Celebrating 30 Years On this World Alongside the Commodore 64 - <AUTHOR> http://randomdrake.com/2012/08/01/celebrating-30-years-on-this-world-alongside-the-commodore-64/

<comment><USER2> As another child who grew up on koala paint and the warm blue glow of the C64 basic prompt, this article was wonderfully nostalgic for me. Thanks for sharing!</comment>


Thinking about Thinking (2007) - <AUTHOR> http://the-programmers-stone.com/the-original-talks/day-1-thinking-about-thinking/

<comment><USER2> I really found the Jungian backlash thing very interesting.

I, for example, like to come into work late. I love being lazy in the mornings, either reading in bed or maybe doing a workout. I do it often. I think it makes me happy, and I come into work feeling /good/. I also leave later than most people, often work overtime, and sometimes I'll work on the weekends, all on my own accord and without getting paid extra.

Now, in many places, I could just /see/ the discomfort this causes in people, especially those who feel like they're obligated to show up at 8, and leave at 5. Lip service is paid to the usual "as long as you get your work done", but more than a few times I've been pulled aside to be asked "could you please come in earlier" \- or I can sense tension when I walk in and some coworkers have been in for an hour already.

It's all really frustrating. Doubly so when people can't explain why a novel behavior is bad, but think it's bad anyway. We really are creatures of habit.

<comment><USER3> >We really are creatures of habit.

We're also creatures of cooperation. Nothing big happens in the world unless 3 or more people agree to do it - simply, nothing. All groups require a degree of cooperation/coordination, and fundamental agreement in order to function - otherwise you just have a fight on your hands, or a disorganized mess, or some sort of dilettante activity where nothing ever gets done.

So we've evolved, socially, to agree to do things in order to get things done. Sharing the same schedule and having a common basis of work is fundamental to human activities; while you may enjoy the luxury of coming late to the office, others may enjoy the luxury of leaving early from the office to get home when there are still daylight hours.

Alas, being different than the others means you're imposing a difficulty on them that they may not feel they deserve, or in any way think is a viable way of operating. This tension and frustration you're feeling - it goes both ways. Having a shared, agreed-upon schedule, reduces that tension - whether you like it or not.

Not saying that you _should_ change just because others need/want you to, but in fact the disagreement over how best to operate is a cause of unnecessary tension. If you can't get it together, in spite of whether you're getting the work done or not, as your manager I'd be inclined to wonder why you think you have the right to impose such tension on your workplace. Maybe you're worth it because your work is special - maybe not. I guess because you've persisted in the position, you must have value for which the hassle is worth it. Not everyone has that luxury, alas ..

<comment><USER2> I would be inclined to agree with you, but this just isn't true in my case and many other cases - usually the people who care the most are the ones I have to work with the least. When I have a meeting, I suck it up and come in on time. But otherwise, there really is no reason I even have to be physically in the office. There are benefits to it, and I like being in the office because it lets me interact with people in ways that I think makes me better at my job, but really I could be on the other side of the world and it'd be fine.

We still ape the rituals of our industrial revolution predecessors simply because no one tried anything else.

<comment><USER3> >usually the people who care the most are the ones I have to work with the least.

Its not necessarily rational - or else if it were, we wouldn't have to deal with this at all, and everyone could just work whenever they felt like it. This is an ingrained, subconscious agreement that we all work as hard as we can and nobody slacks off - alas, having schedule conflicts are an easy way to say "I don't think you work as hard as you should" .. and the corollary: "I don't think I should have to work as hard as you think I should" ..

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> This article made the rounds among co-workers a few months back. Finally took some time to read it and I thought it was excellent.

Briefly: the article suggests the existence of two different thought patterns, mapping and packing. Packing involves cataloging knowledge packets and accessing them in a straightforward way, without considering why things are true or how ideas fit together across disciplines. Mapping involves reflecting on truths to build a map of relationships between them, and updating your representation of that map as you learn new things.

I found mapping to be a super-powerful framework for thinking about things effectively. Some of the article felt reductionist, but it's a fascinating read.

</comment><comment><USER4> This was on Slashdot back in 99: [http://news.slashdot.org/story/99/10/26/137207/beyond-the- pr...](http://news.slashdot.org/story/99/10/26/137207/beyond-the-programmers- stone)</comment>


Uber's Ad-Toting Drones Are Heckling Drivers Stuck in Traffic - <AUTHOR> https://www.technologyreview.com/s/602662/ubers-ad-toting-drones-are-heckling-drivers-stuck-in-traffic/ <comment><USER2> This better not become a trend...

</comment><comment><USER3> This sounds really annoying.</comment>


Rands In Repose: Pushing buttons during an interview - <AUTHOR> http://www.randsinrepose.com/archives/2007/09/25/the_button.html <comment><USER2> Short version: For a technical job, interviews with the technical people are what matter most/exclusively.

If you want trivial advice about how to find out about the company from the unimportant interviews, read the whole article.</comment>


Mobile Market Share Not Equivalent to Usage Share - <AUTHOR> http://www.tenfingercrunch.com/article/196/2012/11/26/mobile_market_share_not_equivalent_to_usage_share/

<comment><USER2> I can think of a number of ways to interpret this data that don't support your conclusions:

1) Online device utilization is a lagging indicator, since the traffic data is representative of the smartphone market share numbers from about 2 years ago. This is consistent with observations that smartphone device use increases over the ownership period.

2) iOS users are engaging in more casual discovery on their devices, and as such hitting more of the reporting sites in these statistics.

3) iOS better serves data-hungry users, either through device selection, plans, legacy, or some other factor.

4) iOS is worse at managing data use, on-device cache, etc.

5) The "unique methodology for collecting this data" employed by NetMarketShare, which is without detailed explanation or put to scientific rigor could be misrepresenting this data.

Any one of these could explain or contribute to a considerable amount of inaccurate data. A combination of them could exacerbate these effects. So unless you're arguing that people are buying Android devices and throwing them in the trash, the number of bits pulled down by devices isn't a terribly useful indicator of market penetration, just user behavior.

If you want to know what platform to target for a particular service (assuming you can only target one), mass-analysis is pretty lousy. Get to know your target market and what devices they use.

Unfortunately, this looks like the kind of "analysis" that starts with a belief and sets out to find data to support it.

<comment><USER3> Thank you for your opinion. The reason behind this analysis was to examine why sales figures and usage figures amongst the two leading platforms did not match up. Not everything is a conspiracy. I am not a mobile developer, just an analyst (not in the tech industry) who enjoys crunching numbers on my own time. I thought I would share it to spark conversation, and I am happy to see it has. Not everyone has an agenda.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Plays into some speculation I made last month: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4734153>

Long story short: I think it may be inaccurate to think of the Android space as strictly a subset of the smartphone space. It seems instead that they're two (perhaps only slightly) overlapping sets.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> There is actually a flaw in the stats used to prove this. For market share comparisons, only phones have been used. For internet usage comparison, the all iOS devices have been used. For a fair argument, the tablet market share should be compared as well. Also, a person is much more likely to browse and consume on a tablet than on a phone.

<comment><USER3> This issue has been corrected and tablets are now included in Device Sales figures. Thanks!</comment></comment>


Maxis explains what went wrong with SimCity & how they're fixing it - <AUTHOR> http://www.polygon.com/2013/3/9/4081464/simcity-interview-ea-maxis-lucy-bradshaw

<comment><USER2> This explains very little that would actually be of interest coming from hacker news.

I expected a technical analysis and got PR bullshit.

</comment><comment><USER3> "We test and work out the capacity load of each server in load testing and through our beta events," she continued. "We have seen play behavior and load in areas that have stressed our game server [databases] in ways that we did not experience in Beta or Load Test."

They didn't use chaosmonkey? [http://techblog.netflix.com/2012/07/chaos- monkey-released-in...](http://techblog.netflix.com/2012/07/chaos-monkey- released-into-wild.html)

<comment><USER4> Chaos monkey simulates servers going down. That wasn't the issue here. This was just too much demand (i.e., not enough servers deployed) combined with what sounds like terribly inefficient algorithms...

<comment><USER3> Ok, using chaosmonkey maybe more complicated than just increasing what a load tester throws at your servers, but the end state is the same. You have less functioning servers to meet the demand. I think it's still relevant. IMO The whole point of chaosmonkey to force your organization to expect the unexpected.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> "With the way that the game works, we offload a significant amount of the calculations to our servers so that the computations are off the local PCs and are moved into the cloud. It wouldn't be possible to make the game offline without a significant amount of engineering work by our team."

I'm running a 2.6 quad core with 16gb of ram and a ssd hd they're saying they have better than that (to overcome the internet latency) on their end for each user playing the game? I could understand needing to sync lots of actions with other players to need the server, but calculations? I call BS, that can't be right. Sounds more like a profit driving decision than a technical one.

<comment><USER6> It is BS, of course. I was disconnected and was able to play for hours. Literally all they need to add is local saving of your city.*

*When I quit the game and came back the next day, my city was gone.

<comment><USER7> Actually I suspect something more like this is happening: your local copy is running the simulation, while it's also being run on the server. Running it locally means you get no lag at all and running it on the server prevents cheating. The two simulations sync from time to time.

<comment><USER8> Preventing cheating might make sense in competitive PvP games, but makes no sense at all in a single player game that has traditionally been played offline.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> "A lot more people logged on than we expected"

So? The whole idea of 'the cloud' is that you are able to quickly (automatically) add capacity to handle temporary high demand for computing resources. With a capable provider like Amazon or Windows Azure, computing resources should not be a problem if you are actively taking care of provisioning.

<comment><USER10> That's assuming their architecture is horizontally scalable like that. What if the bottleneck was at the db layer? If they didn't architect that out to be easily horizontally scalable, then simply adding more servers isn't really going to do much.

(I'm also assuming here that when they say "more people logged on than we expected", the bottleneck wasn't on the login servers, but on whatever it is Glassbox does with all the accumulated city data. Because login/auth severs are relatively simple to scale out horizontally)

<comment><USER11> It seems totally insane to not build a gaming system to be infinitely partitionable as priority #1.

Have users pick a realm (continent) that their region (and hence city) lives on. Only allow X cities per realm. Announce only less-loaded realms to people trying to create a new city . More demand? More realms.

Or in shorter form: copy Blizzard. I'm struggling to think of a reason why this wouldn't be not only doable but the obvious default. Eve gets (deserved) props for violating this default of course but I think EA wants a slightly broader consumer base than Eve for this one.

Anyway I can't wait to read a detailed tell-all from an ex-dev.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Why is the game online-only in the first place?

<comment><USER13> Don't see why this is getting downvoted.

There is an online component, but from what I've read about the game it's probably fair to say that most people will focus most of their time on the single player experience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> what a crock of shit.</comment>


Organic Food Isn't More Nutritious - <AUTHOR> http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/organic_food_isnt_more_nutritious/

<comment><USER2> I never thought the argument was that organic food is more beneficial nutritionally. I thought it is supposed to be _less harmful_ overall. This is an important distinction.

<comment><USER3> I'm not aware of any quantitative research which shows that, though it is a popular opinion in California, regardless.

Edit: Thanks, down-modders. Real mature. You know what you call beliefs without evidence? Religion.

How about pointing out some evidence if you disagree with me?

<comment><USER4> If I had a free thinker award to give, I'd give you one. It's amazing how otherwise "open minded" people seem to fall prey to the dogmas of organic/all- natural/no-additives/USDA-approved/recycled-packaging marketing.

But seriously people, how many lives does genetically engineered rice have to save before you admit that "all natural" sometimes means "inferior", and "artificial" is sometimes "good". You know what's 100% organic? Malaria. And there's little more artificial than the chemical-soaked neon bednets saving millions of lives across Africa.

<comment><USER5> That's a ridiculous argument.

You could distribute Big Macs to the starving masses and credit McDonalds with saving millions of lives, but that wouldn't make it recommended eating for those of us with access to alternatives.

<comment><USER4> It isn't an argument - note my use of the word "sometimes". It's a counter- example to the dogma of organic == good, artificial == evil. The burden of proof that a BigMac would be healthier if it were made from "all natural" ingredients. So, show us one study which shows people who only consume "organic" food to be healthier than those who eat genetically engineered food. You simply won't find it.

For a more concrete argument, let me point you to The China Study [1], which gives more evidence for vegetarianism being related to good health than the "organic" lobby could ever dream of for "organic food". If people really cared about their health, they'd be vegetarian.

Organic food has a lot more to do with identity marketing (like BMW and A&F) than it does real nutrition.

1\. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_China_Study>

<comment><USER6> You are demonstrating the same 'them and us' attitude that is present in the original article. You show your mistake by lumping together 'organic/all- natural/no-additives/USDA-approved/recycled-packaging' as if they were all a single proposition pushed by some united group of science haters. If you can't evaluate each proposition on it's merits then you are failing prey to dogma yourself.

> the burden of proof that a BigMac would be healthier if it were made from > "all natural" ingredients.

Why should the burden of proof fall one way or the other on this proposition? This is the classic technique of those who see themselves as guardians of scientific orthodoxy.

> which gives more evidence for vegetarianism being related to good health > than the "organic" lobby could ever dream of for "organic food"

That doesn't mean that knowing the value of organic food also wouldn't be useful.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> We don't even fully understand the elements and combinations of substances that make up 'nutritious'. So the claims of the author that 'Organic Food Isn't More Nutritious' are demonstrably an overstatement.

It's funny how the author can exaggerate the studies findings like this while showing such disdain for others who respond to his exaggerated conclusion rather than address the studies findings directly. The study has some good information but I'd prefer to hear it from an author that wasn't so partisan to a particular view.

</comment><comment><USER7> > "The Soil Association's response, published in papers across the land, > entirely disregarded the intent of the study and instead argued that organic > food is better for the environment and contains less pesticides than non- > organic food. But in the very first paragraph of the report, the team states > that they aren't looking at the impact on the environment of organic > agriculture or the effect of pesticide use, both of which the FSA has > extensively examined in other research."

> "The FSA study is good science and by attacking, rather than endorsing it, > the organic lobby in the UK has been plainly unscientific."

true, but the SA's response is an excellent marketing response. ple think what they're told, and if no one outright makes the claim about the environmental impact, then people will conclude, oh, it's already to eat non-organic.

</comment><comment><USER8> But it is more tasty.

<comment><USER9> Indeed. We still don't understand enough about food to say that organic food is not better. If you stopped eating real food and only ate lard, soy protein, cardboard, and a vitamin pill, you would probably not do too well. But that is all we use to understand the nutritional value of food. (Vitamins, minerals, fat, carbohydrates, and protein.)

(Admittedly the American food system is getting close to this. Corn is soooo good for you(r wallet), after all.)

<comment><USER10> _We still don't understand enough about food to say..._

Here here! The notion that we pretty much understand what's going on with food, digestion, and metabolism is as widespread as it is harmful. We have only scratched the surface.

I remember seeing a diagram of human metabolism during a talk. It was huge and messy! Spaghetti-coded-Rube-Goldberg-intertwined-messy! And it's only a diagram of what we _do_ understand -- there's even more in there! Biology at the cellular and molecular level was not "designed" to be understood by a human intelligence.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> There's a metafilter thread about this here:

<http://www.metafilter.com/83702/Cuz-Im-freefree-rangin></comment>


The Tangled History of Soviet Computer Science - <AUTHOR> http://nautil.us/issue/23/dominoes/how-the-computer-got-its-revenge-on-the-soviet-union <comment><USER2> I'm puzzled this article has "history" in the title. It would be more appropriately called "a few funny fiction stories and some cheap spin- doctoring on soviet computer science." Somehow it does not mention this guy, who could be called Soviet von Neumann:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergey_Alexeyevich_Lebedev](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergey_Alexeyevich_Lebedev)

On the other hand it does not mention von Neumann either, it talks about Norbert Wiener, whose theories have doubtful contribution to computer science. The critical articles about his theories in Soviet media were pretty ridiculous, but hardly had any effect on the development of computers or control theory in SU. The author mentions nobody else relevant to the subject:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrey_Ershov](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrey_Ershov) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgy_Adelson- Velsky](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgy_Adelson-Velsky) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexey_Lyapunov](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexey_Lyapunov) [https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9F%D0%BE%D1%81%D0%BF%D0%B5...](https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9F%D0%BE%D1%81%D0%BF%D0%B5%D0%BB%D0%BE%D0%B2,_%D0%93%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%BC%D0%BE%D0%B3%D0%B5%D0%BD_%D0%A1%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%B3%D0%B5%D0%B5%D0%B2%D0%B8%D1%87)

Perhaps the author took inspiration for his article from the worst examples of Soviet propaganda. Twisting the facts, mixing them with fiction in such a way that is hard to tell one from another.

<comment><USER3> Article doesn't have "history" in it's title, HN submission has. Title on site is "How the Computer Got Its Revenge on the Soviet Union".

> some cheap spin-doctoring on soviet computer science this article is > actually reworked version of "Gerovitch, Slava. "InterNyet: why the Soviet > Union did not build a nationwide computer network." History and Technology > 24.4 (2008): 335-350." which has a lot of reference and citations. And > article main subject is not history of computer science in USSR, it's about > problems of creating huge computer networks in particular political- > ideological environment.

I don't see how this attempt of informing about attempts of creating Internet in USSR diminishes achievements of great Scientists that you've mentioned. It mentions "MESM", which was created by Lebedev, it's certainly close enough without changing the subject of article.

> Twisting the facts, mixing them with fiction in such a way that is hard to > tell one from another. Where exactly fact twisting is in the article?

[0] [http://web.mit.edu/slava/homepage/articles/Gerovitch- InterNy...](http://web.mit.edu/slava/homepage/articles/Gerovitch- InterNyet.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> There's a great novel, _Red Plenty_, by Francis Spufford, that touches on Soviet computing in the 50s and 60s as part of a broader exploration of Soviet economic planning. I wish more people would read it. It's a weird hybrid of reportage and fiction -- and almost seems science fictional in its world building. Here's a link to the Guardian's review: [http://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/aug/08/red-plenty- fran...](http://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/aug/08/red-plenty-francis- spufford)

<comment><USER5> Red Plenty is fantastic. Well worth reading.

There was a virtual seminar at the Crooked Timber group blog which is worth reading if you enjoyed the book: [http://crookedtimber.org/category/red- plenty-seminar/](http://crookedtimber.org/category/red-plenty-seminar/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I didn't read the article, but I just wanted to take the occasion to remind people that the Soviets also built ternary computers:

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

<comment><USER7> This article is really a rather sloppy piece that contributes little to our understanding of what should be fascinating to this community: alternative histories and possibilities of the computer. For example, how cybernetics and "use of the computer" are used almost interchangeably. A critique of cybernetics, which is in fact somewhere in-between a political program and philosophical system, can in no way be equated with a critique of the computer. In fact, a critique of cybernetics as at once idealist (vs materialist) and mechanistic (vs organic/vitalist) is a very sensible philosophical critique and in no way a contradictory legacy of mere soviet ideology, however philosophically problematic the latter may itself be. Many of the decisions to avoid anthropomorphizing the computer are similar to arguments put forth by Djikstra for perspective.

Historically, how is it even possible that this article doesn't mention someone like Sergei Lebedev, a celebrated Soviet scientist, who had a working computer by the 50s which had been in development since the mid-to-late 40s? Or a figure like Victor Shestakov who independently made many of the same innovations as Claude Shannon? As a community, I think we should be very interested in other ways the computer could have been---at the level of use, hardware and software---thus histories like this or the Japanese [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_generation_computer](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_generation_computer) should be fascinating, even if one finds much about the Soviet Union problematic to say the least.

On the cybernetics point, I would also highly recommend reading Bogdanov's science fiction novel Red Star, written in 1908 (obviously in-between the two revolutions, so technically pre-Soviet, but he was important in defining many philosophical and technical programs in the Soviet Union, notably space flight), for a fascinating account of a utopian intertwining of statistics, computer-like devices, and the life of a planet. Absolutely materialist and organic/vitalist rather than idealist and mechanistic!

<comment><USER7> As a follow-up, I highly recommend [http://monoskop.org/Computing_and_cybernetics_in_CEE#Episode...](http://monoskop.org/Computing_and_cybernetics_in_CEE#Episodes) as a much more detailed account of the history of Soviet hardware and thought about computing, including even the relation to cybernetics.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Love to hear relationship between governments and cybernetics in those days. Like [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Cybersyn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Cybersyn).

The document counts toward the end is mindboggling. And the brezhnev story is delicious.

<comment><USER9> > FTFA: "The project consisted of four modules: an economic simulator [...]"

We have sophisticated physics simulators nowadays but no economic simulator to be found. It's almost as if all those economic formulae are a giant pretense and can't really provide a concrete explanation of how things work as required by algorithms (and people, but you can always fool people - you just can't fool computers).

<comment><USER8> Economic simulation is probably just below weather prediction... not really possible.

<comment><USER9> That's what _I_ am arguing. :)

But your comparison is unfair. It's not about weather prediction, I have no comments about that. But can't we simulate it? Yes we can, I play GTA, sometimes it's raining and my car skids more. That's weather simulation. Where's the economic simulation where I make interest rates negative and ...(fill in the blanks - who knows?)... that's why a simulator would really come in handy.

The difference between physics and economics is physics can use its formulae to simulate what it claims to explain, while economics can't. That makes me think those two sets of formulae are not of the same breed.

<comment><USER8> GTA is a real time crippled approximation of physics, far from a simulation. Maybe economics have no 'one true' model from which equations can be derived, but even if there were such equations, the complexity wouldn't be manageable unless you reduce the precision to the point it's unreliable for real world usage.

<comment><USER9> > GTA is a real time crippled approximation of physics, far from a simulation.

Far? Cars skid in the water. They have different weights. The engine being on the front or on the back makes a difference in how the car drives. They have different acceleration speeds, different traction, and so on. It's pretty good, so I wouldn't call it "crippled".

However, economics can't _even_ make a simulator as good as GTA is for physics. That is pathetic and a testament to its quackery.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This reads like an Adam Curtis documentary (a good thing), and several of the episodes of more famous documentaries touch upon some of the themes here.

The episode of "Pandora's Box" called "The Engineer's Plot" describes the rise of cybernetic thinking in the Soviet Union--less so the early resistance to it. It describes some of the insane rituals that developed out of the entrenched management hierarchies that computing was grafted on to. It effectively shows the endgame of the Soviet cybernetic experiment.

More recently, the episode "The Use and Abuse of Vegetational Concepts" of the documentary series "All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace" describes the development of cybernetics in the US and the resistance to it from environmentalists (outside the scope of the article). It gives portraits of some of the main characters this article talks about, though.

</comment><comment><USER11> [http://goo.gl/ca7UYP](http://goo.gl/ca7UYP)

Mirror for anyone who's getting an error

</comment><comment><USER12> The nomenklatura would invent the most ridiculous arguments ("Condemned as a capitalist tool") to avoid any criticism, to suit their planned programs, corruption, and unjustified spendings.

<comment><USER2> This might be surprising but planned programs of the pesky corrupted nomenklatura sometimes used some science and computing as well. Look at this guy:

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

He received Nobel prize and (horror!) Stalin prize for his work in mathematics and using mathematics for evil planning of economic programs.

<comment><USER12> "(horror!) Stalin prize" "using mathematics for evil planning of economic programs" I hope this is ironic.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Here is another article on the history of Soviet computing:

[http://www.sigcis.org/?q=node/85](http://www.sigcis.org/?q=node/85)

</comment><comment><USER14> Anybody see parallels between this and Stem cell research?</comment>


Evidence of Turkish state violence in pictures - <AUTHOR> http://roarmag.org/2013/06/explicit-evidence-of-turkish-police-brutality-in-pictures/ <comment><USER2> Just to give you a glimpse of better things than saddening photos of police brutality, here is what people did at the Gezi Park in the past 2-3 days:

* An impromptu library was built, here are some photos: <http://gezikutuphanesi.blogspot.com/> (scroll down) with books donated by people and many publishers.

* Women doing yoga at Gezi Park: <http://imgur.com/3kubMll?tags>: <http://imgur.com/3kubMll?tags> (FYI, it is _not_ common to see people, let alone young women, doing yoga in public parks in Istanbul!)

* A number of orchestras giving a classical concert at Gezi: [https://www.facebook.com/dutchrevolution/posts/5801004786774...](https://www.facebook.com/dutchrevolution/posts/580100478677437)

I am left speechless by these events, never seen anything like this in any protest in Istanbul.

And there has many, many really funny graffiti and signs, here's an example: [https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10151695543624468...](https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10151695543624468&set=a.10150304191624468.382994.665339467&type=1&ref=nf)

<comment><USER3> I flew down to Istanbul this weekend to support my friends. Joined in the protests on the front lines - have some photos up: [http://travel.ninjito.com/dump/2013-06-01-Istanbul- Protests/...](http://travel.ninjito.com/dump/2013-06-01-Istanbul- Protests/index.html)

<comment><USER2> Great high-quality photos! Two points I want to underline: (i) the protester- driven excavator in photo 23 is a story onto itself (for those who can read Turkish, the full story can be found here: <http://eksisozluk.com/poma-- 556945?a=today>) (ii) note that all the protesters in the mosque (Valide Sultan mosque, in Besiktas) have not forgotten taken off their shoes, as is the custom, even in that furor, thus disproving that the protests were anti- Islam.

<comment><USER3> A little bit hard to follow the google translation sadly. I was running injured people back and forth into the mosque - what you said about the shoes was totally correct. In the end we had a system that people would meet us at the door to carry in the injured.

At one point an ambulance needed to go through - I ran in front clearing the way, up to where the digger was parked at the intersection.

Someone from the crowd jumped in to start it to make way for the ambulance, and spurred on by cheers, drove the thing forward, over the barricades, and directly into the water cannon trucks, sending the cops retreating.

After making a solid advance of about 500m or so, he was joined by 2 semi- trailers, before he was gassed out of the cabin. As he came down, I sprayed his eyes, and had a good 10 second pause, contemplating if it was worth driving the digger more. Eventually I decided that it wasn't my place (as a foreigner) to drive it, someone else jumped in and took off, and I hopped in the semi-trailer to help the driver who had been gassed.

Shot some video of the digger: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86-r7CVQzF0> and <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZBsdYCOLuY>

and from the truck cab: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSA79KpOSZI>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER2> I've got to say, compared to some photos I've seen on my Facebook feed, these are nothing, many people lost an eye or had concussions when the police aimed the gas canisters directly to their heads at close range (I really don't want to share these, they're gruesome).

The now-famous "woman in red being tear gassed" ([http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/06/03...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/06/03/the- photo-that-encapsulates-turkeys-protests-and-the-severe-police-crackdown/)) photo, taken by a Turkish Reuters photo journalist (who later was wounded himself by a gas canister) has been used as a symbol of the brutality of the police. But wait, maybe this was manipulation on the photographer's part (know to happen) and the policeman did it by accident? Yesterday, the followup shots to that photo were released: [http://fotogaleri.hurriyet.com.tr/galeridetay.aspx?cid=69735...](http://fotogaleri.hurriyet.com.tr/galeridetay.aspx?cid=69735&rid=2&p=1&hid=23434809). Note how the guy is very deliberate in his spraying, angry that this woman had the guts to stand against them.

Lest you think this was just a twisted policeman, let me assure you that the violence is very common. The police has always been violent against protesters in Turkey, irregardless of who's ruling, so this is not a first with AKP. What was interesting, however, was the persistence of people against the onslaught.

If you have a couple of minutes, here's a nicely done video summarizing the Gezi Protests: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=demnc4sQ0VI>

<comment><USER4> > But wait, maybe this was manipulation on the photographer's part (know to > happen) and the policeman did it by accident?

As always you can not now if this exact photo, in its context, had a reasonable explanation. The thing is that the OP shows tens of photos of people highly injured and it cannot be "just coincidence" or bad faith from the photographer.

This photos remembered me the demonstrations here in Spain. Police brutality looks exactly the same. What a shame.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Shocking pictures.

This is converging with alarming speed on an all out confrontation. Turkey is a very beautiful country balancing on the Europe-Asia divide with a lot of internal pressure built up over a long time. If the government keeps pushing like this it will likely reap a lot more than they've bargained for.

The Turks that I've known in my life are tremendously proud and very hard working people, push enough of them around for long enough and all that energy will be directed back at the one doing the pushing.

I really hope that the Turkish government will read the writing on the wall and will change course, if they don't do that then I fear that a lot more lives will be lost.

<comment><USER6> Thanks for the compliments about Turkish people, jacquesm.

I can say that things have improved in the last couple of days; violence of police has been more or less throttled, the local media has started covering the news, and members of the gov't, the deputy PM, the President and even pro- goverment journalists have started realizing the significance of this issue. I would say the main opposition is actually against the PM Erdogan himself now, who has yet to show respect for us. We will see whether he will change his mind in a few days and apologize (not very likely), when he returns from his trip to Algeria.

<comment><USER5> I found it absolutely incredible that Erdogan would leave for a trip to Algeria (of all places) rather than to address these obviously very urgent domestic issues. Whatever he's doing in Algeria I can't imagine that it is more important than to solve the domestic crisis first.

It's almost insulting.

<comment><USER7> It _is_ insulting, that's the point. Erdogan is no stranger to provoking people, and then demonizing them in the ensuing outrage.

Like when he called the protestors 3-5 bandits, or when he called the founders of the constitution two drunkards (and they did drink, but so what?), or when he said "if you have 100 thousand people on the streets, I'll bring out a million" (all easily googleable, don't have time to link now).

His bully-like attitude is partly why he's losing sympathy even among his own supporters and party, which contain a spectrum from conservative-moderates to ultra-conservatives.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Thanks for sharing this and i'm currently in the capital city of Turkey (ankara). I'm one of those protesters.

I can answer questions if someone wants to ask something.

Thanks to HN community for following protests in Turkey.

<comment><USER9> Can you provide some photographic proof that you are who you say you are,

edit: (sorry, the ability to remain anonymous is very important as lives are on the line). You might want to use a throw-away in that case as well because usernames can be tracked.

<comment><USER8> I don't think i can do this.

Maybe you know Turkey as a modern, democratic country but we are not. I'm currently using Tor because of fear. You can face court in Turkey because of just re-tweeting something.

edit: sorry for my english. edited for some grammer mistakes.

<comment><USER9> Ah, well then we'll take it on faith then. Why did you join the protest?

<comment><USER8> Because current government tries to change how we live.

I think government's job is just trying to boost the economy, trying to not get into any war, paying the debts to IMF and etc.

But current ruling party forces our life styles into a shape which they draw.

Just one example:

\- Taksim Square is a famous tourist attraction centers of Istanbul. \- Government first said to bars (pubs): "you can't put stalls on front of your bar." People protested just on facebook and twitter. \- They said: "you can't sell alcohol after 10pm but you can sell other things". Nothing happened. Just some protests but our PM labeled protesters as "alcoholics". \- After that they said: "Nope! No alcohol after 10 PM even for stores. You can't go to pubs, you can't buy from stores." People protested but PM said "So, you wanna raise your children as alcoholics?! We can't let this happen!"

You smell where these is going? Current ruling party tries to divide Turkey in two sides. "Religious good citizens" vs "atheists, lgbts, alcoholics, left- wings" etc.

Someone had to tell them "just because you are ruling party, you can't make everything you want". and we are trying to tell them this.

by the way, sorry for my english again.

<comment><USER10> Is there an article you have seen in the western media that elaborates on what you've said here. I'm not finding my usual sources to be at all helpful explaining what is happening

<comment><USER8> english wikipedia is very comprehensive and up-to-date with even today: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_protests_in_Turkey>

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Um.... any one remember the riots in the UK a couple of years ago? The police shot dead a black suspect, kept the family out of the loop and riots kicked off all over the place. (Yes, there was a lot more to it than that)

Well.... public opinion at the time _wanted_ the UK police to act like these Turkish police. In fact, a lot of people wanted the police to be shooting these youths with plastic bullets, not to mention calling out the army to clear it up.

I wonder if the people who held those opinions are now condemning the Turks? I wonder if this is the sort of thing they had in mind?

<comment><USER12> There was a very clear break between the short lived, peaceful (if hostile) and completely legitimate march following the shooting - and then the full-on rioting that followed.

That said, looking at kweks' photos, it seems there could be a similar thing going on in Istanbul: In the daytime, the protest looks great, peaceful and calm, but at night, they are charging the police in a stolen excavator? The police is definitely wrong to fire CS canisters at head level, but if you're charging against the police in a stole excavator, you've lost the high ground.

<comment><USER13> I don't know how much the excavator was used for overall but there are quite a few times when it ran down water trucks that were actively spraying people. If the protesters were violent towards those in the water truck or were attacking police who weren't violent themselves then they lose the high ground, but destroying property that is used to inflict brutal harm to the people they're meant to protect is justifiable as long as it is done in a way that does not harm life.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> > _These photos reveal the ugly side of the Turkish economic miracle: an > authoritarian neoliberal state willing to kill in order to preserve its > place._

It's good we've got the question of who's the boogieman settled. Nuance is too hard.

</comment><comment><USER14> Those picture sum up nicely to the official response from the official that only 14 people have been injured.

Violence in my neighbouring country has always been high. It is just today the social media allow that to be displayed. Before, the broadcasting was always cutting it off due to goverment censorship. This is just glimpse of the gruesome image of Turkey politians that are ruled by the army. There are far worse example in Turkey that have not seen the cover or day. This is the same in there foreign policy with all the smaller states around them feeling that(armenia, cyprus, syria)

Unfortunately i do not see this changing until the people in Turkey stand up and overthrow the current goverment but that is impossible with out foreign aid as Turkey is a country ruled by the militia.

</comment><comment><USER15> I'm just gonna jump out there and offer a prediction: Erdogan ain't gonna be hold power till 2014.

Most of those victims pictured didn't look like young anarchists/WTO protesters to me... they looked like average citizens. Even if you've got a large contingency of black bloc (I don't know if this is the case and it simply hasn't been pictured), no EU-applicant country can/should be able to get away with such behavior.

<comment><USER16> Turkey is not only an EU–applicant country, it's actively in the process of joining the EU.

<comment><USER15> I know; this is shameful.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I'm still blown away by the quantity and quality of 'citizen journalism' covering these topics. Photos, video, blogs, tweets. We've gotten used to it being a big part but I think the effects are just starting to be felt.

Two years later (and a more developed country) since the Libyan revolution, and the quality of photos is already so much higher.

Give it five more years and we'll have gigapixel photos, live streaming POV cameras (eg glass) and who knows what else. I really think police misbehavior will be improved by it.

</comment><comment><USER18> It's worth looking at the timeline of the photo of the lady in the red dress. It's even more shocking when you see the policeman lurching towards her: [http://lucienballard.tumblr.com/post/52220098289/all- photogr...](http://lucienballard.tumblr.com/post/52220098289/all-photographs- osman-orsal-reuters-brave)

</comment><comment><USER19> It looks like they are actually aiming the tear gas canisters at people's faces and heads. Terrible

<comment><USER20> Here is a video that shows police aiming to head. There are people who lost one eye because of this. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47GDOHJm1cM>

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Wow, we are not seeing this on TV. This cannot be happening in Turkey! This is outrageous and I hope that it encourages more sharing on the internet to educate the world and that people go out in peaceful protests to show the government that they need to be LISTENED to. These people do not look at all as "radical protesters" as the Turkish Gov has made them sound like.

</comment><comment><USER22> How hard is it for civilians to buy gas masks like the police are wearing?

It seems like that would negate most of the tear gas / pepper spray problems.

</comment><comment><USER23> My question is, how long before the peaceful demonstrators turn hostile? If I were there, I would feel like the government has crossed the line into violence and that therefore the crowds have no choice but to defend themselves.

Soon enough, Turkey won't look that different from Syria, if the police keep that up.

<comment><USER24> Saying that "Turkey won't look that different from Syria" is not really a sensible statement. My understanding is that other than the Kurds in the south Turkey does not really have "factions" in it population beyond the normal urban/rural divide. It is not primed for any kind of civil war.

While one could argue that another Arab Spring nation could provide a parallel situation I do not think that any are very similar. Turkey has a history of repression by authority but it has relatively free and fair elections and it is not governed by anything resembling a brutal dictator. What it does have as I understand it is a government that has its base in the rural population and thus does not reflect the interests of the urban population very well.

<comment><USER6> That's right. Turkey had its "spring" in 1920-1930s actually, what is going on is more or less trying to preserve and improve that nature.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Turkey will simply deny that this ever happened but will go on to say that the a large number of the police was also injured and that the number of injured civilian protesters is vastly inflated.

</comment><comment><USER26> What a violence! Why can the police and other law enforcement folk be so brutal against their own people? its beyong outrage.

<comment><USER27> Learn this and don't forget: police serves the state, not the people.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Imagine this clash in the Unitd States. Would the result be more violent or less?

<comment><USER29> <http://youtu.be/45VGFgiFu7Y>

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> I don't think they were trying to hide it.

<comment><USER31> Turk media almost didn't report the news. How would you call that?

<comment><USER30> I would call that my point. The media isn't reporting the news not because the government was hiding the facts, but because the government controls the media.

<comment><USER31> Ok, then I misunderstood your comment :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Al-qaeda goes crazy (Al-qaeda pira).

</comment><comment><USER33> I don't see the problem. This is just like China. Keep sending us cheap textiles and Nest Thermostats, human rights be damned.

</sarcasm>

</comment><comment><USER34> This is awful.

</comment><comment><USER35> Who in their right mind has little kids near a protest? Saw what appeared to be a man wiping a little girl's eyes.

I don't condone violence on any level and I am all for protesting but I would leave the kids with someone I trust and somewhere safe (if that is at all possible).

If I get even an inkling unrest is occurring I would immediately get my daughter to safety (again, if that is at all possible).

<comment><USER36> Sometimes the protest comes near you. Tourists have been kettled in Montreal just walking out of a restaurant or in a park, held for hours without charges laid. It happened quite often last spring.

Also: you're rather quick to judge the parents, yet say nothing about the police that presumably fired at the child. Nice victim blaming.

<comment><USER35> Hence the comments at each end of my sentence - if at all possible. Nice quick to judgment yourself there, sport.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The following is a description (slightly modified) from Dr. Peter Hammond's book: Slavery, Terrorism and Islam:

The Historical Roots and Contemporary Threat.

As long as the Muslim population remains around 1% of any given country they will be regarded as a peace-loving minority and not as a threat to anyone. In fact, they may be featured in articles and films, stereotyped for their colorful uniqueness.

At 2% and 3% they begin to proselytize from other ethnic minorities and disaffected groups with major recruiting from the jails and among street gangs [Europe, Australia, USA and Japan]. Six percent of US prison inmates are Muslim. Like any other minority, they won't integrate, but work to build their own separate community.

From 5% on they exercise an inordinate influence in proportion to their percentage of the population. South Africa's Muslim population is 2%, but they control 35% of the businesses, a large percentage of the banks and have five Cabinet seats while Christians (77% of the population) have none.

They will push for the introduction of halaal (clean by Islamic standards) food, thereby securing food preparation jobs for Muslims. They will increase pressure on supermarket chains to feature it on their shelves (along with threats for failure to comply).

At this point, they will work to get the ruling government to allow them to rule themselves under Sharia; Islamic Law. The ultimate goal of Islam is not to convert the world, but to establish Sharia law over the entire world.

When Muslims reach 10% of the population, they will increase lawlessness as a means of complaint about their conditions. (Ei: car-burnings in France last October.) Any non-Muslim action that offends Islam will result in uprisings and threats.

After reaching 20% expect hair-trigger rioting, jihad militia formations, sporadic killings and church and synagogue burning (India, Mindanao, Philippines). At 40% you will find widespread massacres, chronic terror attacks and ongoing militia warfare [Indonesia].

From 60% you may expect unfettered persecution of non-believers and other religions, sporadic ethnic cleansing (genocide), use of Sharia Law as a weapon and Jizya (infidel tax). (Sudan, Kosovo, Lebanon and Egypt). After 80% expect State run ethnic cleansing and genocide [Western Papua (New Guinea), Iran, Biafra, Turkey and North Nigeria].

100% will usher in the peace of "Dar-es-Salaam" - House of Peace - as in Saudi Arabia, Libya and Yemen.

Islam is the main religion of the Turkish people, where the CIA World factbook states that 99.8%. It has not yet Implemented Sharia law there, you can be sure the unrest will continue there until Turkey is ruled by Sharia law.

<comment><USER37> Member for 1199 days and you post this rant. Seriously, the best thing you can do right now is delete your HN account and not come back.

Edit: Assuming that maeon3 is merely trolling and is not actually deranged, please lets not feed this troll any more.

<comment><USER24> Check out this beauty: "Like slavery in the 18th century, prisons are a necessary evil.." <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5798034>

<comment><USER9> Two can play at the genetic fallacy game Achmed...

How about this abomination of a twitter feed? <http://twitter.com/jmattheij>

<comment><USER24> Sorry, I do not understand this. Who is Achmed? What is the "genetic fallacy game"?

<comment><USER38> I believe maeon3 intended to reply to jacquesm by using jacquesm's past twits, but ended up responding to you.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Pixar Online Library - <AUTHOR> http://graphics.pixar.com/library/ <comment><USER2> I'm loving Ed Catmull's book Creativity Inc at the moment, but I do tend to forget he is PhD in Computer Science who _invented_ texture mapping. The articles are really over my head too.

It is worth noting that Catmull attributes their original publish everything attitude (against an industry standard for trade secrets) as formative in acquiring the talent and industry came early on.

<comment><USER3> Indeed, however Pixar's track record on wage fixing[1] and patent trolling[2] isn't all that great.

[1] [http://www.cartoonbrew.com/artist-rights/ed-catmull-on- wage-...](http://www.cartoonbrew.com/artist-rights/ed-catmull-on-wage-fixing- i-dont-apologize-for-this-105855.html)

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

<comment><USER4> And his legal defense case is "the wage fixing was discovered 5 year ago, this case is essentially the same as a different case we lost against other plaintiffs, so we shouldn't be liable to the other victims also"

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This list is missing my favorite pre-Pixar paper.

[http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~sequin/CS284/PAPERS/CatmullClark...](http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~sequin/CS284/PAPERS/CatmullClark_SDSurf.pdf)

<comment><USER6> And one of the interesting things about that is the paper was written in 1978 but the technology was not really used until 20 years later (Geri's Game, 1997) when hardware was finally fast enough to evaluate the algorithm in a reasonable amount of time.

<comment><USER7> Geri's Game short: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWV3XVhaQsc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWV3XVhaQsc)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Interesting, I don't see anything of John Lasseter in there, not even this gem: [http://www.cs.rutgers.edu/~decarlo/671/readings/lasseter87.p...](http://www.cs.rutgers.edu/~decarlo/671/readings/lasseter87.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER9> In addition to the subdiv papers listed, Pixar also has an open source "OpenSubdiv" project:

[http://graphics.pixar.com/opensubdiv/docs/intro.html](http://graphics.pixar.com/opensubdiv/docs/intro.html)

</comment><comment><USER10> Somehow really fascinating despite being ridiculously far over my head. The pictures help :-)</comment>


Death spiral - <AUTHOR> http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2009/07/death-spiral.html <comment><USER2> Why do costs get created in a company? Generally it seems that we create a cost because we think it will result in revenue greater than that cost or because we think that cost will prevent some other larger cost (such as fines from the gov't).

I'm all for efficiency and maximizing the revenue we gain from each expense but we've still gotta realize that when we cut costs, we're losing something that was intended to generate revenue.

I've seen this happen in a large company where they cut a ton of expenses thinking they are going to be profitable (and they are in the very short term) but all those expenses were there for a reason. A few months later, revenue drops like a brick.

<comment><USER3> I think it's important to look at costs as investments in the business. And if that investment will not yield a good return, why make it?

Buffett famously did this over at Berkshire, where he realized that there would be no future for domestic textile mills. He took the cash flow the company was throwing off and invested it in other companies.

So I think that Godin makes a huge overgeneralization, especially when he mentions newspapers. The economics of that business have drastically changed and allocating capital to keep things the way they are is probably a recipe for failure. They'd be better off using the newspaper's cash flow by cutting current costs and allocating that cash elsewhere (new lines of business)

<comment><USER4> _So I think that Godin makes a huge overgeneralization_

You have basically just summed up Seth's entire blogging history.

<comment><USER5> Its actually impossible to make a good point on the internet without giving someone, somewhere the ability to call it an over generalization. It turns out though, that pointing out exceptions to generalizations is the lamest comment one can make on the internet, because of course, any statement to a wide audience will have exceptions that someone, somewhere on the internet can point out. Pointing out over generalizations is like pointing out spelling errors, albeit less constructive.

You can't get any traffic to your blog if you don't make generalizations, because you won't appeal to a broad, _general_ audience.

Of course, thats all just a generalization ;)

<comment><USER4> _Its actually impossible to make a good point on the internet without giving someone, somewhere the ability to call it an over generalization._

No, it's really not. The Internet gives you the ability to publish as much data and detail as you choose. It allows you to target a selected audience and provide information and discussion topics that relate to a specific audience that would not have been cost effective to reach in the past.

However, if you're more trying to promote yourself or your own "brand" vs. trying to provide actionable valuable data, then yes, you must generalize heavily.

<comment><USER5> Every writer wants to reach more than 5 people in the tiniest sub-segment of any given topic of interest, which is about where you're at if you write generalization-free.

Which is to say that what you wrote is a terrible generalization! Its not always true - its only true for writers that are writing for groups of people numbering less than five.

<comment><USER6> My own writing has adapted to this. I now ONLY make brief generalisations, because I've learned that argument or reasoning or evidence is a waste of effort. People either already agree with you, or as far as they're concerned, you're wrong and always will be wrong. And furthermore you're a fat stupid troll and so is your momma.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Cost cutting can be an effective strategy when all your competitors are struggling as well. The game becomes one of survival, not of growth. Survivors in a market receive a large discrete boost when their competitors fail.

<comment><USER8> Yeah but if you're a local newspaper (which is what this post makes me think of), your competition isn't the other local papers (if there are any). It's Craigslist, Google, etc. You aren't going to beat them because they aren't playing the same game as you. Being the last local paper standing isn't going to win you anything.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> There are two false assumptions in his analogies:

1) That corporations don't already know this: I think most do, and cut their costs on infrastructure, overhead, and process, not on areas that impact quality and customers. 2) That the recession is permanent: Accepting a slow downward spiral temporarily while waiting for a recovery probably could make sense to the risk analysts in some corporations. The trick comes in predicting what the company's losses will be vs. recovery time for the economy, and then the company.

In short, smart companies look at all options. Their long-term cost to keep quality up and maintain customers might actually be more than shrinking for a year or two, then recovering.

Professing that one approach is always the right one is incorrect. It depends on too many factors to generalize.

<comment><USER10> Infrastructure and overhead DO impact customers, just not immediately. Overhead actually impacts more customers than any other single item or department, since it is the total of support costs for all departments.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> To summarize, if your business is in a positive-feedback loop make sure it's one that's going up and not down: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_feedback>

</comment><comment><USER12> This also occurs with semi-public services (at least in the US). For example, the MBTA ("T") in Boston serves largely those without cars: college students, tourists, people with low income. Unfortunately, due to extreme mismanagement, the T regularly decides to cut services and increase fares... and things just get worse from there.

If you're a private business, you have to find a way to escape the spiral. If you're a government service, you need a government that isn't incompetent, corrupt, and myopic.

<comment><USER13> Pubic transport is one of the prime examples of this. We need to save money:

OK we will cut routes, put up fares, reduce number of trains/buses.

So there are now fewer people wanting to use the more expensive overcrowded unreliable service, OK we will have to make more cuts.

Eventualy you aren't actually running any trains but are still paying for all the fixed cost infrastructure.

<comment><USER14> Here in Denver, the public transportation is heavily subsidized by sales taxes. Depending on whose statistics you listen to, 20-40% of the cost of running RTD comes from farebox revenue (the rest comes from mostly a sales tax levy and some from federal grants). City route buses get about 4mpg, and they use so much fuel that every 1/10 of a cent rise in diesel comes out to $100,000 annually.

The worst waste is required by ADA. AccessiRide (those short buses for the severly handicapped) cost RTD about $45 per trip.

<comment><USER13> Subsidizing public transport isn't necessarily bad - if there were no buses how much sales tax would it cost to build enough bridges/freeways/parking-lots etc so that everybody could drive into downtown. What about in Manhattan?

The point was that it is one of those areas were making cuts to save money gets counter productive very fast.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I wonder what prompted this.

<comment><USER16> Given it's basically one paragraph of advice stretched over 5 I'd guess it had something to do with the need to write something every day.

When you create artificial deadlines like that for yourself (as he does) I'd imagine most of your writing is done more out of obligation than inspiration.

<comment><USER15> Oh, I know that latter well enough. I used to blog for AOL (Weblogs Inc), and it's the reason I left.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> extending your cash flow runway does not have to mean degrading your product

<comment><USER18> After reading the article I felt myself thinking "meditation is far easier than field leadership, Mr. Godin", but he does have a point. To his defense, I would say that the first indicator of growth is found in your own mind. If you _think_ you're headed for better things, none of these difficult times will matter; you would still run your business, frugaly of course, but you would also have that life-giving spark, the hope necessary to see far into the future. I would say take his positive energy and run with it!

Heh, listen to me, meditating.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> When a company is struggling, reversing the trend through sales growth is usually _not_ the answer. That's certainly an important component after the emergency turnaround stage, but you have to get the business on a stable cash flow footing before doing that, and that means intelligently cutting costs.

There are many, many businesspeople who think "selling more" is the best way out of a turnaround situation. Most of them fail.

</comment><comment><USER20> Newspapers should never have disbanded their R & D Departments...

<comment><USER21> Not all of them have:

(old-ish article, but I think it's still around)

[http://www.niemanlab.org/2009/05/at-the-new-york-times- prepa...](http://www.niemanlab.org/2009/05/at-the-new-york-times-preparing- for-a-future-across-all-platforms/)

but not nearly enough kept them alive, or ever had them in the first place.</comment></comment>


Why the US is collapsing - <AUTHOR> http://falkvinge.com/2008/03/why-us-is-collapsing.html <comment><USER2> Being an economics major in college, I have to say it's not BS, but it's tactical, not strategic in it's thinking. Politics and greed will keep the worst case scenario's from happening. A crash of the level he's talking about wouldn't take down just the US, it would effectively trash the entire world economy; possible, but highly unlikely.

<comment><USER3> As another Eco Major I think I agree with you. The problem is that runs on banks are like a giant prisoner's dilemma. Everyone is better off getting out if there is a problem, and no worse off if there is not. What he is talking about is similar, and even if the politicians from the other countries realize what is happenning, they will probably be more likely to do what the people want so they can an keep there jobs and be on top during the depression than to try and save the world economy and end up out of office.

<comment><USER4> I agree that it is like a prisoner's dilemma. Perhaps more like the iterated version which does actually allow for cooperation to be the optimal solution.

I think countries holding large amounts of US dollars have a large incentive to talk up its value while quietly selling it off.

However those countries can probably use their influence over the US dollar to influence US policy and perhaps that is a benefit they have factored into to their currency holdings.

I'd say the chances of a collapse are unlikely unless the US decides to play 'chicken' with its creditors and is unwilling to align its spending and earnings.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Very interesting article, However I don't know enough about global economy to assess whether he is right or not. He does make some pretty big assertions and accusations though.

Anybody know whether this is right, total b.s. or somewhere in between?

<comment><USER6> near-total bs with a moderate grounding in fact

<comment><USER7> That's pretty much what I was going to say.

To be more specific, though, the author is right that there are a lot of dollars out there being hoarded because the USD is the global standard currency, and that its fall from that status will have some interesting consequences. Pretty much every other factual claim of the article is nonsense. His explanation of fractional reserve banking is upside-down. He pulled the conjecture "if the interest rate is 4%, then 4% of all credit will default" from the deepest recesses of his rectum. The assumption that the economy will revert to the state it was in just before the end of Bretton Woods reads more like the lazy premise of a short story than an economic theory.

<comment><USER6> Yep. I actually was somewhat credulous until he got fractional reserve banking backwards (getting a $1000 deposit with a 10% reserve requirement means you can lend out $900 of it, not that you can magically lend out $9000 that you don't have), and then it was all downhill from there.

There are a lot of relatively decent arguments that the US economy is in for a prolonged recession, but I would group the article with the crazy goldbug paulites rather than with legitimate, usually fairly well-reasoned economic criticism with which I disagree (Krugman, etc).

<comment><USER8> That actually isn't strictly true; you could loan out that 900, which gets spent by the person you loaned it to, and can then could be redeposited by the person who sold him something, _in the same bank_. And this can be repeated up until it asymptotes off, which (from memory), with a 20% reserve requirement, would occur at $5000. You can do the math on your own for a 10% reserve (I'm guessing it happens at $10,000, which minus the original $1000 is the author's $9,000).

<comment><USER9> Its a geometric series. In math: Let r=(1-reserve requirement) and Total = 1000 * sum(1-r^n,n=0,infinity) = 1000 * 1/(1-r)

Now I'm probably wrong with my indices because I'm a little confused about connecting my infinite sum to people running around at the bank. If I plut in .8 for r (the same as the comment above used, I get 1/(1-.8)=5, or $5,000 so I'm right that far. For 10% its: 1/(1-.9) = 10 or $10,000. So the author is right in numbers, but arguing against this would be ridiculous. How could any bank guard against this? Why would they want to?

<comment><USER8> I didn't say a bank would want to guard against this; I just said that a 10% capital requirement isn't really a 10% capital requirement.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'm an European and the US economy is holding some of my money hostage :-)

I have $8000 that I got from selling some stock options of mine. I let it remain in the US for a couple of months because I needed to get some information from my bank and never had the time to call them...

When the dollar started sinking, I decided to wait because the dollar has its ups and downs. BAD DECISION! Now I will lose 1/6 of the money when I transfer it to my local currency.

</comment><comment><USER11> Wow. It started out quite well reasoned and then, making larger and larger leaps of logic, ended in "stock up on gold and ammunition". I found myself adjusting my tin-foil hat on a regular basis.

I think I liked them more when it was "Music was meant to be free".

</comment><comment><USER12> A "we're all going to die" article? On the Internet? No way!

</comment><comment><USER13> People are arguing about whether or not this is true, but the whole thing is laughable mainly for trying to be a justification for IP violation.

As for the "collapse"...always look to the fundamentals. Demographics, natural resources, culture. Not that that's reasurring.

<comment><USER14> I think dismissing the article as laughable only on the basis of the IP violation is an unnecessary insult to an otherwise well thought out article. Oppose it on the basis of what it argues for, not the (very light) rhetoric.

<comment><USER13> I'm not opposing it. It's just that articles like this are a dime-a-dozen lately. It sounded like any other, with the main distinction being a comical "This is what the pirate party is all about" line tacked on.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> !HN

</comment><comment><USER16> What about the unsaid scam of the day, that the US banks have actually tried to con other nations banks into paying for their crisis, by fraudulently selling 'financial products' that were in effect nothing more than black holes.

If you buy something that is unfit for the propose it was marketed, then that is fraud.

</comment><comment><USER17> "News of my death have been greatly exaggerated" -Mark Twain

[I live in the USA. All clear and normal so far. Just a couple of yuppies making less money than they have grown used to.]

<comment><USER18> It is not the yuppies that decent people care about. A yuppie who's revenue goes down 20% will simply keep driving his BMW for another year before buying the next one. Nobody's (except luxury products manufacturers) heart is breaking for them.

But working class people who lose 20% of absolute revenue in a year? Out goes their health insurance, no more saving, and things get ugly pretty fast. And any society who ignores this deserves to go down.

You can judge a society most not by how it treats his most powerful members, but by how it helps the least powerful. And in a society as rich (in all senses), inventive and powerful as today's Western World, it is a pity that we cannot offer our least able dignity in their life. Economically difficult, you say? Give me a break.

<comment><USER17> I live with my own tunnel vision, embedded as I am in an academic environment.</comment></comment></comment>


Can You Be Too Old For Software Development? - <AUTHOR> http://java.dzone.com/articles/can-you-be-too-old-software <comment><USER2> you should move into contracting and plan your exit stategy!

<comment><AUTHOR> yup

J.O.B. -> contracting -> online business -> 4 hour workweek</comment></comment>


Discover the saltiest users on Hacker News and look up your salt score - <AUTHOR> http://hackersalt.com <comment><USER2> This is pretty interesting. The saltiest comment for each user is like reading reddit or youtube comments. And its hilarious to see dang rank #2 in total salt, even if he is typically the opposite.

Then I searched for myself and didn't even rank. Gonna have to up my jerk game or forever be known as a nice guy.

</comment><comment><USER3> In the comments, it would be nice to have a link to the original comment for context.

<comment><USER3> [Too late to edit.]

Some comments like the second in the main page:

> _Discussed 7 months ago: (435 points /163 comments)_

are helpful, not salty.</comment></comment>


Tesla's readying a 'million mile' battery that could greatly lower cost of EVs - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/14/21258650/tesla-million-mile-battery-catl-china-kilowatt-hour-cost-range-improvement <comment><USER2> This article is pretty low quality. The claim that the new million mile battery technology is coming to the China Model 3 first is not supported by a source and contrary to what people who follow this stuff closely have been saying.

The partnership with CATL is rumored to be for providing Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP) cells for made in china Model 3 & Y. The million mile battery technology is rumored to be a combination of technologies that Tesla will use to manufacture batteries themselves w/o a partner. The million mile battery will probably be reserved for their higher end models in the near term while they continue to use Panasonic and CATL for some time while they ramp up production of their own cells.

The best source for info on all this that I've found is YouTube channels like Hyperchange

[0] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KB-yc- lVExw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KB-yc-lVExw)

<comment><USER3> _This article is pretty low quality._

Yes. First, who's doing this? It sounds like Contemporary Amperex Technology Ltd in Ningde, Fujian Province, is providing the batteries. But there's no press release from them.[1] Also, their stock went down a bit today,

CATL is the world's largest lithium battery manufacturer. They produce about 40GWh of battery capacity a year, compared to Tesla's 35GWh or so. CATL has been roughly doubling production each year for the last few years. Their output is not exclusive to Tesla. They've mostly targeted China and European car manufacturers. They're building a huge battery plant, bigger than Tesla's "gigafactory", in Germany.[2]

If this is real, it's all about CATL.

[1] [https://www.catlbattery.com/en/web/index.php/news/lists](https://www.catlbattery.com/en/web/index.php/news/lists)

[2] [https://www.electrive.com/2019/02/04/catl-plans- up-100-gwh-b...](https://www.electrive.com/2019/02/04/catl-plans-up-100-gwh- battery-factory-in-germany/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Reuters confirms this: [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-autos-tesla- batteries-exc...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-autos-tesla-batteries- exclusive/exclusive-teslas-secret-batteries-aim-to-rework-the-math-for- electric-cars-and-the-grid-idUSKBN22Q1WC)

</comment><comment><USER5> What kind of lifetime do people assign Tesla's current-day packs?

It certainly seems like, based on the 450k mile "Tesla Taxi"'s experience, assuming no faults, they're certainly good for ~300k but that's just one data point (and of course they had a faulty battery, too).

IIRC the warranty on my Model 3 pack is for >70% retention after 8 years/100k miles, but in real world experiences, they don't seem to degrade much past the first 10k miles. We're over 30k miles and the life is basically exactly what it was at 10k.

But I don't know what the commonly-expected "pack lifetime" is. I have seen the owner surveys out to 100k-150k miles and the lifetime still looks good at that point. And of course they've been through a lot of revisions over the years.

<comment><USER6> I'd like to know the strategy for maximizing lifetime. If typical use is about 30 miles per day that leaves a lot of room for strategizing. Should I charge it every night, every other night or every third night? Should I keep it charged to 80% all the time, or should I let it go down to some minimum level first before plugging in?

<comment><USER7> Keep it above 40% and below 80% and you should be good. The damage is mostly done during charging so setting your max level to 80% and leaving it plugged in is about the best way to go.

The main thing to look at is the floor. Keep the battery from going too far below 40%. (I believe past 20% is where damage really starts to happen).

Other tips to keep the battery happy are things like driving slower, using chill mode, etc. Fast discharges damage the battery so eco driving is usually good for the battery.

AFAIK, LiPoly batteries don't really suffer from any sort of memory effect. So there is no harm in not fully discharging. The one catch is that your BMS can get out of whack if it doesn't see 10% and 90% for a while. So occasional charges up to 90% or 100% are not a bad thing to recalibrate the BMS.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> An estimate last year claimed Tesla's costs were ~$160/kWh[1]. This article suggests by end of next year, <$100/kWh. In percentage terms that's a big improvement, but even going by last year's estimates, only $8k out of the $40k price tag of a standard Model 3 is actually accounted for by the battery. So if that $8k drops to $4k, I can imagine the car price dropping to say $35k. But not more than that.

[1] [https://insideevs.com/news/400529/tesla-battery-costs- droppi...](https://insideevs.com/news/400529/tesla-battery-costs-dropping/)

<comment><USER9> I know Tesla has the best batteries of an EV in mass production, but that price seems really high. I found this article last year talking about VW paying <$100/kWh.

[https://www.electrive.com/2019/09/09/id-3-batteries-cost- vw-...](https://www.electrive.com/2019/09/09/id-3-batteries-cost-vw- under-100-per-kilowatt-hour/)

<comment><USER10> Batteries vs Battery Packs. Lots of extra stuff goes into the pack(cooling, wiring, frame, monitoring/charging electronics ext). Not sure exactly what Tesla's breakdown is, offhand don't think I've seen them release ever release the info.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This article's shadiness aside..

Battery tech just continues to amaze me. Right now the cheapest EVs are in the same price ballpark as mid-range gasoline cars, and range anxiety is fading fast.

I always thought that EVs would get "as good" as gas cars eventually but now I'm realizing that they may surpass them by a long shot. In the not-too- distant future an EV may cost way less, require far less maintenance, be cheaper (and greener!) per mile, be faster and safer, and have a longer usable lifespan, than a gas car. Amazing stuff.

<comment><USER12> > In the not-too-distant future an EV may cost way less, require far less > maintenance, be cheaper (and greener!) per mile, be faster and safer, and > have a longer usable lifespan, than a gas car.

While this sounds great I seriously doubt that this is going to happen as it is directly against interests of car manufacturers. As confirmation I like to bring Nissan Leaf example as it is on the market for a long time and is suffering from battery degradation - and guess what - despite fact that car is working fine battery replacement is not easily obtainable and not cheap, examples:

[https://www.autonews.com/sales/nissan-leaf-buyers-dealers- wo...](https://www.autonews.com/sales/nissan-leaf-buyers-dealers-worry-about- replacing-worn-out-cells)

[https://www.reddit.com/r/leaf/comments/9l0pjo/first_gen_leaf...](https://www.reddit.com/r/leaf/comments/9l0pjo/first_gen_leafs_replacement_battery_just_went/e737uoc/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> We don't really know all this stuff yet. Tesla will have a 'battery day' where we will get actual information. So far this is all speculation. I have heard so many different potential options and improvements, non of it is that well founded.

However Tesla does certainty have some strategy vertical integration and they are doing interesting things. They know that batteries is the competitive advantage and they are pushing that very hard.

</comment><comment><USER14> Does that mean a single battery could be reused for a second car when the first car is worn out?

<comment><USER15> Same thing happens with ICE vehicles. Engine swaps are common on models where the engine outlasts the body- e.g. snowy states where cars rust out, and dirt bikes where the bike is often totaled in a crash long before it wears out and then parted out as spares for racers who blow engines.

<comment><USER16> I've seen transmission swaps more than engine swaps - they seem to fail more frequently in ways that they can be rebuilt. As for the frames themselves, I think modern car frames last a lot longer than the did in the 70s and 80s, even in snowy climates.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> note - article is from the verge</comment>


Femometer: Intelligently Track and Measure Your Monthly Cycle - <AUTHOR> http://www.femometer.com/ <comment><AUTHOR> Femometer is an intelligent Basal Body Temperature (BBT) thermometer that syncs to your phone, tracks and predicts your cycle, and alerts you to important natural changes in your body. The compact and portable device is for every woman, whether you're tracking your period, timing your cycle to prevent pregnancy, or getting ready to start a family.

Using Femometer is as simple as taking your temperature in the morning. To get an accurate reading, take your temperature orally when you first wake up in the morning, before you even sit up in bed. After using Femometer, your unique temperature data is sent directly to your smartphone which will produce comprehensive and easy-to-understand charts about your health. Femometer can be set to notify you of your period, fertility window, PMS, and when it's time to see a doctor.

The Femometer includes an intelligent tracking algorithm that learns to detect even the smallest fluctuations in your fertility cycle. With Femometer, women everywhere are empowered to understand their own bodies through data.

<comment><USER2> A lot of women don't realize that their monthly "birth control bleeds" are actually fake-periods. Chemically-castrated women's cycles are nothing like those of non-medicated women.

Your FAQ could point out that the device is incompatible with chemical castration, but that it should work with the drug-free copper IUD.</comment></comment>