How To Peel Banana Properly - <AUTHOR> http://jonathanturley.org/2009/07/09/the-proper-way-to-peel-a-banana/

<comment><USER2> I've been doing this for years, and there are a few benefits.

Aside from opening easier than the other way, the stringy bits all stick (mostly) to the peel better than the other way.

I think there were a few more reasons why this is better, but it's been so long since I've opened a banana the other way, that I forget.

From what I recall, humans are the only animals to eat a banana from the wrong stem end. How are we the ones who got this wrong?

<comment><USER3> me tooo it's so obviously correct and I totally learned it from animal planet.

it also lets you easily discard the nasty bit on the end

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I have been doing this for years, but can't talk family into it... Yes, there have been multiple discussions.

</comment><comment><USER5> In this, I defer to the expertise of monkeys worldwide.

^^^ How many things can you say that about? ;)</comment>


Why charging for access to news sites won't work - <AUTHOR> http://daringfireball.net/2009/07/charging_for_access_to_news_sites

<comment><USER3> Gruber quotes Upton Sinclair: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it."

A beautiful quip. This really hits to the heart of old media's problems; there are so many jobs in so many media giants devoted to advertising, distribution, and management that have suddenly become somewhat unnecessary and even counterproductive when operations are moved online. But good luck finding a man among them who advocates giving himself a pink slip.

<comment><USER4> The opening of a frontier means that the adventurous idealists go there first.

Once the possibilities are clear, those who seek fortune over adventure follow suit.

And after the tide has turned, only the most emotionally attached, deeply- rooted or unable to adapt remain in the old places.

In any case, those left to turn off the lights are unlikely to be the most reasonable.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is the money quote:

"Undeniably, there is money to be made in digital publishing with free reader access, but whether that revenue leads to profits depends upon the scale and scope of the organization. The potential revenue does not appear to be of the magnitude that will support the massive operations of existing news organizations. What works in today's web landscape are lean and mean organizations with little or no management bureaucracy — operations where nearly every employee is working on producing actual content."

<comment><USER6> There certainly is a management bureaucracy in MSM, but this is not specific to the so-called old media. But I think there is yet a bigger expense - <USER2> you do original reporting or investigations, that will cost you a lot of money to do properly. On the contrary, he is a blogger who probably just sits home most of the time, watching media and react to them in the form of commentaries.

Now, I don't mean it in the derogatory means, it's perfectly ok to make money by blogging, but still...his perspective is rather limited and there is still a difference (in terms of business) between really covering news and just blogging about them.

<comment><USER7> I've wondered about that myself. Up until the last two years, it seemed like there was a symbiotic relationship between mainstream news outlets and bloggers where the old line media provided the facts (and a fair helping of bias) and the new line media commented upon, fact-checked and elaborated and recontextualized. About two years ago it seemed like the balance tipped and all of a sudden the old line media was reduced to verifying and validating stories that were already out there in a big way. I do know that there are blogs that do original reporting but it seems like there exists a place for an organization that is trusted to check out the ground truth of some of the more speculative stories.

I don't want to live in a media world where it is impossible to tell if an article of financial news is a scandalous revelation or was just made up by someone who thinks that the elders of zion meet under a tree on wall street.

<comment><USER8> I'm not worried about the death of the news organizations, it's journalism I'm worried about.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm not sure if that's really the problem. I'd hypothesize that if you needed to type in a credit card number, name, address, etc. into a badly designed interface every time you saw a newspaper for sale, they wouldn't sell a lot of them, either.

</comment><comment><USER10> Reminds me of one of my favorite sayings about this topic:

"People pay for atoms, not bits"

<comment><USER11> Software. World of Warcraft. Text messages. Phone calls. Your gym membership. The $20k of digital goods in your IRA. Brand-name goods (the name is bits, not atoms). Ambiance. Experiences. Charity. Politics. Gift cards.

People pay for bits _all the time_. Don't be afraid of charging for them!

<comment><USER12> What people won't pay for is management and distribution of bits. If your job is to make sure that a bunch of atoms get from Point A to Point B, then sure. It's challenging. If your job is to get bits from Point A to Point B, then the magic word "scalability" becomes your job description. If you're not delivering those bits for near zero cost, then what are you good for?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> For a good example of a succesful online news pay site, check out Stratfor.com.

They've picked out a good niche area (international political, military, and economic news), and have a team of writers who scan and filter down news sources from around the world.

While it's pretty clear that tradtional newspapers are being challenged, nobody really knows what form the news business will take in the future.

It's up to entrepreneurial people to make it happen: "the best way to predict the future is to invent it"

</comment><comment><USER14> The future of online content is in aggregation.

Traditional news orgs that are making the unnecessarily painful transition to online news need to slim down their operations. Simplify. The future is distributed media. Fire half your staff and pay independent news sources for content.

Arrington has a breaking story about Twitter planning to colonize Mars? Business Week likes that bit of news, and pays him for sole distribution rights. That's cheaper than staffing a tech biz writer that is inevitably going to miss out on some big stories.

In the end, the way to make it is going to depend on the way you allow your users to access content. Format, quality, etc. You have to drive users, period.

Control the content, control the users. Pay for good content, not for good writers.

<comment><USER15> I don't get it. How is paying a writer for sole distribution rights cheaper than a staff writer? Keep in mind you've got to compete with other organizations shopping for the same story. Isn't there going to be a very small time frame for finding content worthy of an exclusive deal? When you have writers on staff you're usually aware of what they have in the pipeline and can plan accordingly. You may not necessarily have that kind of access to a freelance writer who could potentially be selling stories to your competitors.

I also don't understand the part about a staff writer inevitably missing some big stories. Can't a freelance writer potentially miss out on the same stories? Again, there's also the problem of being in position to buy the story with your plan. I would imagine in that scenario the odds are much higher that stories will be missed.

There are a lot of holes in this plan. If it was that easy I don't think old media would be in so much trouble. I don't think they're ignorant. I think they're well aware they have a problem, but haven't been able to come up with an acceptable solution.

<comment><USER16> Can't speak for the OP, but if you have a choice between having one full-time person looking for stories vs. 100 writers and bloggers pitching you stuff, maybe the odds of you finding a scoop are better in scenario #2. And maybe the competition to get picked up will drive prices down so the stories themselves are cheaper to buy a la carte rather than as prix fixe.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I love DF, and this is a decent piece, but John doesn't cite a lot of much more developed thought on the subject. If you care, start with Jay Rosen (<http://journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/> ; <http://twitter.com/jayrosen_nyu> ) and Clay Shirky (<http://shirky.com> ; <http://twitter.com/cshirky>).

<comment><USER18> I can second at least one article by Clay Skirky "Thinking the Unthinkable"... Its not just that the newspapers and MSM have a revenue problems, its that we are in the early going of a radical change in the very institutions that, in the past, sustained and maintained the culture. It is going to take years to reform new institutions and its doubtful that anyone can say with any certainty how it is going to turn out. Welcome to the new reformation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> ... I for one do think the Newspapers can make this work if they all do it at the same time.

This would imply that all the real decisions are made by just a few key individuals ... which is exactly the structure of Newspaper companies in the first place. Murdoch and friends.

\---

Take for instance Paul Graham's solution to Patent Trolls[1].

PG advocates an industry wide protocol not to employ anyone who worked for a Patent Troll firm. A coordinated strike here is what Paul is talking about, and Newspapers are shortly attempting a coordinated restricting of free-to-air content.

The first steps have already begun. Times Online (UK) has restricted content for Mobile devices (try it). I cannot access editorial comment on my phone, browser at work is fine.

\----

[1] <http://www.paulgraham.com/softwarepatents.html#f8n>

\---

This John Gruber article is a circular argument.

It smells a lot like ::

"Newspapers don't belive in my set of acceptable bussiness models"

.... ergo ....

"They will not make money because they didn't use an acceptable business model"

</comment><comment><USER4> Also, because newspapers compete head-to-head with television news organizations in the online world. I think this was one of the major original reasons why the newspapers felt they had to go online for free in the late 90's.

TV news organizations have much less concern that free online news articles will cannibalize their profit center.

</comment><comment><USER20> Part of the problem is that the products are not completely interchangeable. I used to buy the NYT or WSJ 3-4 times a week -- but my use case was either reading the paper at lunch or on the bus ride home. Online versions don't work as well for that. (The Kindle would, probably, but I don't own one, and won't buy one for that purpose.) OTOH, I use online news sources when I want to read a story or scan for headlines, things I seldom if ever did with physical papers.

</comment><comment><USER21> I think Mr. Gruber has a very good point when it comes to general news sites, but several specialized sites do quite nicely with at least limited pay walls. <http://sqlmag.com/> comes to mind. Other sites take a "freemium" approach quite successfully such as <http://www.arstechnica.com> .

</comment><comment><USER22> I'm not sure TPM is a useful model for much of the old media. I don't think anyone is worried about the viability of Washington-based quasi-partisan editorials. The costs are low, and there are political rewards in investigating opponents. But TPM doesn't have an Iraq bureau, and the real question is if their model could even support one.</comment>


Things I Learned in 2019 - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/fluxx-studio-notes/52-things-i-learned-in-2019-8ee483e6c816 <comment><USER2> I need to try this Baijiu, can any recommend some you can get in the States?

<comment><USER3> As someone currently in China, this comment made me laugh. I don't think I have ever craved it.

That said, you should try it anyway. I hope you like getting drunk. Personally, the flavor reminds me closer to the chemical alcohol you might find in a science lab more than anything else. It typically starts at 40 proof and goes up from there.

<comment><USER2> Man that sounds awful, but I still have to try it. Why is it the most popular liquor on the planet (according to this article)? No one seems to be saying anything good about it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Wowzas! Love this list as always</comment>


Ask HN: Need some help in database design issue - <AUTHOR>

Just thought to ask it here in case someone has already gone thru this issue before.
I am going to have a catalog of about half a million to one million products.
On a day to day basis there will be updates to this products, maybe their description or rating will change.
New products will added everyday.
I need to show things on my website like most popular product, product which is getting more popular (some sort of trending etc.)
Now my doubt is how to store all this information in the database.
I can store the product information in a table in MySQL. When the daily batch update happens, append the new rows to the table. I need to keep the old rows as I need the historical price and rating information.
From this master table run jobs which will take some time to create statistics like most popular products etc.
The website runs against this summary table.
I am using Python and Pylons for the frontend. I will use celery for creating the jobs.
I also need to provide full text search on the product catalog which I think will need to go against master database which might have a million rows so will be quite slow. Is there any other way for it?
So is there a good way to store this kind of historical information in the DB and create trend based reports, full text search for some catalog that gets updated on a daily basis? <comment><USER2> Since I just asked a similar question... you might want to try codereview.stackexchange.com :)

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi Kevin,

Can you give me the link for the question you asked. I am getting lots of search results when I go to the codereview site.</comment></comment>


Warner Bros. wants to build a $100M aerial tramway to the Hollywood sign - <AUTHOR> http://www.latimes.com/business/hollywood/la-fi-ct-hollywood-sign-sky-tram-20180710-story.html <comment><USER2> I try not to rant on this site but I can't help myself here so I'm sorry:

The whole _point_ of the sign is you can see it from far away. If you look at it from the street in downtown Hollywood or whatever, you are experiencing the sign as it was meant to be experienced.

For people who... for some reason... want to go RIGHT UP to the sign... or behind it... sigh — This is an interesting compulsion which I normally would not judge. But we're now talking one hundred million dollars and untold materials and effort... to help visit... a SIGN. Literally just a sign that says, "Hollywood." Up in some otherwise beautiful nature.

To enable this dysfunctional behavior with this kind of money and technology is nuts. Go to the beach. Go for a hike. Come up with some other utterly unimaginative scheme to visit an object you saw on a screen.

Sometimes it is better NOT to apply technology to a problem. Let's NOT make this easier to accomplish. It's pointless, thoughtless behavior with no worthwhile reward.

To quote an actor named Will Ferrel dressed up as an imaginary fashion star named Mugatu, "Doesn't anyone else notice this? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!"

("I invented the piano key necktie! I invented it!!")

<comment><USER3> The Apple and Google HQs are literally just offices and laboratories where people work.

JPL and Kennedy Space Center are just hangars and launchpads where we send rockets into space.

Yellowstone is just a spot on the earth where a bunch of water comes out.

Different things appeal to different people. For some people, getting to visit the Hollywood sign up close is a big deal, especially given the importance that Hollywood films have played in influencing American and international culture. (Hollywood is _huge_ overseas. The sign is literally what billions of people first think of when they think of America. New York and the Statute of Liberty are a close second.)

EDIT: The view of LA _from_ the area below the sign is also pretty great. That view is likely to be just as much part of the attraction as getting up close to the sign. There is only one other easily accessible spot where you can get a view of LA like that (and currently the only spot where you don't need to hike): the Griffith Observatory.

EDIT: The other great view of the LA basin is Inspiration Point in Alta Dena (north of Pasadena), which is a 2-12 hour hike round-trip depending on your fitness level. On a clear day, you can see out to the Channel Islands to the West, and Orange County to the South, and Malibu to the North.

<comment><USER2> There are _amazing_ things going on at those HQs, JPL, Space Center, and Yellowstone. This is a sign.

<comment><USER3> It's a sign representing the Hollywood movie industry, which almost everyone in the world loves. To them, the sign is just as amazing as the HQs, space centers, and national parks. I happen to think all of these things are amazing, which is why I include the sign in this august group.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Hope it stays open at night for the incredible night views.

</comment><comment><USER5> > _cost the studio an estimated $100 million, .... take visitors on a 6-minute > ride more than 1 mile up_

Which goes to show the absurdity at play here. There are plenty of ski lifts and gondolas that run around a mile, in MUCH more adverse conditions, with a MUCH higher elevation gain (which is really all that matters) that cost less than an order of magnitude less.

<comment><USER3> A barebones ski lift/gondola isn't what Warner Brothers is going for here.

A fancy, Hollywood-worthy gondola justifying a $25-$30 ticket is what they're going for. Large, spacious, gorgeous views, smooth ride...basically, a premium experience. Not just functional containers but highly stylized/decorated, so that they're immediately recognizable in future pictures of LA. The goal is to create an tramway that is an attraction in its own right, much like the SF streetcars.

Also, there's the matter of minimizing the environmental impact to Griffith Park and routing the tramway to minimize the impact to existing views of the sign.

<comment><USER5> Have you ever been on the Whistler Peak to Peak?

or any other modern gondola?

I'll bet my bottom dollar it's a high speed detachable using doppelmayer bits

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> 1- spend their own money 2- put the visitor center by the start of the tram instead of in the (semi-?) wild area up at the sign

<comment><USER3> RTA. They are spending their own money and there are two visitor centers: one at the start and a sign-specific visitor center already planned for the area near the sign.

<comment><USER6> Yes, they are spending their own money - Sorry I didn't make it clear I was endorsing that action. They also state they will share revenue with the city.

> there are two visitor centers

No, in re-reading the article, I didn't find any reference in the article to a second visitors center - only one near the sign. I think it would be better to only have one at the start of the tramway.

       ...tramway to transport visitors to and from the Hollywood sign, starting from a parking structure next to its Burbank lot.

      ...to a new visitors center near the sign

       ...The visitors center near the sign would educate visitors

<comment><USER3> Oh righto, I'm operating from info beyond just this article.

WB will be building a visitor center in the lot where the tramway will start, as part of the upgrades to their public facilities where they currently have studio audiences wait. They're trying to do what Universal Studios did: make their studios a tourist attraction. As part of those plans, they'll be adding exhibits and other attractions/stores/restaurants, like a minature Universal Citywalk.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Why...

<comment><USER8> RTFA:

"Residents of the hilly neighborhoods surrounding the famed Hollywood sign — the symbol of Los Angeles' signature industry — have long blamed the attraction for worsening traffic, parking nightmares and disruptive tourists.

Now one of the movie and television business' biggest players, Warner Bros., says it has a bold solution."

<comment><USER7> That's not a valid reason, again I ask why?

Investing 100 million dollars, likely displacing some home owners and businesses, inconveniencing those residence and business owners for probably years to actually construct the thing and then actually getting people to use it after spending what will probably cost more like 150-200 million dollars after budget overruns from delays just sounds like an epic waste of time and money. All of this so people can go visit an advertisement that's now missing 31% of its letters for a retail development project...

<comment><USER9> > The 95-year-old studio on Monday told city officials it would foot the bill > for an aerial tramway to transport visitors to and from the Hollywood sign, > starting from a parking structure next to its Burbank lot.

If they're actually going to pay for the entire project it's nowhere near as bad as the city building it.

I bet the root of this is a Warner Bros exec that lives at the top of one of the Hollywood hills and wants to eliminate traffic from his own house.

<comment><USER7> >I bet the root of this is a Warner Bros exec that lives at the top of one of the Hollywood hills and wants to eliminate traffic from his own house.

That I'd believe.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Make people walk it. It's not like most people couldn't use the exercise anyway.

</comment><comment><USER11> Horrid idea. We have friends who live near the sign, which is just an old real estate advert that originally said 'hollywoodland' to encourage development.

It's a nice hilly neighborhood and the sign is best seen from down below not up close. An aerial tramway would be better to some non residential location nearby where they can see the sign and views of LA IMO

<comment><USER12> > the sign, which is just an old real estate advert that originally said > 'hollywoodland' to encourage development.

Oddly dismissive. It's iconic, and no less so because it was originally a real estate advertisement.

<comment><USER13> It's ironic that what's essentially a billboard would get turned into an icon.

It's also kind of sad that Hollywood has so little in the way of interesting landmarks that a billboard is how it's represented.</comment></comment></comment>


GoDaddy Acquires MailChimp Competitor Mad Mimi - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2014/08/20/godaddy-acquires-mailchimp-competitor-mad-mimi-to-beef-up-its-email-marketing-service/ <comment><USER2> I don't know exactly, It is good news or bad to all user of Mad Mimi. I have been using Mad Mimi as my email marketing service and as much as I know, GoDaddy supports SOPA. So, I think This acquisition can be Bad news for us and If Mad Mimi Remain the same just some improvements, Thumbs Up!

Today Morning, I received a main from Gary Levitt confirming that they are joining with Godaddy and Here is the Main That I received: [http://www.techiesmith.com/godaddy-acquires-mad- mimi/](http://www.techiesmith.com/godaddy-acquires-mad-mimi/)

Anyway, We are looking for some improvements of Mad Mimi. As Gary Levitt Says, The Support of godaddy, I also think That, Mad Mimi just took the right path to improve their support but will they still remain free for beginner?

<comment><USER3> Hey there,

Dean here from Mad Mimi (and Gary's brother and partner). Thanks for posting these awesome questions. You bring up some valid points.

Let's discuss SOPA first. While GoDaddy initially supported SOPA they changed their position and now, under Blake, their new(ish) CEO, they strongly support privacy and a free and open web.

The way we look at this acquisition is this: Mad Mimi is going to stay the same. The same people, same developers and same customer support. We'll continue making improvements like we've always done (based on Gary's ideas and customer feedback and inspiration).

We'll slowly build out a deep integration into GoDaddy for their customers and look at new ways to innovate and stay awesome.

We're not going to change and see this as a cool opportunity to be a force for positive change in a larger company. I'm totally open to chatting more about this too - just shoot me an email at dean @ madmimi.com.

Cheers Dean

<comment><USER2> Hello Dean, Thanks for replying on this thread and assuring me that Mad Mimi is going to remain the same as always.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What's the closest one can get to a personal Basic Income with software? - <AUTHOR> If you want to live modestly, cover your basic needs in the smallest fraction of your time possible so you can work on other things, what is the best path to take?
What types of businesses are most suited to that? (Only thing that comes to mind is Bingo Card Creator.)
Where do I find other developers and entrepreneurs shooting for that goal without getting drowned in the spammy noise that the theme of (semi-)passive income brings with it?
I'm not just talking about bootstrapping. I'm talking about making specific decisions so that you can put in time in the beginning but with the clear goal that once you reach a certain monthly recurring revenue, the thing you optimize from there is the time you spend achieving that revenue, not its growth.
Note that the answer "it's impossible" doesn't count. In the spectrum between zero maintenance effort and being a full-time business owner there must be tons of opportunity. What's the lowest amount of hours needed to make X amount of money? Or what's the highest amount of money possible to sustain with Y weekly hours?
And where do I learn about how to do it and find people with the same goal to grow with?
Thanks!
P.S.: if you look for Garrett Dimon's post on Recurring Revenue vs Disability Insurance, you will see how this is not about living the easy life, but having a little safety net when things go really wrong for a really long time. His quote:
"No source of income beats creating something that makes money while you're asleep. Or sick. Or in the hospital. Or busy caring for a loved one." <comment><USER2> There are any number of software entrepreneurs (and, for that matter, insurance agents) who widely vary the amount of time they spend on the business and include many weeks where they look gainfully unemployed.

In terms of what to shoot for, a) recurring revenue (BCC didn't have it and _believe me_ did that radically raise the savviness bar required on the customer acquisition front), b) B2B where something is important enough to need but not enough to require a long sales cycle or urgent support if the thing hiccups, c) a well-understood marketing and sales model that you can semi-automate.

The third thing is probably hardest to build, and as your time scale gets longer, it is the most likely part to require your sustained attention to improve. (I have no information how BCC is doing these days but I rather suspect the original organic SEO strategy which served me well for 5+ years will not continue operating unaltered for 20.)

In terms of where these folks hang out: business owners who have priorities in their life other than the business are still business owners. I think the great mistake in the "passive income" community is failure to treat running a business like running a business; it becomes aspirational for lots of folks who have neither the skills nor the inclination to run a business nor, unfortunately, the desire to change either of those two things.

This makes "passive income" spaces into a whirlwind of depression and hucksterism. Meanwhile, if you ask around the table at MicroConf, you'll find some folks who had a really good year and worked really hard for it and you'll find some folks who phoned it in while taking care of parents, getting married, throwing themselves into a home-building project, starting a new business, etc.

MicroConf, BaconBiz, and DCBKK are three conferences which all had folks who were at many points along the spectrum here. All have online ambits to them, too. (I suppose one could run a not-awful conference about software businesses in maintenance mode but if you have one then flying out to a conference would absorb a few weeks of maintenance mode and be probably a lot more boring than going to MicroConf.)

<comment><AUTHOR> Wow, thanks a lot for taking the time to answer. This is better than getting on the front page.

>a) recurring revenue (BCC didn't have it and _believe me_ did that radically raise the savviness bar required on the customer acquisition front),

Didn't know the savviness gap was that big.

To be honest, I even considered emailing you to ask if doing bingo card software localized to Brazil for instance was a good idea, since: 1) you've trailblazed its SEO and conversion optimization tactics already 2) sold it, so no conflict of interest 3) they haven't to my knowledge localized it 4) there seems to be few competitors in Brazil, and 5) you seemed to have been able to make a decent annual salary from it with ~3h/week if I'm not wrong.

I'm not nearly as savvy to tune something like it to the extent you did though, and the Brazilian Portuguese market is much smaller than the whole internet's English-speaking audience.

So B2B non-critical SaaS sounds like the best bet indeed.

>The third thing is probably hardest to build, and as your time scale gets longer, it is the most likely part to require your sustained attention to improve. (I have no information how BCC is doing these days but I rather suspect the original organic SEO strategy which served me well for 5+ years will not continue operating unaltered for 20.)

That makes a lot of sense. What I like about BCC is that the user-satisfying part of the software itself is so simple and unchanging that you had the time to devote yourself almost exclusively to optimizing traffic and conversion.

It's hard to think of a useful SaaS product that wouldn't require a good amount of code maintenance, stack upgrades, new features requested by users, etc. just to keep the repeat business of the current ones.

As a solo entrepreneur with little time available, splitting it between that and constantly tuning marketing channels sounds challenging. But as you said, a lot of it can be automated.

>In terms of where these folks hang out: business owners who have priorities in their life other than the business are still business owners. I think the great mistake in the "passive income" community is failure to treat running a business like running a business; it becomes aspirational for lots of folks who have neither the skills nor the inclination to run a business nor, unfortunately, the desire to change either of those two things. This makes "passive income" spaces into a whirlwind of depression and hucksterism.

Exactly. I was at my wits end googling around (I might be terrible at googling, who knows) for a community that didn't come off like that. I went so far as proposing one myself under the "4hww4devs" banner ([https://hsribei.github.io/log/4hww4devs/](https://hsribei.github.io/log/4hww4devs/)), hoping the "devs" filter would bring in a more skilled and "business owner"-mentality crowd.

Thankfully I found Indie Hackers, which has taught me a lot so far. And through that post I was reached out to by Matthew Mallard, who started the ##passiveincome channel on Freenode a couple of months ago. I hope being on Freenode achieves the same kind of selective pressure I was looking for.

>MicroConf, BaconBiz, and DCBKK are three conferences which all had folks who were at many points along the spectrum here. All have online ambits to them, too.

I will definitely acquaint myself as deeply as I can with those. Thank you a lot for the pointers, and for the kindness in answering without prejudice.

<comment><USER2> _I even considered emailing you to ask if doing bingo card software localized to Brazil for instance was a good idea_

I'll take the liberty of answering here: it's a terrible, terrible project relative to your goals when you consider the the universe of projects you can ship with the same skill set. Bingo Card Creator is fundamentally a CRUD app which spits out PDFs; life-time value of a customer is ~$30. There are _numerous_ applications which, for the same technical challenge, sell to businesses for $50 ~ $200 per month and LTVs in the $1k ~ $10k range. Do one of them instead.

<comment><AUTHOR> For the same technical challenge? None occurs to me, but I'll think harder about that. Even if other options are more challenging, I guess I welcome the excuse to dabble in Elm soon :) Thanks for the advice.

<comment><USER3> Here's an example: [https://jsreport.net/](https://jsreport.net/)

It may seem like a complicated product, and I'm sure the guys behind it put in a lot of work to polish it, but the guts of the product are 3-4 well- established open-source libraries wrapped together with duct tape.

Here's a shameless plug to something I built, as another example: [https://smsinbox.net](https://smsinbox.net)

patio11 was kind enough to give me some feedback about that when I was getting started. I successfully charge businesses $75+ per month to use it, and although I'm proud of the programming work involved to build it, it is not substantially more complicated than BCC.

EDIT: I noticed your comment on Indie Hackers about not feeling as qualified for B2B since you don't have a lot of experience working for companies. One way to tackle this is to build a product that participates inside a bigger ecosystem (Wordpress plugins are an example, or Shopify plugins or something like [https://baremetrics.com/](https://baremetrics.com/) in the Stripe ecosystem or my thing in the Twilio ecosystem). The awesome side effect of this approach is that it often simplifies distribution, since there are already communities established around those platforms.

<comment><AUTHOR> Curious: are you living off of smsinbox? What do you estimate is the average weekly amount of hours you spend on it?

<comment><USER3> _> are you living off of smsinbox?_

No, not even close :) But the customer base is growing slowly and steadily.

 _> What do you estimate is the average weekly amount of hours you spend on it?_

Under 2, most weeks.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This sounds a lot like what I've done with my SaaS products.

I set out to build a business with the heuristic of "Maximize Jason's Vacation Time". I like to climb rocks, surf and travel through interesting parts of the world, and always found it hard to do that for, say, most of the year every year when I had to work for other people.

So I built a product that brings in recurring revenue, generally sells itself, and has a userbase of technical people who can usually solve their own issues for themselves, and are generally fun to talk to when they need help. Even so, I've also made a priority of automating everything that can be automated, including common customer service things, so that as time goes on there are fewer things that can interrupt my Days Off. (Days Off being defined as days where the sun is out or the kids of off school and I don't need a rest day from climbing or surfing, so hey, let's polish the product a bit).

And yes, as you describe, I've passed up opportunities that would grow revenues faster at the cost of more of my time being taken up by the business.

The one downside is that it took longer this way. It was 4 years before my product stuff could pay my rent, and another 2 before I could properly live off of it, buy houses, raise kids, etc.

But now that it's there, it's kinda nice. I've gone as far as not bothering to bring a laptop on the road anymore for trips less than a few weeks.

I have a blog (linked in my profile) with some possibly useful info, and it seems I do a lot of my writing about this stuff here as well. Searching comments for "jasonkester product" seems to pull a bunch of stuff up.

Good luck!

<comment><AUTHOR> Wow, it's so great to hear that there are people out there who are actually doing this. Congratulations! That's exactly the kind of security I want to have.

Good to know how long it took you. 6+ years requires grit, and although still a bit limited by the RSI, I'm in a personal position where I can have that kind of long-term commitment.

I loved the expat software website, by the way :) It reminds me of an amusing conversation someone on Freenode (##passiveincome) sent me this link to:

myles.io/thoughts/passive-income-hacker-vs-startup-guy

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Glad to see @patio11 thinks the same way. Look at his answer to this:

Q: Why are you bothering with BCC when consulting is so much more lucrative? (I can think of a few good reasons, but I'd like to hear what your reasons are.)

A: I really enjoy being a product guy. BCC has a very desirable property in that it mostly works in my sleep. Consulting is quite lucrative and intellectually engaging, but it often disrupts my life in ways that BCC does not: for example, flying off to $BIG_CITY_ACROSS_OCEAN for a few weeks is wonderful once or twice a year but would get tiresome if I were doing it every month. I very rarely get tired of BCC, and with the exception of a trivial amount of support all of my work for it is at my absolute discretion to schedule. I mean, my little brother is graduating college this spring and, without even looking at the calendar, I can say "Sure, no problem, I'll be there. Tell me the day sometime."

Money is also not a huge motivator for me. I like it, don't get me wrong, but after I've got the rent and necessities covered (oh look, bingo) money generally has to be the icing on the cake to motivate me to do something. (Shh, no telling the consulting clients.)

Source: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2018936](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2018936)

<comment><USER2> Worth mentioning: my desires on what to optimize for have waxed and waned over the years.

<comment><AUTHOR> If it's not too personal, I'd love to know how your, er, personal philosophy has changed over the years.

Is it work that got more interesting, so you don't mind doing more of it, or you found new uses for money you didn't think were important before, or something else entirely?

(Feel free to ignore.)

<comment><USER2> A combination of things: I had a conversation with Joel Spolsky which convinced me that people with the opportunity to contribute a lot to the world have an obligation to do so. (He grounded this in a Talmudic understanding but it largely comports with me as a Catholic, FWIW.) I've found myself vastly more interested in doing work when work impacts meaningful problems that I care about, like e.g. changing hiring in the tech industry or making entrepreneurship a transformatively better experience worldwide. I have at times had some not-so-happy health issues to deal with and when not dealing with them my tolerance for a more traditional workweek is rather higher. As I get increasingly far from my salaryman days, my raw distaste for things-that- feel-like-work declines.

I wouldn't primarily credit attitudes about or desires for money with any of this, though my personal burn rate is much higher now than it was in 2010. (I got married, had two kids, and moved to Tokyo; this makes ~$10k spend like ~$2k used to.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think the short answer is: (1) work for yourself, not as an employee, (2) find a niche market, (3) create a SaaS product for it, (4) outsource tasks like support to other people instead of doing them yourself.

I just recommended this book the other day in a related thread [1], but _Start Small, Stay Small: A Developer 's Guide to Launching a Startup_ by Rob Walling really is a stellar reference on this topic. He is very big on the "grow big enough to have a functional small business (buzzword: micropreneur) but don't grow forever and obsessively". They also have a (paid) forum where you can talk with likeminded devs turned founders.

[1]: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13981490](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13981490)

[2]: [http://www.startupbook.net/](http://www.startupbook.net/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the pointers! I think (2) is the hardest, but I'll try some of the things Amy Hoy publicly shared about her Sales Safari process (can't afford 30x500 yet).

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> You could also get a job that pays well, live within your means, and use the extra money to buy dividend paying stocks and bonds or rental real estate (use a property manager to keep it passive).

</comment><comment><USER7> Honestly, in my experience that would be consulting.

I've personally always failed building anything that people would like to use enough to pay for it, and I've seen many people waste (or invest) about 10x what they would put into consulting to make less than minimum wage (or even 0).

Yet, I'm still trying.

<comment><USER8> I would agree. I built something people liked enough to pay me for, and it even gave me a basic income. But I was on call all the time and generally working a lot for like 1/4 what you get working for other people around here, and going home at six.

My experience was that I could slack off and work less than full time, but doing so would damage the business and then I would have to put in a lot more effort.

I mean, if I was better at business, it would have perhaps been different. As it was, it was full time work for about what I earned when I was 17, and on top of that, finding a job after working exclusively for my self was rather harder than doing so after sporadic contracting gigs.

<comment><USER7> Nice.

May I ask what your project is/was?

What difficulties did you encounter?

<comment><USER9> [http://prgmr.com/xen/](http://prgmr.com/xen/) Xen-based VPS

Look forward to hearing Luke's answer - as a fellow sysadmin eneterpreneur, he's been a real inspiration (even though I'm in a different line - training).

<comment><USER7> I don't hate it, but that's a really crowded and competitive market, uh?

:-)

<comment><USER8> This is something else I want to write about. Starting a really different service is a lot harder to sell, and I knew going in that selling is what I am worst at.

Also, when I started, most of the competition was using UML or OpenVZ. Xen was unquestionably superior to those technologies for multi tenant systems, so one could argue that this market wasn't as crowded in 2005

Of course, I was big into the idea of a commodity product. Like I said, competing as a commodity requires less marketing skill. Instead of talking someone into trying something new, you start with something they already are using and then just point out the advantages of your implementation, which can be as simple as the blog I posted in the other comment.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Great source of bootstrapping information see the videos

[https://vimeo.com/user12790628](https://vimeo.com/user12790628)

</comment><comment><USER11> indiehackers.com is a great place to start looking at ideas. I've recommended it on a couple of threads, but it's worth a look.

<comment><AUTHOR> Indeed! I take back what I said previously. There has been positive response and even someone who's done before giving me hope it's possible:

[https://www.indiehackers.com/forum/post/-KgG2eMQ4Sv9wWUc4SKJ](https://www.indiehackers.com/forum/post/-KgG2eMQ4Sv9wWUc4SKJ)</comment></comment>


The Belt CPU Architecture - <AUTHOR> http://ootbcomp.com/docs/belt/index.html <comment><USER2> I got to talk with Ivan after he gave an earlier version of this talk at Asilomar and the good news was he's the real deal, pretty much every question I could think to throw at him he had a solid answer for, the bad news was I felt the same way about the Mill architecture as I did about Intel's iapx432 architecture [1], which was elegant to a fault.

That said, I got the sense that this was what Intel was going for when they did Larrabee [2] and just missed because of the focus on Graphics. Unlike Larrabee is suspect OOTBC will need to build it themselves like Chip did for the Propeller [3].

That said, the challenge of these bespoke architectures are the requirement for software, or first a GCC port :-). I believe Ivan said they had a port that talked to their simulator, but I don't know if that was an optimizing thing like SGI's compiler for Itanium or a proof of concept thing.

The weird thing is of course "Why?", and one might say "But Chuck, faster and cheaper, why not?" and I look at the explosion of ARM SoC's (cheaper, not necessarily faster than x86) and look back at ARM and think 99% of this was getting the ecosystem built, not the computer architecture. So who can afford to invest the billions to build the eco-system? Who would risk that investment? (Google might but that is a different spin on things).

So playing around with the Zynq-7020 (same chip that is on the Parallea but not the Epiphany co-processor) I can see a nice dual core ARM9 where you have full speed access to a bespoke DSP if you want for the 'tricky' bits. Will that be "good enough" for the kinds of things this would also excel at? I don't know, so I don't know how to handicap OOTBC's chances for success. But I really enjoy novel computer architectures, like this one and Chuck Moore's '1000 forth chickens' chip [4] (it was a reference to the Seymour Cray's quote, "Would you have 1,000 chickens pull your plow or an Ox?"

A really interesting time will be had when 'paid off' fab capacity is sitting idle and the cost for a wafer start becomes a function of how badly the fab wants to keep the line busy.

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_iAPX_432](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_iAPX_432)

[2] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larrabee_(microarchitecture)#Di...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larrabee_\(microarchitecture\)#Differences_with_CPUs)

[3] [http://www.parallax.com/propeller/](http://www.parallax.com/propeller/)

[4] [http://www.colorforth.com/S40.htm](http://www.colorforth.com/S40.htm)

<comment><USER3> I'll try to address some of the questions and issues raised here; the Mill has been more fully discussed on comp.arch, and there is more material at ootbcomp.com/docs. Sign up at ootbcomp.com/mailing-list to get announcements of additional videos, white papers etc as they become available.

<comment><USER4> I just signed up. Can't wait to see more of this!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> First off, I love the post! Super meaty goodness.

I read-ish the whole set of slides and it sounds pretty good (the devil is always in the details), but I got a little worried about VLIW-ish issues when [in the slides] he said on slide #57:

        The compiler controls when ops issue

One of the big issues with VLIW was that the compiler had to be intimately aware of processor architecture. So when you upgraded your '886 to a '986 you needed new binaries because the '986 had more registers or executions units. [I assume Itanium fixed some of this, but it also sunk my interest in VLIW.]

Is this architecture going to face the same issue?

Edit: I watching the video and heard that "nearly all of what the super scalar is doing is [not calculating]". One of the other VLIW issues was that chip area was dominated by cache-area, so all the stuff about [not calculating] shrank and shrank relatively as cache area grew (see: [http://techreport.com/review/15818/intel- core-i7-processors](http://techreport.com/review/15818/intel- core-i7-processors)). This claim concerns me.

Edit V2: but damn... Exciting stuff.

<comment><USER6> As someone who worked on operating systems back at Multiflow (late 80's, the first VLIW start-up as a spin-off from Yale research), it struck me recently that something like an LLVM representation of binary code might solve the "compiler problem" (needing to know the exact specifics of the chip's latencies). I.e., you'd run and load LLVM binaries, and have a runtime final optimization pass that took into account the specific latencies of each opcode for a particular implementation. (The LLVM architecture is actually already set up to do optimizations at runtime on LLVM "binaries".)

But perhaps that "final optimization pass" would be nearly as hard as the whole compilation problem in the first place; dunno. I wasn't on the compiler team, so this is perhaps a naive viewpoint.

<comment><USER7> > The LLVM architecture is actually already set up to do optimizations at > runtime on LLVM "binaries".

Pragmatically, exactly how fast is that run-time optimization? Could you realistically JIT it, or should the more-optimal, chip-specific asm be cached between loads? Or is this so slow you'd only ever want to do it once?

<comment><USER6> Right, forgot to say that: you'd cache the results (like Rosetta translation on the PowerPC or the DEC VAX-to-Alpha binary recompilation) so you'd only take the translation hit once.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I like this guy and his presentation style, it is good to see someone delivering seriously on an old idea: queue machines. (The "Belt" is the queue machine model revisited. I can't see a theoretical breakthrough here). But the Mill's realization that combines a queue model with VLIW and embedded spiller machinery is worth attention.

Some criticism however: no sign yet of how variable latencies in memory will be tolerated. Requiring fixed latency for FUs is problematic with cache misses and FU sharing between pipelines. Also his comparison between a 64-item belt and the 300+ registers of OoOE is unfair, since the 300+ registers will likely tolerate more latency than the smaller belt.

I wrote a review of what I get from his first two talks here: [http://staff.science.uva.nl/~poss/posts/2013/08/01/mill- cpu/](http://staff.science.uva.nl/~poss/posts/2013/08/01/mill-cpu/)

<comment><USER9> Nice post; I had the same thought of using promises for memory access. I guess you could extend that to a massively-parallel design (promises for communication).

I _think_ Torben Mogensen posted the same basic idea of replacing registers with 'temporal addressing' to Usenet back in the 90s -- comp.arch? comp.compilers? Boy, it's been a long time.

<comment><USER8> Every successive incarnation of dataflow scheduling uses a matching store and synchronization tokens on long-latency operations. You have them in Tomasulo's reservation stations at a very small scale (considering FUs as unpredictable), in the MTA throughout the memory system, in the D-RISC core of my research group, and quite a few others.

It's quite a common and recurrent idea really. However promises / dataflow tokens / I-structures / etc all are subject to a common flaw / problem: when you receive multiple completions simultaneously, which of them are you going to schedule first? This choice is highly non-obvious and has tremendous impacts on data locality.

<comment><USER9> Thanks. Idle curiosity: do you know any introductory refs about that question and its impact? (which to schedule first)

<comment><USER8> Sure, the best reference is the paper by Culler et al. from 1992/1993:

David E. Culler, Klaus E. Schauser, and Thorsten von Eicken. Two fundamental limits on dataflow multiprocessing. In PACT '93: Proceedings of the IFIP WG10.3. Working Conference on Architectures and Compilation Techniques for Fine and Medium Grain Parallelism, pages 153–164. North-Holland Publishing Co., Amsterdam, Netherlands, 1993. ISBN 0-444-88464-5.

A preprint is available as tech report CSD-92-716 from Berkeley: [http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/Pubs/TechRpts/1992/6259.html](http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/Pubs/TechRpts/1992/6259.html)

<comment><USER9> Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Wow, the one submission I've made anywhere that hit the front page, and I'm kicking myself for the title. 'Belt' is really their name for the category of machine architecture in the sense of register and stack machines. 'Mill' is the name of their specific architecture/family.

As far as the meat goes, I'm gratified that I'm not the only one to think this is mindbogglingly elegant. I see some misconceptions in this thread, but I'm finding it difficult to explain the divergences without beginning to inexpertly regurgitate large portions of this and the previous talk (on their instruction encoding).

</comment><comment><USER10> As someone who has worked implementing the same algorithms on a VLIW DSP (TI C64x) and ARM and x86 a few comments after watching the beginning of the talk. It's been a while so this is from memory...

The different VLIW execution units can only process a subset of the instructions set. That means you need the right mix of instructions in your algorithm to take advantage of the full throughput. If you have any sort of serial dependency you won't be able to take advantage of all the execution slots. It basically excels at - signal processing (and even a subset of that). That said, when you hit the sweet spot it's pretty good.

When someone like TI compares their DSP to ARM they usually tend to ignore SIMD (very conveniently). SIMD (NEON on ARM or SSE on x86) can buy you almost another order of magnitude performance on those super-scalar CPUs if you're dealing with vectors of smaller quantities (16 bit or 8 bit). So while on paper the VLIW DSP should blow the general purpose superscalar out of the water for signal processing algorithms at comparable clock rates it's not quite like that when you can use SIMD. It also takes a lot of manual optimization to get the most out of both architectures.

So when you're in the VLIW's sweet spot your performance/power/price is pretty good. But the general purpose processors can get you performance in and out of that sweet spot (you're probably sucking more power but that's life).

You really can't look at "peak" instructions per second on the VLIW as any sort of reliable metric and you need any comparison to include the SIMD units...

EDIT: Another note is that for many applications the external memory bandwidth is really important. The DSPs benefit from their various DMAs and being able to parallelize processing and data transfer but generally x86 blows away all those DSPs and ARM. I guess in a modern system you may also want to throw the GPU into the comparison mix.

<comment><USER11> Both SIMD and VLIW are techniques that only work on programs with a good amount of statically accessible instruction level parallelism, but VLIW is much more general since it can be used in cases where you know in advance that you want to be executing a number of instructions in parallel, rather than one instruction multiple times. The programs that can be sped up by SIMD are a subset of the programs that can be sped up by VLIW, are a subset of the programs that can be sped up by OoO engines. Of course, SIMD has a big advantage in instruction bandwidth vs VLIW, and if you're already going OoO the SIMD instructions only use up a minimum of the OoO engine's resources. Combining VLIW and OoO, on the other hand, is very difficult to do.

<comment><USER10> Agree.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Very interesting that the architecture has no condition codes, or any global state for that matter. Also, that the belts are logical, in that there really isn't a chunk of memory where the belt lives, but the members of a belt live where they live and know "which belt" they belong to and "where on that belt" they are.

Too bad they can't release their emulators/simulators, but I sympathize with their desire to be first-to-file to protect what sounds like years of work.

<comment><USER3> Exactly :-) We will be publishing as fast as we get the filings done.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> This looks fascinating - and "the real deal" (not crackpottery) but I'm hesitant about a number of items.

It seems like quite a reach to pick a 'latest and greatest' IA processor (why is this $885? Because it _can_ be) as a point of contrast. We can hit half the performance envelope and/or about an eighth the price while keeping many of the features that make a desktop processor what it is (like, for example, a whopping big cache hierarchy). Picking on x86 seems like a good way of overstating the case; if we're getting a new architecture, we may as well pick on ARM or Tilera or what have you.

Am also, as an early believer in the Itanium, somewhat nervous about static scheduling for any purpose. Dynamic branch prediction is very accurate on today's architectures; this does not mean that static scheduling can emulate this accuracy and enjoy the benefits.

</comment><comment><USER4> This was a very nice presentation indeed. Too bad they could not tell us how they handle the memory hierarchy. Because that part is crucial for any statically scheduled architecture.

Also the implementation of the belt itself could be quite nasty. Just look at the face of the guy who asked about it after he hears the answer. ;-)

Finally, they will not get anywhere near peak performance with general purpose code. The parallelism is just not there at the instruction level. They would do well on high performance computing or digital signal processing with enough floating point units and memory bandwidth.

Instead they seem to target big data. An interesting move. It will be interesting to see actual performance numbers (even from a simulator). I wish them luck.

<comment><USER3> We consider the Mill family to be general-purpose, with the same potential markets as any other GP architecture (x86, ARM, zSeries, PowerPC, etc.). Individual family members can be configured for particular markets; the Gold mentioned in the talk is indeed somewhat Big Data oriented, with eight ALUs and only two FPUs. A High Silver, with six FPUs and a SIMD height of 256 bits, is an FP banger. A Tin, with one ALU, no FPU, and 8-byte SIMD, is at the low end.

There is an architectural minimal size to Mills; there must be at least one ALU and one memory unit, and all Mills must use a 64-bit address; the z80 market is safe from us, and you won't see Mills in your toaster or thermostat. There's no architectural maximal Mill, but there are diminishing returns; in current process technology we feel that eight ALUs are getting close to that edge, but those decisions are made independently for each market and process.

Ivan

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> At 17 mins in, when he talked about rename registers, it reminds me of SSAs. It's quite fascinating to see that something like that happens in the hardware level as well

<comment><USER15> My first thought was "Huh, that sounds like an architecture that would map perfectly to LLVM's SSA IR". Can't wait to watch the video now!

<comment><USER14> nah it's a different thing. He says general purpose processor architectures have so many rename registers because of single assignments. He then proceed to talk about percentage of data being Single Assignment.

Therefore, it's better to use a statick-sized queue structure. Hence "belt" \- it's like a conveyor belt.

I'm still watching it though. The topic is interesting but man, his voice is droning.

<comment><USER16> What he's talking about there isn't SSA. In SSA you never assign to a variable more than once. Instead you shadow the existing variable with a new version.

Converting to something akin to SSA (but not quite the same thing) is actually what he's talking about superscalar architectures doing in register renaming.

That said, just because you use an SSA IR doesn't mean your code generation doesn't require register renaming. But it would be a very good basis to generate code for this architecture.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Interesting idea. A limitation of the temporal addressing is that variables live on entry to a basic block have to be put in the same position on the belt on _each path_ which could enter the block. This is okay for loops, but it's going to require lots of shuffling about in conditional code. Still could be worth it, of course.

<comment><USER4> They will probably do lots of if conversions to avoid this and to make use of the 33 issue slots. They could also add special instructions to push several values on the belt to keep different paths aligned.

<comment><USER3> Bingo!

Ivan

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> This feels like a functional architecture. It's really cool.

</comment><comment><USER19> I don't get how this is different than an in-order register-based VLIW architecture, except that it makes branching more difficult to deal with because you need to synchronize belt-deltas between branches (which sounds like the dual of a register move to me)?

I work daily with a VLIW architecture and the only place I ever see a plain "move" instruction is in loops. Everywhere else, the compiler just churns through the registers as if they were in a belt anyway – just the names are absolute instead of relative.

I can imagine this might simplify the processor logic some – results are primarily read from one of the first few belt locations, and are always written to the first location. "Register moves" aside, is this the primary benefit?

</comment><comment><USER20> My takeaway from this presentation:

\- To achieve instruction-level parallelism, traditional architectures (his example: Haswell) often employ very messy techniques like register renaming which create a huge amount of complexity increasing power-consumption.

\- He has focused on one such technique called Very Long instruction word (VLIW), and has taken it to an extreme: the technique he proposes is to throw away general purpose registers, and replace it with a "belt": a write-once linear tape of memory (implemented using stacks).

\- He then points out various advantages of this model, including in-order execution (ILP traditionally requires reordering), short pipeline, and overall simplification of architectures.

All this looks fine on paper, but I don't see a proposed instruction set, or any indication of what realization of this model will require. In short, it's a cute theoretical exercise.

So, let's look at what the unworkable _problems_ with Haswell are, and what's being done to fix them. Yes, nobody can seem to be able to figure out how to reduce power consumption on performant x86 microarchitectures beyond a point. It's a very old architecture, and I'm hopeful about the rise of ARM. The solution is not to throw away general purpose registers, but rather to cut register renaming and make ILP easier to implement by using a weak memory model (which is exactly what ARM does). ARM64 is emerging and the successes of x86 are slowly percolating to it [1]. Moreover, the arch/arm64 tree in linux.git is 1.5 years old and is under active development; we even got virt/kvm/arm merged in recently (3 months ago), although I'm not sure how it works without processor extensions (it's not pure pvops). ARM32 already rules embedded and mobile devices, and manufacturers are interested in taking it to heavy computing. In short, the roadmap is quite clear: ARM64 is the future.

The core of the Linux memory barriers model described in Documentation/memory- barriers.txt [2] (heavily inspired by the relaxed DEC Alpha) should tell you what you need to know about why a weak memory model is desirable.

[1]: [http://www.arm.com/files/downloads/ARMv8_Architecture.pdf](http://www.arm.com/files/downloads/ARMv8_Architecture.pdf)

[2]: [https://github.com/torvalds/linux/blob/master/Documentation/...](https://github.com/torvalds/linux/blob/master/Documentation/memory- barriers.txt)

<comment><USER21> A weak memory model has almost nothing to do with ILP.

To exploit ILP, ARM has to do the same thing as every other register architecture: move to a superscalar out-of-order architecture. There's no real alternative. The weak memory model makes cache coherency protocols simpler/faster, but won't save you from false register dependencies.

Three-address code _might_ make it possible to defer the costs of complex register renaming, but ARM has discovered the importance of code density, and Thumb-2 (2-address code) is preferred for most functions.

<comment><USER20> I see. Can you explain to me how it fixes the power consumption problem? Yes, I know that it needs to reorder instructions to achieve ILP, but isn't that the entire point of a weak architecture? To reduce the memory barriers and weaken the ordering constraints, making it easier to reorder?

What are false register dependencies? And how does a three-address code help in register renaming?

Some reading references would help. I'm currently reading [1].

[1]: [http://www.rdrop.com/users/paulmck/scalability/paper/whymb.2...](http://www.rdrop.com/users/paulmck/scalability/paper/whymb.2010.07.23a.pdf)

<comment><USER4> The ordering constraints of memory models are foremost between instructions that are executed on different processors. As long as instructions execute on a single processor, everything appears to execute sequentially (even if it doesn't).

The real cost of weak memory models is in software. Programmers that write multithreaded code need to understand the memory models. And few actually do, because these things are not trivial. So you gain a few percent of performance with a weak memory model and at the same time you dramatically restrict the number of programmers who can write correct code. A very bad deal.

Hennessy, Patterson: "Computer Architecture, A Quantitative Approach." is the standard introduction to computer architecture.

<comment><USER20> What?! Linux provides me memory-barrier primitives: smp_mb(), smp_rmb(), smp_wmb() etc. Even an everyday Linux hacker does not need to understand the peculiarities of each architecture, because the locking peculiarities are all abstracted out in commonly used spinlock_*() interfaces. Any sane compiler- writer would use these primitives too: so, unless you're writing raw architecture-dependent assembly, or are a very hardcore Linux hacker, you do NOT need to understand this.

Linux supports Alpha, which provides the weakest ordering guarantees anyway, so no: any architecture stronger than Alpha puts absolutely no burden on anybody. In practice, weaker ordering constraint means more freedom for Linux.

<comment><USER4> Sure, if you use a portable set of primitives you only need to understand how and when to use those primitives and only the relaxed memory model they are based on. But even that is a lot to ask for, and too much for many programmers.

And this particular solution only works inside the Linux kernel and only using GCC. It doesn't matter what we think a sane compiler-writer or a sane computer-architect would do. Many times we just have to live with the choices other people made.

I think you got something wrong here. Architectures with strong memory ordering put more burden on the hardware and less on the programmer. That was the point I was trying to make: weak memory ordering is not worth it, because it is better to let the hardware do the hard work and not to burden the programmer with it.

Linux may work well with relaxed memory ordering, but that does not come for free, a lot of people had to understand first, what a relaxed memory model is, etc.

<comment><USER20> > weak memory ordering is not worth it, because it is better to let the > hardware do the hard work and not to burden the programmer with it

My question is very simple: why do we have architectures that reorder aggressively if the performance gain is not worth it? CPU manufacturers do understand that weaker guarantees leads to complexity that must be handled at the software level: so, are they mad? The fact of the matter is that we have been moving away from Lisp machines, CISCs and "human" instruction sets to RISCs, because the kernel/ compiler is in a much better position to make optimization decisions than the hardware (it can see the bigger picture).

These architectures exist, and the infrastructure to handle all this complexity has already been written (yes, all major compilers too [1]). Yes, a lot of people had to study a _lot_ to get us where we are today, and the success of our little iPhone apps stands on the shoulders of those giants.

I seriously don't get what software complexity you're whining about. Complexity is not the exception in Linux; it's the bloody rule! Have you seen the fs/ tree implementing various filesystems? Perhaps the kernel/ tree with the state-of-the-art scheduler? Or even the net/ tree implementing TCP/IP?

I'm not interested in discussing some hypothetical idealized textbook world where everything is simple and elegant: I'm interested in contributing whatever little I can to tomorrow's concurrency infrastructure.

The mammoth question in the room has still not been answered: how does ARM manage significantly lower power consumption? Aggressive reordering (=> weaker guarantees) seems to be part of the answer.

[1]: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory_ordering#Compiler_suppor...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory_ordering#Compiler_support_for_hardware_memory_barriers)

<comment><USER4> > Are CPU manufacturers mad?

No they are not. But in the early 90ties when most of these decisions were mande, the situation was very different. Processors got twice as fast every two process generations. Shared memory multiprocessors were an exotic niche. But then we hit the power wall, and all of a sudden shared memory multiprocessors became the norm. Today, you can not just wait for a new processor to make your program magically faster, you have to rewrite it. If you asked the same people who took these decisions in the 90ies today, many would (and many actually did so publically) say that they regret this decision.

On, complexity. Yes, software is incredibly complex. That's why you don't want to add even more complexity to it!

> How does ARM manage significantly lower power consumption?

Easy, ARM is targetting the low power market. So they don't need to build the fastest chip. When you try to build the fastest chip, energy efficiency suffers a lot. Once ARM starts to compete with Intel on performance, their power usage will skyrocket.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> This guy looks and is awesome! Can't wait to have them produce many-core Mill CPUs, that I'd like to throw algorithms onto. Then I'm gonna Buy Buy Buy

</comment><comment><USER23> This reminds me a lot of SSAs. This is really really cool stuff. One of those genuine progress type things in this space.

</comment><comment><USER24> This strikes me as a further progression of the idea of register windows; in particular the SPARC architecture.

</comment><comment><USER25> Wow, this addresses quite a number of my concerns with aging CPU architectures, specifically with throwaway registers for fundamentally low- latency operations like chaining ALU functions.

</comment><comment><USER26> Is there a simulator for this available somewhere?

</comment><comment><USER27> What would be the ideal language to compile to this?

<comment><USER28> Fortran or numerical code in C. It seems best suited for statically unrollable loops with few data-dependent branches or random memory accesses.

<comment><USER29> C expects addressable registers. From what I can tell this doesn't have those!

It really does seem like a Lisp would map much better, with the whole caller/callee and those private data belts that looked like hardware level closures!

<comment><USER11> To elaborate on what knz42 said, C expects addressable memory but doesn't say anything about registers at all. In fact, the existence of registers is sort of vaguely awkward from the perspective of C's model of computing.

<comment><USER30> > doesn't say anything about registers at all

Considering that C has a "register" storage-class specifier keyword, I don't see how you can make that claim. Granted, modern compilers ignore it.

Certainly, the C specification states that "register" storage is non- addressable, so it does say something.

<comment><USER31> That "register" nowadays is just a sequence of characters that, to those familiar with CPU architecture, rings a bell. Modern C standards do not convey any links between the keyword and hardware registers. [http://www.open- std.org/JTC1/SC22/wg14/www/docs/n1124.pdf](http://www.open- std.org/JTC1/SC22/wg14/www/docs/n1124.pdf), section 6.7.1:

 _" A declaration of an identifier for an object with storage-class specifier register suggests that access to the object be as fast as possible. The extent to which such suggestions are effective is implementation-defined."_

And 'non-addressable' only applies to the C 'runtime'. The standard does not say anything about the hardware.

For example, a C compiler for the 6502 could attempt to store variables of storage class 'register' in the zero page. Such storage locations have an address, but you are not allowed to take it from standard C.

For an even better example, look at [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TMS9900](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TMS9900). That CPU stored all its general purpose registers in RAM.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> After Bret Victor's inspiring talk yesterday, it's fitting to see a new CPU architecture make it to the top of HN.

Keep it up! Maybe tomorrow we'll see an idea to replace threads and locks.

<comment><USER33> You can replace threads and locks, if you use non-blocking programming techniques.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non- blocking_algorithm](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-blocking_algorithm)

<comment><USER32> With massively parallel hardware, concurrency is the biggest challenge facing programmers today. It's a terrible programming paradigm. And your Non-blocking algorithms only add complexity to an already difficult problem. For example, I've seen NBAs lead to a priority inversion bug.

Did you even watch his talk? I didn't see anyone arguing against Bret's scaling concerns with threads in yesterday's HN comments.</comment></comment></comment>


Living in denial: When a sceptic isn't a sceptic  - <AUTHOR> http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20627606.000-living-in-denial-when-a-sceptic-isnt-a-sceptic.html <comment><USER2> Awesome post. He did a good job of outlining the difference.

I'd add one piece -- it goes both ways. On the other side of the skeptic is the true believer, which knows that the current consensus or opinion is correct and is just looking for reasons to confirm his belief. This is the scientific malpractice the leaked emails reveal.

Both of these positions suffer from the same problem: they already know the answer before the conversation (or experiments) even begins.

By the way, these topics go way beyond climate science, or even politics. These are the same types of conversations we have in technology teams about things like TDD, or linux versus windows. There are lots of opinions and consensus (or not) but most times what we really should do is have an open mind, create a theory, perform an experiment, see what works, and adapt. Many times teams would rather argue than do this. This is because we (technical people) suck many times at being able to politely disagree.

The same problems we see with skeptics and true believers in climate science are the ones we see all around us everyday. To me understanding and being able to work these kinds of conversations have much more immediate and useful value than the types of compression algorithms Google uses on its databases.

<comment><USER3> Right, but the term "climate change skeptic" ought not to exist, because following the evidence where it leads ought to be default position of everyone.

Also it's interesting that in that particular debate, there are "deniers" but no "zealots". It's only one side that feels the need to label the others. That ought to set the alarm bells ringing.

<comment><USER4> Bot sides accuse the other side of all sorts of things. Your statement is simply false.

In fact, doesn't a denier automatically, by his mere existence, claim that "the others" are "zealots"?

<comment><USER5> No.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> "Either evolution and the big bang happened or they did not; both matters can, in principle, be solved with more data and better theory. But the right form of taxation or government cannot be answered with more data and better theory. They are ideological positions that are established by subjective debate."

If you don't adjust your views of taxation and government based on data, nobody should ever listen to what you have to say on politics (or anything else). I'm trying to find a more charitable way to read this, but there really is none. Presumably, if he supported some tax policy, being shown a dozen nations that subsequently implement the policy and face unmitigated economic disaster would do nothing to shake his faith in it.

<comment><USER7> One's policy views might be based on morality, in which case one might not change them based on facts. An example:

I oppose torture. You can show me 100 nations which ban torture and then suffer from preventable terrorist attacks, and it won't change my view. I would choose to ban torture even if it stops law enforcement from preventing some terrorist attacks.

Some people hold similar views on taxation, redistribution, the welfare state, etc (i.e., "tax is an immoral act of theft, regardless of economic benefits", or "the welfare state is a moral imperative, regardless of economic harms").

<comment><USER4> I find that hard to believe. Surely there is some limit that would change your mind? Maybe if it would save 1000 lives per month? Or one million lives per month?

I suspect you don't have any hard data on the impact of torture. Not saying that torture is good, just saying that even in your example, science might change your mind.

<comment><USER8> This is a bullshit argument. Torture does not save shit and it is good for nothing.

What if destroying the earth would save the universe?

What if Batman wanted you to torture someone?

What if cutting off the eyelids of a brown person meant that unicorns would walk the earth?

What if I snuck into suburban households and cut up humans for body parts so my nanobots could learn regeneration techniques? What if the nanobots could reanimate all the dead humans after I cut them up?

The reason it is bullshit is because you can put anything in the place of torture and justify it by saying it "saves lives". But for some reason, the arguments that we want to justify this way always boil down to freeing ourselves from the shackles of morality. It is the will to power dressed up in the clothing of public policy.

What kind of life are we saving? Is there anything we value more than life?

<comment><USER4> Learn to read. I didn't say that torture is good. In fact, I don't have any data on it at all. Just saying that data might still affect one's opinion.

What if you family was abducted and locked into an air sealed room, and the culprit was caught by the police. Your family has 1 hour left before air supply runs out. Would you still be against torture.

Again, I can't stress this enough: please read carefully. I am not advocating torture. This discussion is not about torture at all.

<comment><USER8> I know how to read. The concept I am criticizing in your argument is "data". And I am saying that taking a statistical approach to these questions is misguided.

"Maybe if it would save 1000 lives per month? Or one million lives per month? I suspect you don't have any hard data on the impact of torture."

I didn't say you were advocating torture either. I am trying to show by example that this decision calculus can be used to justify all kinds of evil nonsense, torture being one example. You can always generate counterfactuals of this form to justify anything... so this method of justification is meaningless.

I don't know why you believe that we are not talking about torture. Maybe you don't know that you are presenting a family-based reformulation of the exact same ticking time bomb scenario used by Alan Dershowitz to justify torture. You are reusing these arguments, so maybe you should think about exactly what these arguments have justified in the last ten years.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ticking_time_bomb_scenario>

It's true, though, that you are not talking about torture per se. What you are talking about is weighing some count of human lives against a moral imperative not to do some evil thing. Torture usually stands in for that evil thing because up until very recently, everyone agreed that it was so evil that the kind of weighing you are talking about would not be countenanced.

Let me tell a story that may explain what I am getting at. In 1984 (the year), a feminist named Carol Cohn went to a military school to learn about strategic nuclear concepts like mutually assured destruction, first strike, credible second strike, counterforce weapons, etc. What she found was that as she became immersed in that world, she learned to make similar kinds of artificial weighings of the destruction of cities against the loss of second strike capability. The decision calculus she learned to use allowed her to think about nuclear weapons in terms of numbers and geography rather than in terms of human life ("collateral damage").

"If I was unable to speak my concerns in the language, more disturbing still was that I also began to find it harder even to keep them in my own head. No matter how firm my commitment to staying aware of the bloody reality behind the words, over and over, I found that I could not keep human lives as my reference point. I found that I could go for days speaking about nuclear weapons, without once thinking about the people who would be incinerated by them."

<http://www.buildfreedom.com/tl/tl07aa.shtml> (the whole article)

I suggest you should not be acquiring "data" at all on this question. The only things the data could tell you would be artificial and dehumanized.

<comment><USER4> Not sure I understand what you are getting at - what exactly has been justified by the "ticking time bomb" experiment? I am not arguing for bad science.

I am also not using the ticking time bomb as a general example to support torture - I was just challenging the original posters assumption that his morals were unchangeable.

Nevertheless it is nonsense to refuse to weigh lives against each other. For example, in big building projects, there is presumably an inherent risk that innocent people will die in accidents during the building process. Yet the decision is often made to build (perhaps build a hospital?). Or take streets - thousands of people die in road accidents every year (and probably many more are killed by exhaust fumes), but apparently society has decided their lives are worth sacrificing. If the decision wasn't conscious, I'd argue it would be an improvement if the decision were made consciously.

Also, nuclear weapons are a real problem. They don't go away by simply not thinking about them. Frankly it might be a good thing that there are other people than feminists thinking about it.

Lastly, I think morals are just a poor workaround for having no sound theory for why a certain kind of behavior is beneficial. The more morals can be replaced by reason, the better for society, in my opinion.

Morals may have a good reputation, but in some other countries people get stoned to death for immoral behavior. Since morals have no scientific foundation, at times we might be ashamed about our own behavior a couple of years later, when understanding improves.

<comment><USER8> "morals have no scientific foundation"

Your consequentialist philosophical views also have no "scientific foundation". Science reveals the world as it is, not as it should be.

You claim that somehow you are beyond values by applying this crude calculus of "lives saved". The truth is that you have not provided a foundation for your ethics. So what is it?

I agree that you do not understand what I'm getting at. Maybe we should just table this.

edited to add:

"what exactly has been justified by the "ticking time bomb" experiment?"

If you read The One Percent Doctrine, you will learn about the people the United States tortured to try to get intel about terrorist attacks, using the ticking time bomb justification. And hello, "we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud." We invaded Iraq using similar justifications about the risks of WMD.

<comment><USER4> You don't understand what I am saying and misquote me. No point in discussing further.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> There's a pretty strong impulse to call somebody a "denier" in order to categorically denounce what he's saying, as well as everybody similarly skeptical. It's important, when doing this, to paint the person in the simplest "nutshell" terms. Those awful climate "denialists" for instance:

 _In a nutshell: Global warming either (1) isn't real (2) isn't caused by humans or (3) doesn't matter_

Well, #2 is certainly within the bounds of possibility. Evidence: The entire history of the earth. And, as for #3, you could actually make the argument that global warming would be a net positive. (Contrast warming with a new ice age.) Not say that it's true, but it's a possibility, and shouldn't result in intellectual exile.

He, of course, misses #4:

(4) Global warming is real; but it is #1 mainly intended to achieve a long- standing but tactically-shifting goal of governments to control capital, and otherwise generate billions/trillions for the well-connected and #2 is hopeless because China and India aren't getting suckered into it, ever.

 _That_ is something they don't want to address, because, as far as I've seen, it is the correct assessment. "Follow the money" almost always is. And if you keep following the money, you will likely find that even the most committed climate changists are not expending their own resources to short Florida coastal real estate on the weight of their beliefs.

<comment><USER10> It's sad that this is being up-voted as it is incredibly misleading and a conspiracy theory to boot:

>#1 mainly intended to achieve a long-standing but tactically-shifting goal of governments to control capital

No, global warming is not a government plan. It is an area of scientific consensus that has emerged from the work of thousands of individuals in many countries. Most mainstream solutions to dealing with global warming have absolutely nothing to do with controlling capital. In the US, we constantly bend over backwards to makes sure private enterprise controls lots of stuff (even the alternative energy technologies that are being heavily subsidized in R&D and production).

>you will likely find that even the most committed climate changists are not expending their own resources to short Florida coastal real estate on the weight of their beliefs.

This statement is at best tremendously disingenuous and at worst an amazing attempt at self-delusion. There is no good way to short houses. (Getting CDSs on mortgage backed securities is possible but there are no houses on the coast securities. Shorting those wouldn't even help, as mortgages will be paid off before the sea rises enough). Also, all the global warming sea rise predictions are on the order of decades and centuries. What highly knowledgeable scientist in there late 30s or 40s will make at bet that will be resolved when they are dead?

I'll bet you any amount of money that we will have a Korean president by 2150. Don't believe me? Unless you do, you'd better make a bet with me.

<comment><USER11> > No, global warming is not a government plan.

The proposed solutions to GW are. Politicians will play a significant part in distributing carbon credits. And you said it yourself:

> (even the alternative energy technologies that are being heavily subsidized > in R&D and production).

Subsidized by whom? Private companies that only exist because of government money really aren't private.

I disagree with the OP that it's a scheme to control capital, I don't think it's a scheme of any kind. I just think politicians happen to absolutely love an issue with an absolute evil and a very difficult and expensive solution. No matter how much, the other guy will never be able to do enough.

My main beef with GW isn't the science. I think it's highly entertaining to follow stuff like ClimateGate, but my beef is with the politics. "Solutions" to GW invariably includes hugely expensive government programs.

<comment><USER12> "hugely expensive government programs"

That phrase is redundant.

Edit: grammar

<comment><USER13> Not entirely. It's a scale, that goes from "expensive" to "mind boggling expensive". There's just plain expensive (The V-22 Osprey program), and then there's _really expensive_ (The total expenditure of the Social Security program, from inception to 2050).

<comment><USER12> I know... I was making fun of government contracting. I worked for various government contractors for around six years, so I feel like I'm morally obligated to make fun of the whole thing whenever I can.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> You know, my position is that I'm unconvinced that climate change is being affected by Humans quite as much (it seems rational we affect it a bit) as some people say.

(straight up; I'm not here to argue that out. This isn't the right forum, it's just setting the story).

I usually get branded a climate denier (and sometimes a loon :)) even in relatively high brow discussion. Which is amusing because you get real idiot deniers sucking up to you and sensible people you want to have a discussion with ignoring you.

This raises two points.

Firstly a poor assumption has been made; because every time I start trying to compare which papers I have read with others in the discussion they either a) point me to a magazine/paper article or b) don't know what I am waffling about. It's annoying because you quickly realise that the most well read [non climatologist] on the subject are almost exclusively in the "bit of both camps" category - and, sadly, we are all still branded deniers.

The second point is it worries me that this is a Scientific field that is based on the idea that not-believing in man made GW is akin to being heathen sin and crazy talk. I hate that, it seems so irrational given the fact we are still developing the theory!

<comment><USER15> I applaud you for actually digging in and understanding what the studies are saying, it's a vast field and to try to do that is daunting.

However, I don't think it's a surprise that not believing in man-made GW is met with a huge amount of distrust (I assume you mean by actual scientists) because to most climate scientists, that question is settled. There is argument over the severity of the effect, but not over its basic existence. _Even_ if you have an good explanation of why the majority of scientists got everything totally wrong, any community has more inertia than being swayed by lone dissenting voices unless they are very well known and respected, because you will basically be telling them all that they fucked up.

<comment><USER14> Honestly. Most climate scientists shrug :-) as I said it's rationale that man has an affect on the climate. If you consider the work done so far there really is not much more we can honestly say than that.

It always amuses me, too, the slanging match that evolves over what could be a fairly trivial point. Truthfully we are sorely lacking in long term data (no easy solution to that) and filling that void is this "elephant".

Ultimately a rational decision must be made that is completely unnconnected to GW. And that is: what is climate change going to do, and how do we need to react?

Currently I have quiet confidence we will start to ask that within the next decade.

<comment><USER15> _Ultimately a rational decision must be made that is completely unnconnected to GW. And that is: what is climate change going to do, and how do we need to react?_

You lost me here, how is the question of what is climate change going to do completely unconnected to global warming?

<comment><USER14> Sorry, I forgot the qualifier "man made". :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> This is just one paper in an entire issue of New Scientist about "Denial" [http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20627605.900-special-r...](http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20627605.900-special- report-living-in-denial.html)

There was a post by Robin Hanson on Overcoming Bias about it, with a long string of comments <http://www.overcomingbias.com/2010/05/dumping-on- denial.html>

</comment><comment><USER17> I think he forgets one specific form of denial: demands for impossible evidence.

Example: Creationists demand for a complete fossil record

Since things get destroyed, a complete fossil record is not going to happen. If evolution is true: we don't expect a complete fossil record, therefore lack of a complete fossil record is not evidence against evolution.

</comment><comment><USER18> This comment is pretty interesting:

"here are supporters on both sides of the climate debate ('warmists' and 'deniers') for whom the science is secondary. One feature of them both is that recognise no shade of gray."

This kind of polarization happens a lot in the technology field (e.g. SQL vs NoSQL, Flash vs HTML 5) - usually not by the leaders in these areas but often by people who feel they have the need to strongly align themselves with one particular perspective.

<comment><USER19> At least most of the debaters in those tech arguments have written a line of SQL or a HTML page. The climate debate is filled with people who don't know the difference between weather and climate and have never even heard of terms like radiative forcing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> _Scepticism is integral to the scientific process, because most claims turn out to be false._

Winning quote right there.

<comment><USER15> True. That's exactly why claims that have many independent lines of evidence, like global warming, should be taken seriously.

<comment><USER14> Well, although I don't want to get into any argument about it (I was meaning it as a "winning quote" in general - not just r.e. climate science) I think your wrong.

Because considering GW as a single claim in entirety is incorrect - there is a lot of claims and elements that make it up. It is more a field than a claim.

<comment><USER15> I thought that was what I was saying -- that there are a lot of claims that, when taken as a whole, point to the conclusion that global warming is happening.

But I admit that I'm biased -- I think that basic physical arguments will tell you that it must be happening. We can argue over to what exact degree, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Summary: some people pretend to be thoughtfully considering, but really they're just mean old baddies. The list of mean-old-baddies is below. don't let them trick you! You'll go to hell!

We are the goodies. We believe. Follow us and be saved.

[See article for list of Satan's minions.]

<comment><USER20> There was a common smugness to the tone of the article - borne of the comfort of parroting conventional/majority opinions - which your summary/comment makes explicit. Thanks.

<comment><USER5> This seems uncharacteristic of Shermer. He, of course, is not the only one. In fact, most debate, and AGW debate in particular, has this character: the proponent claims overwhelming evidence, but shows none. It's like playing poker with someone who wants to claim the winnings without showing you their hand.

I would prefer to see more "How I was convinced..." type of stuff. I've seen more of that on the side of the skeptics/deniers, probably because they are the underdog, and so more likely to be forthcoming. It doesn't make them right, but it does coerce them into being better proponents.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> william-newman I have no particular sympathy with any anti-vaccine activism that I know of. But I wonder how, other than by not being an important faction in the appropriate big political tent, "anti-vaccine denial" ended up on this article's excrement list along with Holocaust deniers, while "nuclear power denial" and "genetic engineering denial" didn't.

My impression is that political opposition to nuclear power plants, to nuclear waste facilities, and to GM crops have had at least as much economic impact as political opposition to vaccines. Thus, it seems to me that they shouldn't be left off this list because they're unimportant.

Perhaps the columnist thinks that the anti-nuke and anti-GM-crops political movements should be spared because they have achieved their political impact primarily by honestly making valid technical points? Granting for the sake of argument that that is a tenable position, then why ignore them? Wouldn't the anti-nuke and anti-GM movements make useful examples to clarify his position by comparing and contrasting? Wouldn't describing what is healthy and good about the thinking of the anti-GM and anti-nuke coalitions help us understand better what is so characteristically diseased and vile about anti-vaccine folk to justify grouping them with Holocaust deniers?

(I extended this comment, writing on an analogy to criticism of left-wingers as "politically correct," at [http://naturalspiritofgoodcompany.blogspot.com/2010/05/on- ha...](http://naturalspiritofgoodcompany.blogspot.com/2010/05/on-hacker-news- on-new-scientist-on.html) .)

</comment><comment><USER21> What's with the photo and caption beside this article? [Photo of refinery/ childhood cloud machine :) Caption:"Would you object to this sight even if there was no evidence it was causing harm?"]

The newscientist.com editors injecting some of their own belief into an otherwise reasonable article?</comment>


When is a VR installation a work of art? A veteran critic and curator explains - <AUTHOR> https://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2019/07/vr-art-aesthetics-cristina-garcia-lasuen.html <comment><USER2> > In any case, if VR is ever going to become a full-fledged medium in fine > art, it will need to come with observations like this.

Being the one who invented this art genre I beg to disagree. Esp. with the "You have to be an artist to be recognized as artist".</comment>