go/168/common-sense/2961/part-1/)

Still, audio quality is better than LibriVox. Are the recordings also public domain in Lit2Go?

<comment><USER2> Yes, all of the Lit2Go ones are public domain--it's how they are able to legally produce them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I believe reading a book out loud is as difficult of a performance as singing a song, and the talent of the readers on this site varies widely.

For me, the key to deriving value from this site is finding those performers whose work I enjoy.

Since it is volunteer based, would it be obnoxious to start using some sort of rating system for the readers?

<comment><USER5> He's not on librivox, but the best audiobook narrator I've ever listened to is Ray Porter, who does a lot of books on Audible. His 14 by Peter Clines and the Fold by Peter Clines were two of my all time favorite audiobooks. Also his The Cartel and the Power of the Dog by Don Winslow were both great.

<comment><USER6> Another recommendation: Stephen Fry. He's also a famous British comedian. He has narrated all of the Harry Potter books and the first Hitch Hiker's Guide. Some of the best audiobook narration I've encountered.

(The second HHGTG is narrated by Martin Freeman, I think. It was part of the 2005 HHGTG movie release. )

<comment><USER7> HHGTG by Stephen Fry... that sounds like a great combination, will have to check it out.

In terms of narration, my favorite audio book is The Odyssey, read by Ian McKellen.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I was thinking about this the other day. Recordings have a potentially much higher quality than a speech engine. There a lot of reasons for this, but a couple of them, like mispronouncing words, or the wrong cadence, are fixable through human intervention in the engines interpretation of the text.

Wouldn't it be interesting if we had a speech engine that could take hints that were annotated in the text? Similar to how one can add type hints to clojure variables to clue the compiler in for better optimization. Perhaps it could even be unobtrusive and even readable, a la markdown, such as a tick mark to indicate a stressed syllable or earmuffs (asterisks) for an emphasized word. Perhaps inverted angle brackets >>could indicate speeding up a passage.<<

With such a system, it would be possible to use something like git/github to take "patches" for improving the speech of a piece of text.

This came to me when I was thinking about reading some of PG's essays to create audio versions that would be useful for long drives and accessibility. I emailed him asking for permission, but no response (I didn't expect one, he probably is flooded with email and/or didn't have the time for a response, but I thought I would try anyway.)

I suppose I could just start doing it, and if it garnered attention and ran afoul of YC's sensibilities, I'd get a response then.

However, it occurred to me that 1) my voice isn't particularly pleasant, and 2) audio files are very inefficient storage of textual information. Text to speech, while greatly improved over the decades, still isn't much of a substitute. But perhaps with hinting it could be good enough.

<comment><USER9> I've been working on aspects of this one for years, first on the TTS side of things: [https://www.twilio.com/blog/2013/08/the-pronunciation- challe...](https://www.twilio.com/blog/2013/08/the-pronunciation- challenge.html)

And then on the ASR side of things: [http://clarify.io/how-clarify- works/](http://clarify.io/how-clarify-works/)

I'd love to hear what you're thinking along these lines.. it's always useful to get outside perspectives. Feel free to drop me a note. :)

<comment><USER8> Interesting work! I've put together some thoughts on how markup/down/left might be used as slightly lower level tools to address some of these issues. It was great reading these because a lot of the problems simply hadn't come to mind when I was first thinking about this.

I want to dwell on it for a little bit (day or so) and then I'll send you an email.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> If you look at this forum discussion...

[https://forum.librivox.org/viewtopic.php?p=743803#p743803](https://forum.librivox.org/viewtopic.php?p=743803#p743803)

You can see that an audio recording of a book published in 1921 was pulled due to legal letters.

Of course, in the US, works from 1921 are all supposed to be in the public domain. But already events like this occur for places other than LibriVox - multi-national companies with large legal departments and law firms on retainers not only assert rights for works from 1923 on, but for works before that as well. Most small companies and organizations can't deal with the time and expense required from these spurious legal threats and are forced to give in.

Once TPP passes, things will just get much worse.

<comment><USER11> That would be a more valid argument if the link provided was about an actual copyright court case, rather than the estate of Agathy Christy asserting their ownership over the material in question.

<comment><USER10> How can they win "an actual copyright court case" for copyrights they don't hold?

When TPP passes, they actually will hold these rights.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Worth to note that Librivox also gives a significant boost to text-to-speech and speech recognition research, currently librispeech corpus based on librivox is the largest and quite useful corpus of spoken English. [http://www.danielpovey.com/files/2015_icassp_librispeech.pdf](http://www.danielpovey.com/files/2015_icassp_librispeech.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER13> Nice to see LibriVox get some love on HN. I'm currently listening to The Book of Ser Marco Polo, the Venetian, concerning the kingdoms and marvels of the East: [https://librivox.org/the-book-of--marco-polo-1-by- rustichell...](https://librivox.org/the-book-of--marco-polo-1-by-rustichello- da-pisa/)

<comment><USER14> interesting, that book was one of my favourite when I first read it, but one of the parts I loved was the illustrations[0]. Just listening to the text should make up for such a different experience!

[0] I don't even know who did them in that edition, but they were in the style of gustave dore

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I am an audio book fanatic, but I haven't been able to use Librivox very much. Quality of reading is everything and it is both a natural talent (voice) and an Art. An intelligent reading requires a great deal of preparation and a high level of dramatic intelligence. I would pay every time for a voice like Sean Barrett's.

Sadly the commercial market is totally dominated by Audible and the cut they take from publishers is enormous. So the price of great audiobooks will remain high. Also I can't listen to them on Linux (unless you count Android which I don't really).

What I'd love is:

* A new platform that is publisher friendly (perhaps an initiative funded by a group of publishers * DRM free

Not likely though.

</comment><comment><USER16> I like to listen to podcasts and audiobooks to fall asleep. The android app[1] works well for me. Some of the Mark Twain[2] books were professional quality.

[1] [https://play.google.com/store/apps/developer?id=BookDesign&h...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/developer?id=BookDesign&hl=en)

[2] [https://librivox.org/author/9?primary_key=9&search_category=...](https://librivox.org/author/9?primary_key=9&search_category=author&search_page=1&search_form=get_results)

</comment><comment><USER17> I'd also suggest checking out [http://podiobooks.com/](http://podiobooks.com/) . They have more recent offerings, frequently read by their authors.

</comment><comment><USER18> Some really good stuff to be found here. I recently listened to What I Believe by Leo Tolstoy, read by David Barnes ([https://librivox.org/what-i-believe-by- leo-tolstoy](https://librivox.org/what-i-believe-by-leo-tolstoy)), and both the reader and the recording was as good, if not better, than any audiobook I get from Audible. But it does vary. They also have a very nice iOS app.

</comment><comment><USER19> There are a few Mark Twain audiobooks there that are quite good.

</comment><comment><USER20> Any recommendations for fellow HN readers..?

<comment><USER21> I enjoyed listening to Candide a month ago: [https://librivox.org/candide-by- voltaire/](https://librivox.org/candide-by-voltaire/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> yep,great repository

</comment><comment> ross-harrison Also in news: Syria is not a great place to vacation right now</comment>


The best site to find password leaks: Google - <AUTHOR> http://www.google.com/search?q=filetype:sql+password+123456+gmail&hl=en&tbo=1&output=search&source=lnt&tbs=rltm:1&sa=X&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&biw=1440&bih=819 <comment><USER2> Johnny (& others) have been doing this type of thing for years. The classic collection is here: <http://johnny.ihackstuff.com/ghdb/>

</comment><comment><USER3> Similar, and interesting in the context of LulzSec releases, is @PastebinLeaks on Twitter. It scans Pastebin for a variety of things (mail address lists, PGP keys, SQL dumps, and router configuration files have all popped up so far). They're not 100% - especially the mail/password dump detection - but it's definitely catching stuff.

<http://twitter.com/#!/PastebinLeaks>

<comment><USER4> These kind of tools cause more harm than good.

<comment><USER5> That's balderdash. These kinds of tools raise awareness of the issue, hopefully making more people think twice about posting private data to a public place. If they continue to be unaware of the danger of doing so, then it is simply exploited silently and everyone wonders how it happened.

Your statement assumes that security through obscurity is a good thing.

<comment><USER6> At this point, you're both right - exposing these things to a massive audience just increases the number of potential attackers.

Someone ought to write a tool that follows this account, and e-mails people warning them that their e-mail has been compromised.

The hard part would be explaining what happened, how to verify it, and how to fix it to random strangers without convincing them that you're the one who just tried to steal their life savings.

<comment><USER7> www.hacknotifier.com does this (disclaimer: I started it) - but it requires the user to subscribe to our service. Unfortunately, cold emailing them (which we considered), would be considered spam.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> i just created a google alert for my email + "filetype:sql". <http://www.google.com/alerts> \- might as well make this work for me...

<comment><USER9> This is a great idea. Unfortunately pastebin and sites like it are generally not indexed by google.

<comment><USER6> Crawling pastebin is trivial - there was an HN story on it awhile ago, and I wrote my own from scratch as an exercise. Perhaps we should suggest this to the guy behind <https://shouldichangemypassword.com/>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Well, it is the best site to find almost anything, so why not passwords? :)

Honestly though, google shouldn't even have to worry about these things, their mission is to organize data on the web. If it is there, it should be searchable.

</comment><comment><USER11> Google hacking is truly awesome and powerful. In fact there is some pro material already on the web such as <http://johnny.ihackstuff.com/ghdb/>

There is also a pretty good book from a spanish Microsoft MVP (yeah it sounds bad but still its an important award, :\\)

[http://www.informatica64.com/libros.aspx?id=hackingBuscadore...](http://www.informatica64.com/libros.aspx?id=hackingBuscadores)

It's a shame they decided not to translate it, anyone is up to it here? It contains everything that you'd ever wonder and much more.

<comment><USER12> Here's the teaser from the link. I don't own the book and thus have nothing else to translate.

Title: Search Engine Hacking with Google, Bing & Shodan Author: Enrique Rando

Pages: 272

Price: 20 Euros + Shipping (includes IVA)

Though it's been 2500 years since Sun Tzu wrote "The Art of War", many of his lessons remain relevant. His teaching contains several passages that seem especially suitable for people who work in Information Security:

* "Those who disable foreign armies without combat are the best teachers of the Art of War."

* "Before you fight, first learn the skills of the enemy's workers, and then fight them according to their weaknesses."

* "When you can perceive subtlety, winning is easy."

Without a doubt, this information is key in preparing for attempted security breaches. Without it, determining what to attack and how to do it is impossible. Search engines have become important tools for collecting data and other intelligence. However, despite Google hacking's many years of use, its techniques have perhaps not always been well-treated or publically shared.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> How does this actually happen though? Is this simply a case of people leaving the standard "apache index page" turned on or do this many people actually publish links to their SQL files someone crawlable?

<comment><USER14> Usually a combination of the Apache index pages, dumb server setups, and being people being lazy, careless and/or forgetful when they dump a database to disk.

Also, sometimes an index.html file is accidentally removed, causing (brain- dead installs) to suddenly reveal the contents of a directory, eg. <http://shahinfosoft.com/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Welcome to 2005. Hopefully this isn't new to the rest of you.

As someone else mentioned, Johnny posted articles on this years ago. But, he merely popularized it, Google hacking was around long before him.

See also: filetype:mdb, filetype:xls, "ssn" and so on.

For music, try: metallica filetype:mp3 For books, try: oreilly filetype:epub (or whatever)

<comment><USER16> What's really the interesting story is that it isn't 2005 and yet this stuff still works.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> And even if its hashed, there's public databases resolving those: <http://hashash.in/>

<comment><USER6> This is only good for unsalted hashes, which hopefully are on the decline.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Also: <https://shouldichangemypassword.com/>

<comment><USER19> I tried "hello" and "god" and both are safe, apparently.

<comment><USER20> use your email address.

<comment><USER19> I was joking. Not very funny, I admit...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> it nice how a screenshot from a groupon post made it into a new thread on HN

see the on at <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2704359>

</comment><comment><USER22> And now for porn:

[http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&tbo=1&biw=1315...](http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&tbo=1&biw=1315&bih=929&tbs=rltm%3A1&q=http%3A%2F%2F*%3A*%40members.bangbros.com&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=)

(SFW-ish; no images, just links to really sleazy websites)

</comment><comment><USER23> C'mon! Mistakes happen, sure. But a correctly written robots.txt would prevent this

</comment><comment><USER24> It's a shame these companies are so cheap that they don't hire real developers.

<comment><USER25> You think Fortune 500 companies don't hire complete idiots too? They just have 5 extra people for every 1 developer to double check whether or not the developer did something stupid, test the site for obvious vulns, etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Remember to turn on private browsing.

<comment><USER27> Private browsing isn't going to help with sites that publish their databases in plaintext, as in the link.

<comment><USER26> Your browsing history will show your passwords that you searched for to people who use your computer. Also, next time you google search when logged on your password might also show as a suggestion.

Otherwise a password-not-yet-leaked will no longer be. If you didn't turn on private browsing as I suggested and are using Safari, type the password you searched for in your URL bar now and you will see why I said what I said.

<comment><USER6> Why would you search for your passwords at all, then? Wouldn't it make more sense to search for your email and username?

And for that matter, why do you have so few that you can easily google for them instead of generating random ones per site?

(Fun fact, googling for your e-mail address reveals a hash of your password on MtGox.)

<comment><USER26> Maybe someone was like me and they didn't think to not search for their password which ended up on their browser history. The title had _password leaks_ in it and that's the first thing I thought of when I got there: "Hey my MtGox password got leaked lets google it."

For that matter, I have a unique password (with the necessary special characters) for each account that associates with my identity (Not naming any examples here), but only several unique passwords for websites I don't intend to use much e.g. to read newspapers, and apparently, MtGox.

(Yes, I was searching for my MtGox. password because it was the same password I used for random throwaway sites. No I never used it, I don't even remember having confirmed my account there. My asset in bitcoins amount to < $2 USD.)

I still don't understand why all the downvotes. It would've helped me if someone reminded me not to actually google my password with my browser watching. Apparently not anyone else.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Downmod me if you feel like, but I genuinely feel bad about HN after seeing this submission.

edit: definitely downmod to make an example.

<comment><USER25> ...why do you feel bad about HN just for exposing terrible security practice? Hopefully startups get shocked enough by it to tighten up their privacy policies.</comment></comment>


China's coronavirus is not remotely under control - <AUTHOR> https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2020/02/05/chinas-coronavirus-not-remotely-control-world-economy-mounting2/ <comment><USER2> From expat and smuggled reports, there's about several dozen dead bodies on the streets and in crashed vehicles around central Wuhan. On the whole, that's not very many compared to having the population of NYC. There would probably be a similar number in an average day in NYC, but the coroners are reportedly too afraid and/or also under curfew to pick up the bodies.

Roughly 100 million people are locked down as of writing.

The number of infected and dead in Western media should be multiplied by the viewer by about 2x-10x to get a current number because of a) undercounting and b) the long delays in receiving information.

Interestingly, several large, multi-thousand bed, world-class, negative air- pressure hospital/triage facilities were built in about a week.</comment>


Y Combinator Universe: List Of All Known YC Start-Ups (Includes Latest Batch) - <AUTHOR> http://ycuniverse.com/ycombinator-companies.php

<comment><USER2> There are a _lot_ of errors in there. I only looked at the S09 batch and e.g. Gabriel Weinberg (DuckDuckGo founder) is listed as a WakeMate founder and some companies are listed as "live" whose domains are dead, plus there's a company I've never heard of (despite being in that batch - just checked again, and it seems they were a pivot from the batch a year earlier). It seems a wiki format would be useful.

That said, there are a lot of other places with this info available at this point:

• <http://ycpages.info/>

• <http://yclist.com/>

• <http://www.techgox.com/accelerators/Y-Combinator/details>

• <http://altpedia.org/wiki/List_of_Y_Combinator_companies>

<comment><AUTHOR> It's not a competition, just one more site to use as a reference. I make revisions whenever better information is available.

I'm reluctant to change a status to "dead" because alot of companies change domain name, pivot, etc. So I generally leave a site as "live" even if there's domain issues.

I also track New Me start-ups and 500Startups. I'm working on a better layout using a wiki/blogging platform for all three sites.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Just looking at my batch (s07) there are numerous inaccuracies. You might want a way to submit them or something.

</comment><comment><USER4> Great list. (Minor note: you may want to consider changing "manquisition" to the gender-neutral "acquihired".)

</comment><comment><USER5> There's also <http://yclist.com>

</comment><comment><USER6> Re: YC Batch 2008-06, Backtype was actually acquired by Twitter a while back.

Great resource, and interesting to see dead/live/acquired ratios, kudos!

</comment><comment><USER7> It is illegal to publicly declare that you're looking for funding. You should take that down.

<comment><USER8> It is? I didn't know that. Do you have a source?

EDIT: Nevermind. I found it. Rule 502(c) of federal Regulation D of the Securities Act of 1933 prohibits advertising or general solicitation for investors. <http://www.sec.gov/rules/interp/33-7516.htm>

<comment><USER7> A big portion of the JOBS act is dedicated to changing this. Try putting something about money or funding into your Angel List status update and they'll tell you that you can't talk about seeking funding publicly, and that any message that sets off their trigger will be reviewed.

<comment><AUTHOR> Since you mention it, my start-up is also on AngelList. Just sayin'. <http://angel.co/av-squid>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Color me disappointed. At this stage, I'd hope Ycomb would have the economic freedom (and desire) to fund socially significant startups beyond yet-more- coupon refactors and facebook-for-cats projects.</comment>


Internationalization and l10n in Rails - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/consti/i18n-howto

<comment><AUTHOR> hn seems to outsmart me: I named that submission "i18n & l10n in Rails" and it got titled "Internationalization and l10n in Rails". ;)</comment>


Office Tools for Starving Startups - <AUTHOR> http://powerof2games.com/node/14 <comment><USER2> Don't forget the design tools: -Inkscape -Gimp</comment>


15 Technologies My Newborn Son Won't Use - <AUTHOR> http://gizmodo.com/5901576/15-current-technologies-my-newborn-son-wont-use

<comment><AUTHOR> I disagree with movie theatres, mice, and phone numbers. Phone numbers are convenient as a primary key for people and are already ingrained in our consciousness, why would we get rid of them? Movie theatres are more about the common experience, and I think will continue to be so. The author misses the point, you don't go to watch a movie, you go to the movies. It's so ingrained in our culture and has grown to be such a bigger thing than just passive watching. When it comes down to it, people like lining up and hanging out with people for something exciting and new. Look at Apple releases and video game releases, people still line up and dress up to go do things collectively. And mice are just more accurate than touch and less cumbersome for navigation.

<comment><USER2> I actually logged on to make the point that the author is behind on the phone number front. In the context of his example, (asking a girl on the bus for her phone number), phone numbers were dead when I was in high school. (10 years ago) Back then, for me, it was AOL screen names. That's what you asked for. that's how you communicated. today, I think it's morphed back to phone numbers, so you can TEXT. And kids LOOOOVE their texting.

but I guess the author does have a point, that we dont need to remember numbers anymore. I dial by user-name (or, simply, name), if you will...

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Apart from three things, I don't use any of these technologies. The three things and why they're relevant to me are wired internet (because most DSL+Wifi boxes suck), desktop computers (laptops don't pack the power I need, esp. gaming but also compiling) and hard drives (this is going to change when SSD's get big enough).

The reasons why these things are relevant to me don't apply to the vast majority of customers out there.

Although I still like desktop PC's since they're upgradable or at least some parts are recyclable. An old laptop is worthless piece of junk, parts of a desktop can be reused. A little overclocking and some memory just resurrected my old desktop for $100 and it's good for 1-2 more years. On the other hand, my g/f's macbook (newer than my desktop) is as good as junk now. It won't fluently run new OSX (and websites are too heavy) and the crappy GPU makes it useless with Linux (bad drivers -> crappy video playback).</comment>


Bypass Authentication by pressing backspace 28 times in Grub2 - <AUTHOR> http://hmarco.org/bugs/CVE-2015-8370-Grub2-authentication-bypass.html#exploit <comment><USER2> This has, of course, been all over the computer news services. Two StackExchange Q&A WWW sites have addressed this in different ways.

* [http://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/250028/](http://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/250028/)

* [https://security.stackexchange.com/questions/108428/](https://security.stackexchange.com/questions/108428/)</comment>


Startup Quote: Thomas Edison, co-founder, General Electric - <AUTHOR> http://startupquote.com/post/1493433006

<comment><USER2> "I do not think there is any thrill that can go through the human heart like that felt by the inventor as he sees some creation of the brain unfolding to success... Such emotions make a man forget food, sleep, friends, love, everything."

\--Nikola Tesla

<comment><USER3> How appropriate. Edison was Tesla's hero, and Edison gave him the shaft.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Anything that won't sell, I don't want to invent. Its sale is a proof of utility, and utility is success.

\- Thomas Edison

<http://startupquote.com/post/1493433006>

<comment><USER4> so I guess Edison would prefer the Slap Chop over the LHC. superb.

<comment><USER5> Someone sold the LHC enough to get the money required to build and support it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> to be fair, he said this before the open source revolution, right?</comment>


Ask HN: Your first Front End job experiences? - <AUTHOR> Hi,
I am working as freelance developer for almost a year, mostly building web pages (JS, CSS, HTML, WP, learning Angular and Vue) for small businesses, and now I want to go higher level and apply for job as front end developer.
What are your experiences on first job, what is the first thing you had to do, what was your background when you applied?
I am little insecure because I never worked in team, never had opportunity to work in corporate world.
Could you please share your experiences, and give a few advices?
I know this is maybe funny question, but do things work in real world; for example if you don't know how to do something, do you use google or se, how does other developers treat you?
I hope you understand my English, because its not my native language. Thank you. <comment><USER2> Be honest about your abilities and experience level. Companies worth working for have learned to mistrust overconfident developers from one or more previous bad hires.</comment>