Redesigned 8-bit and 16-bit games (Some unbelievable) - <AUTHOR> http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=332904 <comment><USER2> I'm sorry, but messing with A Link To The Past is like painting eyebrows on the Mona Lisa or colorizing Citizen Kane.

Of course, my dogs' names are Link and Zora (there was a Zelda, but don't ask) so maybe I'm a purist.

<comment><USER3> I think you're missing the beauty of hacks like this. I don't find the idea of playing the games all that interesting...but damned if I'm not blown away by how awesome the guys who built them are.

<comment><USER4> I agree. As an aside I am really beginning to question the length of copyright terms. This kind of derivative work is really interesting.

<comment><USER5> I am really beginning to question the intelligence of gaming companies. There is a real opportunity to open old games' development platforms and have open contests for people to make hacks like this. Take the best ones, put them into a collection, and let the creators share in the profits. Everyone wins, especially fans of the games.

<comment><USER6> To be fair to the gaming companies, I can understand why they don't want to open their platforms. The infamous Video Game Crash of 1983 has been blamed, in part, on the fact that console-makers such as Atari, desperate to get a large portfolio of games in the market, held very low standards for what games they would allow to be made for their system, leading to outright terrible games like E. T. and worse, outright offensive titles like Custer's Revenge. The desire not to repeat this mistake is much of why Nintendo held tight control over its franchise and, in the US, deleted the edgy, religious and sexual elements from games like Final Fantasy 4/6.

Although, I'm inclined to agree with you. If Magic: the Gathering had gone open source at some point, there would still be people over 15 who play it. However, they'd also have to change their business model.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Am I missing a download link?

<comment><USER8> Linking to illegal derivative works probably violates the rules of that forum but fortunately linking isn't a crime. The below links may be patches and not the ROM itself. The ROM itself can be found on your local torrent site, probably in a pack that includes every SNES or NES ROM!

Brutal Mario: [http://www.smwcentral.net/?p=showhack&id=1012](http://www.smwcentral.net/?p=showhack&id=1012)

Extra Mario Bros: <http://www.derok.net/nes-roms/super-mario-bros/extra>

Sonic 2 Long Edition: [http://forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?showtopic=11648&s...](http://forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?showtopic=11648&st=0) (try PMing people in this thread or going on their IRC channel)

Zelda Parallel Worlds: <http://zeldaparallelworlds.googlepages.com/>

The Second Reality Project: <http://www.romhacking.net/hacks/41/>

Sonic Megamix 3.5 (4.0 isn't out yet): <http://info.sonicretro.org/images/3/3f/S1MMU.rar>

Super Metroid Redesign: <http://drewseph.zophar.net/>

Mario Adventure: <http://www.vintagecomputing.com/index.php/archives/63>

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Super sweet stuff! At first it was minor modifications, and now the huges ones. I guess the next step is to make a new NES or SNES game from scratch? I envision a state-of-the-art high-level language compiler and customized development environment...

</comment><comment><USER10> already beat the second reality 1 and 2 but I guess I'm not getting any homework done until I finish Super Metroid Redesign and Parallel worlds. damn you hacker news.

</comment><comment><USER6> Anyone know how to copy FF6's Terra and bring her into the IRL module? Thanks to Sex and the City, the quality of females in this module is _seriously_ lacking.</comment>


Premera has been the target of a cyberattack - <AUTHOR> http://premeraupdate.com/ <comment><USER2> Was the attack _actually_ sophisticated? Usually, when megacorporations get pwned, the attack is not sophisticated at all, but they pretend it is (for PR reasons). This page doesn't tell us much about the nature of the attack, which is understandable. And as for what was compromised... almost everything of value?

Given that this is an insurance company, I imagine the attackers were either criminals (who wanted to steal this information for identity theft), or state- sponsored attackers (who would want this information for HUMINT reasons, such as verifying identities or determining good targets).

<comment><USER3> We won't get any technical details. The fact that this was pulled off and the initial compromise was a year ago means they've got no alarm bells for someone dumping the DB.

It's negligence at it's finest. Here's to hoping for class-action. 2 years free "identity theft protection" (which is useless to consumers until post- theft) and credit-report monitoring (which is free to them, and again only comes up post-theft) is pretty bullsh*t.

Roll some heads and hand out fines.

<comment><USER4> I wrote my state insurance department because I was so annoyed by the paucity of information in Anthem's disclosure. [https://gist.github.com/paulhenrich/d1015fff356d037dc41d](https://gist.github.com/paulhenrich/d1015fff356d037dc41d)

<comment><USER3> I'm interested in seeing their reply. Will check back, please update your git once you receive one.

<comment><USER4> Will do.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> y-satellite This follows a recent breach at Anthem, another Blue Cross health insurance company: [https://www.anthemfacts.com/](https://www.anthemfacts.com/)

Edit: Actually, based on that site and this article ([http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/premera-blue- cros...](http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/premera-blue-cross-data- breach-affect-11m-people-29705515)) the breaches were both discovered on Jan 29.

<comment><USER5> Surely that's more than a coincidence?

29th Jan, the "cyberattack"wording, Mandiant...

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> So what happens when more than 50% of the US population has their semi-private data spilled out into the open?

We're get closer to a day when there will be collated a single text file with name, dob, address, SSN, ID#, and maybe ccn for hundreds of millions of people. It will just float around the net ready for use/abuse.

What happens? A quick move to biometrics? Ignore it and hope it goes stale?

Right now Chase keeps dubious stuff from happening by requiring text confirmation for all my "out of pattern" purchases but that's kind of clunky.

<comment><USER7> I would guess that the PII of close to 100% of anyone who has ever done business with any financial services or insurance company has been compromised. We have to get to a point where this information is just assumed to be public and not valid for identity purposes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> "Our investigation determined that the attackers may have gained unauthorized access to applicants and members' information, which could include member name, date of birth, email address, address, telephone number, Social Security number, member identification numbers, bank account information, and claims information, including clinical information."

Then, of course, "The security of our members' personal information is a top priority."

<comment><USER9> One wonders if the attackers could generate a massive number of medicare invoices that paid out to a bogus company which transferred all of the deposits off shore.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> So they waited 7 weeks before informing their customers? That's unacceptable. I wonder how many other blue cross companies were affected and we simply haven't been told yet.

<comment><USER11> I thought the same thing. WA's insurance commissioner doesn't sound happy about it either:

[http://blog.seattlepi.com/boomerconsumer/2015/03/17/insuranc...](http://blog.seattlepi.com/boomerconsumer/2015/03/17/insurance- commissioner-offers-comments-on-premera-cyberattack/)

I called to ask about it, and was told that they were following the recommendations of Mandiant and the FBI; that they may put consumers at more risk if they announced prior to remediating their systems.

It's an interesting point of distinction, as Washington state law requires disclosure "in the most expedient time possible ... The notification required by this section may be delayed if a law enforcement agency determines that the notification will impede a criminal investigation."

[http://apps.leg.wa.gov/rcw/default.aspx?cite=19.255.010](http://apps.leg.wa.gov/rcw/default.aspx?cite=19.255.010)

Perhaps the call center scripts weren't nailed down yet - but they sure didn't mention an ongoing investigation as the reason for the delay.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Does it bother anyone else that this site isn't on HTTPS and doesn't provide identity information?

<comment><USER13> yes, though it's probably worth noting that a video of their CEO talking about it is probably pretty hard to fake

<comment><USER14> As far as I know, that guy is an actor.

<comment><USER15> Let's assume he's an actor and DNS is poisoned. Clearly this is intended to reach a wide audience. Presumably, the real CEO would learn of the fraud shortly. Let's say that takes a few hours. The corrected DNS will take 4 hours to propagate. So, how many people will sign up for fraud protection in between?

If I was designing an attack, a high visibility, low persistence attack where I send my victims to a website not under my control (unless you're asserting the attackers also got control of protectmyid.com) would not be my first choice, especially if I'm spending the money it took to shoot that video and stream it to all the people who you ostensibly want to see it.

<comment><USER16> > The corrected DNS will take 4 hours to propagate.

This misconception bothers me a lot. DNS changes are complicated: there's no "n" where "n = the amount of time where any domain will magically be fixed".

"Propagation" is based on the configured TTL values of the specific DNS records requested, for the specific zone. Add in layers of application/OS/intranet/ISP/DNS provider caching, and it's a complicated nightmare to fix/predict reactively.

Most BIND9 installations use 86400 seconds by default: _24_ hours. And some domains use more, some less, some have dynamically generated TTLs to simulate changing of records at a set/recurring wall clock time, instead of a time to live, some DNS caches are reset frequently, some caches retain values much longer than allowable by TTL...

<comment><USER15> Yes, I have configured BIND before. True, true, and still, most of the time, in my humble, limited experience, it will clear in well under 4 hours.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Speed up Sklearn algorithms using Cython - <AUTHOR> https://blog.sicara.com/https-medium-com-redaboumahdi-speed-sklearn-algorithms-custom-metrics-using-cython-de92e5a325c <comment><AUTHOR> Hi, thank you ! From my understanding, it should work the same way, I will take a deeper look at Numba.

</comment><comment><USER2> Nice write-up !

If you don't mind me asking: have you considered using Numba to optimize your sklearn code ?

It works wonders for vectorized code (like your distance metric function).</comment>


GAO Audits the Federal Reserve - <AUTHOR> http://sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/news/?id=9e2a4ea8-6e73-4be2-a753-62060dcbb3c3 <comment><USER2> Astounding. How long do we little people sit around and take this? How much more egregious do things have to get before we say enough?</comment>


9,096 Stars in the Sky – Is That All? - <AUTHOR> http://www.skyandtelescope.com/astronomy-resources/how-many-stars-night-sky-09172014/ <comment><USER3> For those who swear they have seen a sky with more than 5k stars, next time you're in those same wilderness and staring up at the sky there might be a way to verify whether you are seeing ~4k or ~40k stars.

Here I've compiled a distilled version of the cited tables...

        Mag    Visual_Device         Stars    Example
        -26    naked eye (daylight)      1    Sun
        -13    naked eye (twilight)      1    full Moon
        -06    naked eye (dusk)          1    cres Moon
        -04    naked eye (metro)         2    Venus
        -02    naked eye (metro)         2    Jupiter
        -01    naked eye (metro)         2    Sirius
        +00    naked eye (city)          8    Vega
        +01    naked eye (suburb)       22    Saturn
        +02    naked eye (suburb)       93    Big Dipper
        +05    naked eye (rural)      2822    Jupiter moons
        +06    binocular (rural)      8768    Uranus
        +08    binocular (wild)      77627    Neptune

If you happen to be in a place/time-of-year to see Uranus (n.b. cool mobile apps exist to help locate celestial bodies), you can probably see at least 4k-5k stars. If you can see Neptune with the naked eye, perhaps you are actually seeing 30k-40k stars.

## Notes ##

Each magnitude is 2.5x brighter than the next:

> Mag+01 is 2.5 times brighter than Mag+02

> Mag+01 is 2.5*2.5 times brighter than Mag+03

Mag Scale: [http://www.icq.eps.harvard.edu/MagScale.html](http://www.icq.eps.harvard.edu/MagScale.html)

Star Count: [http://www.stargazing.net/david/constel/howmanystars.html](http://www.stargazing.net/david/constel/howmanystars.html)

<comment><USER4> If you can see Neptune with the naked eye, you're probably a genetically altered mutant with eyes the size of melons.

Neptune is theoretically a naked eye object, barely, against a perfectly black background. In reality the sky isn't perfectly black, even with no man-made light sources. (See e.g. the Zodiacal Light.) So your chances of seeing +08 objects without binos or a telescope are basically zero.

I lived in a very rural area for a while with limited light sources. On a clear night, the sky was absolutely glorious, and going for night time walks under it was a favourite hobby.

But even on the darkest and clearest nights, with half an hour of dark adaptation, +04/5 was as good as the view ever got without binos.

<comment><USER3> Agreed. I wouldn't expect anyone would be able to spot Neptune. The comment was basically about proving to yourself that you're not seeing more than ~5k stars.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Reminds me of the Big Dipper eye test. If you can spot the double star in Ursa Major constellation you're supposed to have 20/20 vision. The two stars are Mizar (magnitude +2) and Alcor (magnitude +4). In urban environments this is a good combined test ;-)

On a personal note (which I hope many will relate), I'll never forget the very first time I looked up at the night sky after getting my first pair of glasses. The sheer number of extra stars I could see combined with the clarity, made me fall in love with stargazing :-)

<comment><USER6> I read somewhere that in Roman times the test to become a soldier was to look at the Pleiades cluster and if you could see seven stars you would pass the eye test.

<comment><USER7> That doesn't sound quite right.

Of what use is a vision test where it's easy to memorize the answer? In English Pleiades is also known as the Seven Sisters, because of the ancient Greek myth. I can easily believe that Pleiades was also associated with 7 in general Roman culture.

It doesn't help that more than 7 stars can be visible. ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleiades](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleiades) says "Its light is dominated by young, hot blue stars, up to 14 of which can be seen with the naked eye depending on local observing conditions.") Muhammad was written to have been able to see 12.

If someone says there are 9 stars, is that a sign of good vision? Or simply a guess?

Then there's the observation that other cultures see six stars. See [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleiades_in_folklore_and_liter...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleiades_in_folklore_and_literature) .

In modern times only 6 stars are usually visible to the naked eye, and there are proposals for why 7 was used in Ancient Greece; eg, stellar variability or a numerological leaning towards 7.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> NASA used to run an experiment with students counting stars [1] in various sites. The most that was counted was around 5000 which tallys up to the theory.

[1] [https://web.archive.org/web/20140610015945/http://starcount....](https://web.archive.org/web/20140610015945/http://starcount.msfc.nasa.gov:80/test4.cfm)

</comment><comment><USER9> Reminds me of William Hershel and a classic example of "if your scientific theory relies on you being special/unique, it is almost certainly wrong"

Hershel made a lot of amazing discoveries and advancements with this telescopes, so decided to count the stars in every direction of the sky. He found that there were equal numbers no matter where he pointed his scope, so we must be at the center of the universe!

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

<comment><USER10> Well, we are at the center of the observable universe.

<comment><USER11> We are at the center of "our" observable universe. But ... since we don't still know the bounds of universe, technically we don't exactly know where our absolute position in the universe really is.

<comment><USER12> I was under the impression us doesn't make sense to consider the idea of absolute position in space.

<comment><USER13> I don't think that's completely true. Details of the cosmic microwave background might indicate that we're at the center of the universe:

\- [Axis of evil (cosmology) - Wikiwand]([https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Axis_of_evil_(cosmology)](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Axis_of_evil_\(cosmology\)))

And besides the above, the CMB itself provides a 'natural absolute frame of reference' as it's the remnants of the very early universe.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> The tone of the article is a bit confusing - I suppose it is written by someone who has a lot of experience looking up and a lot of time spent seeing lots of stars. But as a life-long city dweller with some rural experience, I would have guessed a max of 3,000 or so stars visible when there is no light pollution. They call the number 9,000 "unimpressive" but to me, the idea that my eyes could probably resolve about 9,000 stars at night is _incredibly_ impressive.

Regardless, most of humanity sees more like 10 or 200, which is super sad and I would be interested in knowing if there are studies (or any possible way to know) what kind of effect that might have on a population - not being able to see the night sky well, or at all.

Edit: At night at one spot, there 4,500 visible, not 9,000 - but then we have an odd tagline, again showing the odd choice of words by the author.

> Ten thousand stars bedazzle the eye on a dark night.

Not really? Just 4,500 if you live in the middle of no light pollution.

<comment><USER15> Perhaps it's the contrast with the idea that the universe is vast.

Looking up at the sky gives us a sense of awe. But why? Is it because we "see countless stars"? Apparently not. 9000 is a pretty small number compared with the grains in a fistful of sand, or a cup of rice. So why does looking at the starts give this sense of vastness?

It's possible that it's an acquired mode of thought. Perhaps to ancient people, the 88 constellations (and approx 700 familiar stars in constellations) were ... just that, a few familiar dots on the celestial vault.

I somehow imagined I could see tens of thousands ... but had never really bothered to count.

<comment><USER14> Yes, that makes sense. To me, the vastness comes from knowing how many stars are in the dark 'gaps' I can't see with my eyes. And knowing how many of the visible stars themselves have planets. We're getting the to point of exoplanet discovery where you can find a star with your eyes, know which one it is, and check to see how many planets orbit it.

So when I look up at the night sky, I can almost see all the planets orbit all the stars up there, and all the moons around all those planets - and it _is_ vast. Even just what you can see and imagine with your own eyes and head, it's vast. No need for looking through a telescope to get the sense of vastness - but perhaps you do need the knowledge that stuff is _up there_ \- even if you can't see it.

okay, a showerthought:

The ancients treated the stars and planets as Gods. And some of them have the same characteristics - they exist for seemingly eternity, or at least billions of years. They shine light and provide what is necessary for life to start, and for it to go on. They are always up there, 'above', 'watching' as it were (they send rays of light down to the planets, where it is partially absorbed and partially bounced back). And one day, when the Sun goes out, it will end the universe that exists on Earth. Based on what we know now, the ancients seemed to get a lot right in the actual nature of the stars.

<comment><USER16> > We're getting the to point of exoplanet discovery where you can find a star > with your eyes, know which one it is, and check to see how many planets > orbit it.

Fomalhaut is a great example. Occasionally I'll take people out for sky tours, and when Fomalhaut is visible I mention to them that not only is that star extraordinarily close (25 ly), but that it has planets that we've actually imaged in photographs!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> [https://urbigenous.net/library/nine_billion_names_of_god.htm...](https://urbigenous.net/library/nine_billion_names_of_god.html)

Not saying anything else so I don't spoil it.

</comment><comment><USER18> > At the poles, where the north and south polestars are pinned to the zenith > and no stars rise or set, the same ~4,500 stars are visible every single > clear night of the year.

Ofcourse, at the poles you have long polar day (midnight sun) in summer - <USER2> will generally see only one star during the night: the sun.

Conversely, during polar night, you'll be able to see some stars for most of the day, if not maybe a few bright stars even at noon.

<comment><USER19> There's a south pole star? must be new

<comment><USER20> Both polestars are 'new', in the sense that precession brings different stars closer to the pole axis over time.

Sigma Octantis (mag 5.47, ra 21h09m dec −88°57′) is the best South Pole star within (optimistic) naked-eye range. As you can see, it is just over 1° off axis (c.f. Polaris, which is marginally better at c. 3/4° out).

<comment><USER19> yes, but here in the southern hemisphere, there is no recognised "pole star" \- mag 5.47 isn't at all bright enough to be counted

Instead we navigate by using the southern cross to find the south celestial pole

<comment><USER21> > _here in the southern hemisphere, there is no recognised "pole star"_

My polar alignment scope has etchings for Sigma Octantis (screenshot from companion iOS app: [1]). Wikipedia also describes Sigma Octantis as a southern pole star [2]. Maybe it's just not as common to refer to Sigma Octantis as a pole star as it is for Polaris, but it does seem to be recognized.

[1] [https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/astro-physics- polaralign/id5...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/astro-physics- polaralign/id555953481?ls=1&mt=8)

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

<comment><USER19> we're talking about naked eye stars here, again no one in the Southern Hemisphere I've every heard of looks up and points at a "pole star"

<comment><USER21> > _we 're talking about naked eye stars here_

We're talking about pole stars. Being a naked eye star isn't a necessary condition. Choice of a pole star is a balance between brightness and proximity to the pole.

> _again no one in the Southern Hemisphere I 've every heard of looks up and > points at a "pole star"_

It's never too late to learn something new. :)

More to the point, "the north and south polestars" would be well understood by much of _Sky & Telescope's_ target audience, and that's who they're writing for. I get that it's going to be less common knowledge outside of their target audience, but that doesn't make the article incorrect, which seems to be what you want to argue.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> This should be easy to verify with sampling: I mean count the stars in a spot in the sky and extrapolate to the rest.

Actually the recent Sky and Telescope article about killer asteroids mentioned another interesting form of sampling. The article said that astronomers have a high confidence that 90% of all large asteroids which cross earth's orbit are known. But how can this be? This is the argument: we "tag" an asteroid when we find it. Then we look for these types of asteroids over some period of time. 90% of the asteroids found in this period are already tagged ones, so we know only 10% remain.

I'm trying to get my head around the reliability of this method- at the very least the sampling has to be non-biased and sensitive.

</comment><comment><USER23> Would this be true from space also? Where there's no atmosphere and light pollution.

<comment><USER11> Kepler, Hubble and a number of other telescopes are placed in space exactly for this reason. They can see the skies much clearly and that they can stay focused on a tiny patch of sky for months and take a vivid picture with the faintest of light from the distant stars.

<comment><USER24> This is a good place to mention [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hipparcos](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hipparcos)<USER2> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_(spacecraft)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_\(spacecraft\))

Had I not drop out from my PhD studies my thesis would be about photometric system for GAIA :(

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> People should check out the free, open source sky atlas/planetarium software Stellarium:

[http://stellarium.org](http://stellarium.org)

A sort of Google maps for the heavens. You can download star catalogs with over 150 million stars.

It's amazing what you can do with it. Here's a little movie I made of the 2-day long transit of Uranus across the Sun as viewed from Neptune in the yer 46915: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KU9yzUUMhqU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KU9yzUUMhqU)

</comment><comment><USER26> The moon makes up 1e-5 of the visible sky hemisphere. That means there is one star per 11 moon-areas. That seems very low to me. I'd have guessed the ratio was closer to 1:1. I'll check next time I'm out at night!

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solid_angle#Sun_and_Moon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solid_angle#Sun_and_Moon)

<comment><USER27> Keep in mind that area is square, so that's a little over a 3x3 grid of moons. (Well, actually a little smaller, because circles don't pack perfectly.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Reminds me how I like to ramble on to friends about how light pollution is a serious matter, and also of Paul Bogard's The End of Night ([https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16131044-the-end-of- nigh...](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16131044-the-end-of-night)).

<comment><USER29> Serious? Does anyone other than astronomers care about light pollution?

<comment><USER30> Some species of animals use celestial features to navigate or coordinate mating behavior. I think the most notable are sea turtles, whose hatchlings may be confused by artificial lights.

Somnologists also care about light pollution, particularly the colors. One hypothesis is that artificial lighting interferes with health sleep patterns and behaviors.

Bombardiers on nighttime missions do like to have lighted targets to aim at.

...it's not an issue that motivates many people, no.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> When they say 'visible with the naked eye', do they mean looking straight on or with peripheral vision? Because you can sense more light in your periphery, so that might explain why it seems 'more' than about 4500 stars you can see.

<comment><USER8> No you genuinely can't see more than ~4500 stars. I think we imagine that we can see more stars because we see a lot of photos taken using long exposures that can pick out more stars [1]. A 30 second exposure can bring out several times more stars than the human eye can see.

[1] [https://petapixel.com/2015/04/04/what-the-naked-eye-sees- in-...](https://petapixel.com/2015/04/04/what-the-naked-eye-sees-in-the-night- sky-compared-to-what-the-camera-can-capture/)

<comment><USER32> I've been in parts of the country where there's complete blackness in the new moon. I didn't stop to count the stars, but it looked much more like the second picture than the first one. The Milky Way is astonishingly vivid and the stars are endless.

The author of that article might claim the first picture is "real" in a physical sense, but even if it was, it ceases to be when transfered to a limited computer screen and viewed in indoor ambient light.

<comment><USER33> The second photo more closely matches what I see, though it looks more black and white than that. I suspect there is a wide range of night vision as I have watched people stumble around when I thought there was plenty of light.

<comment><USER34> Are you by any chance color blind?

<comment><USER33> No, but at night color becomes difficult to distinguish. It's not exactly black and white but really muted colors.

<comment><USER34> That's for everyone. Cones have lower sensitivity and more noise. Colorblind people have supposedly higher quantities of rods.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> If you calculate the diameter of most stars in the night sky, the apparent diameter is on the order of a large molecule held at arm's length. The fact that you can see them at all boggles my mind.

<comment><USER36> Below a certain size, you're looking at the point spread function of your eye/camera.

<comment><USER35> It never really occurred to me but I wonder how much of twinkling is due to the light wobbling around a small set of individual rods/cones/etc.

(Also might explain why some photos show a bunch of stars that are deep blue/red)

<comment><USER36> I believe it's an atmospheric effect: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twinkling](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twinkling)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> How is it counted if you see one dot that's really a far away galaxy with a billion stars all shining to make that one dot?

</comment><comment><USER38> This to me is one of the biggest proofs that the Torah (first part of the Bible) wasn't just a bunch of legends written by man.

It says that Abraham's children will be as numerous as the sand on the seashore and the... _stars in the sky_.

After all, as far as ancient people knew, there were millions (possibly billions) of sand grains by the sea, and ... maybe 5,000 stars?

I am sure Greek astronomers would have laughed at any Jew who said that the number of stars is in the millions and billions.

Yet these days with modern science we have found out that there _are_ as many if not more stars than sand grains.

Now, an atheist would say "that was just an expression". But who really uses stars as an example of millions, just like sand grains, over and over repeatedly, if they really thought there weren't that many? It must have been one lucky guess!

There are other proofs but this to me is one of the hardest to explain away.

* EDIT: lots of militant atheists on this site I see, wielding that downvote button rather than engaging in substantive argument _

<comment><USER39> Are you serious?

1) Surely the Bible is just making the same mistake I make when looking at the sky - imagining that I'm seeing millions instead of just 9k.

2) If it wasn't just an expression then there are an estimated 300 billion stars in the milky way alone. Astronomers put current estimates of the total stellar population at roughly 70 billion trillion (7 x 1022). I don't see that many descendants of Abraham.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. A figure of speech that uses the stars as a reference to a huge number is not extraordinary evidence.

<comment><USER38> Quadrillions

[https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2012/09/17/161096233/w...](https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2012/09/17/161096233/which- is-greater-the-number-of-sand-grains-on-earth-or-stars-in-the-sky)</comment></comment></comment>


Oklahoma isn't working. Can anyone fix this failing American state? - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/aug/29/oklahoma-education-system-four-day-school-weeks-poor <comment><USER2> Maybe it's time to get rid of privatized prisons and maximizing incarceration and felony convictions. May also be time to start expunging most felony records after N years. Who tries to start a large-ish business when 1/12 the population is caught, how many other felonies are committed? This is of course only part of the problem.

In the end, it's time to look at the value proposition everywhere, cutting education as deeply as they have should be a last resort. I'm all for cutting in most places, but it's pretty clear that they have larger issues to address than 4-day schools and a 1:12 felony rate will fix.

<comment><USER3> "Expunging" criminal records might be a bit too much, since this information might be still be useful for public statistics bureaus and for policy makers. Making criminal records past a certain period unavailable to the public would suffice.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The author of this article lives in Canada and has written a book called "You Dumb Okie." I don't see anything constructive about his tone, nor do I find any new ideas in his writing. It sounds like criticism and resentment pointed at red states.

<comment><USER5> > I don't see anything constructive about his tone, nor do I find any new > ideas in his writing.

Umm... the article is making the case for how Oklahoma is failing it's people. A case accompanied with publicly available data. The tone seems mostly reasonable.

> It sounds like criticism and resentment pointed at red states.

You seem to be the one who's conflating Oklahoma with red states.

If you think there's something wrong about the article, maybe critique something _in_ the article. Right now, all you seem to be doing is lobbing ad- hominem attacks.

<comment><USER4> As an Oklahoman, I think it's a little strange when someone at a Canadian university writes an article funded by the Rockefeller Foundation about "failing" Oklahoma, and has written a book called You Dumb [Epithet that applies to me]. I don't see how the tone there is remotely reasonable.

The author explicitly links Oklahoma to Trump by describing it as having the third-largest margin of victory in the presidential election. Hence the red state comment.

I don't think you actually read the article, because you assumed that i was lobbing ad-hominem attacks instead of directly referencing what the author has written.

<comment><USER5> > As an Oklahoman, I think it's a little strange when someone at a Canadian > university writes an article funded by the Rockefeller Foundation about > "failing" Oklahoma, and has written a book called You Dumb [Epithet that > applies to me]. I don't see how the tone there is remotely reasonable.

Three points:

One, your argument seems to be with the title and the tone of the author's book. I'm looking purely at the content of the article which seems reasonable to me.

Second, the response of Oklahoma's /governor/ to falling revenues is prayer: > "Our situation is dire," Oklahoma finance director Preston Doerflinger said. "To use a pretty harsh word, our revenues are difficult at best. Maybe they fall into the category of somewhat pathetic."

> Governor Mary Fallin had an answer: prayer. The governor issued an official > proclamation making 13 October Oilfield Prayer Day.

Doesn't that seem mind boggling to you? That definitely seems /dumb/ to me.

Third, I don't think that epithet "dumb okie" necessarily applies to you. The author's argument -- without having read the book -- seems to apply to a subset of Oklahoma. For instance the author is clearly sympathetic to the victims of police brutality, the teachers of Oklahoma etc.

> The author explicitly links Oklahoma to Trump by describing it as having the > third-largest margin of victory in the presidential election. Hence the red > state comment.

That's fair. Sidepoint: how do you feel about Pruitt at EPA?

<comment><USER4> > seems reasonable to me

your own black box idea of "Reasonable" is basically the justification for everything you're saying. I can't really communicate with you when you are setting the criteria for every point on which you and I seem to disagree.

<comment><USER5> How is it black box? The OP posted a link to an article; in the discussion, I talk about how the tone of the _article_ sounds reasonable to me.

And, then I even give examples from the article describing how they seem reasonable.

Look you clearly disagree with my criteria -- so go ahread and back that disagreement up with an example from the article.

<comment><USER4> It's totally impossible to debate your opinion of something being "reasonable." I think the tone of the article is not reasonable. You think it is. What is there to discuss if "reasonable" is your test of correctness? It can't be proven or disproven.

And you totally glossed over something _from the article_ that I referenced, instead calling it an ad hominem attack against the author. He straight up linked Oklahoma to Trump as a glaringly high-margin-of-victory state. I'm not disputing the vote tally, but I'm simply saying that the mention of it in the article expressed an opinion on the relationship between red-state conservatism and allegedly bad government.

So your comments aren't actually connected to what the author is saying, and my larger criticism of his bias. I don't buy the idea that the funding and role of the speaker are irrelevant. You seem to be pushing that idea pretty hard. It just seems like you're selectively ignoring certain aspects of the discussion because they don't line up with what you want to believe.

Not only that, but if I say something is a "failing" government entity, then I am absolutely setting a critical tone, and perhaps a pejorative one. You can have efficient, good government among religious folks, or you can have ineffective government among religious folks. There isn't a causality demonstrated by the author, but he still implies that government administered by religious people is naturally ineffective.

You're going through the motions of discussing the article but you're arbitrarily ignoring the context of the article, the bias clearly represented by the author both in the text and in his other work, and the links the author draws between Oklahoma, Trump and religion as a way of disparaging the state.

If you can't see that the author is not cold and unbiased in his arguments, and would clearly prefer to live in a more secular and socialist (why else criticize his own mother for refusing government welfare money) place than Oklahoma, then I don't know how to say anything that is "reasonable" in your view.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> What works in NY and CA is often very harmful in low population states. Laws like AHCA and agencies like the EPA often give little consideration to the economies of low density states. It doesn't have to be this way, we can exploit natural resources safely, and we can have affordable health care, but not in the current fashion.

<comment><USER7> Oklahoma's natural resource exploitation regime is so lacking in regulation that they are notorious for their man-made earthquakes. It is near the theoretical lower limit of regulation. It is unimaginable that excessive regulation is the state's foremost problem.

<comment><USER8> These man-made (mini) earthquakes have caused damage that in total could be measured in the low millions of dollars (if that much).

To put that in perspective, a single large frac well can pull in a million dollars a day easily.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Has anyone tried holding the people who run public institutions there accountable for their failure?

<comment><USER7> Oklahoma native here.

The state is an interesting mix of utterly dysfunctional state government and reasonably competent city governments, in a state where most of the people live in either Oklahoma City or Tulsa metro areas. I don't know much about Tulsa but Oklahoma City has repeatedly passed sales taxes over the last 30 years in order to bring about civic improvements. These tax plans are known as MAPS: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_Area_Projects_Pla...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_Area_Projects_Plan) These plans have been executed pretty much according to what they claimed to do, and the administration over the years has been competent and uncontroversial.

The state government, on the other hand, is totally dominated by the homophobia, Islamophobia, and the rest of the guns-and-gays distractions of the national far right. State government has repeated slashed taxes on oil and gas extraction, plunging the state into the crisis described in this article. No meaningful debate ever takes place in the state legislature or executive. Campaigns are fought entirely on the basis of who hates gays and loves Jesus more than the other guy. It is really sad, and a strange contrast to the major local governments.

When I was going to high school in Oklahoma I was offered a perfectly adequate education at the public school nearest my house. We had all the AP subjects. We had music, drama, and art. We had football, baseball, basketball, swimming, and any other sport you'd care to think of, even rodeo. Of course we didn't have sex education, which is why Oklahoma suffered from, and continues to suffer from the worst teen birth rate of any state in the nation.

Back then, people went to private schools only because either their parents were utterly unhinged Jesus freaks, or because they failed out of the public schools. Private schools were for weirdos and losers. Now it's the opposite. No family with any kind of money sends their children to public school in Oklahoma. The state educational apparatus has completely failed in the span of only about 25 years.

<comment><USER4> Another Oklahoman here. I graduated from a public school ten years ago and my graduating class had students who attended MIT, Princeton, and so forth. From what I understand, my community has continued to send students from public schools to first-rate colleges. So I don't know if I would say that "the state educational apparatus has completely failed." Perhaps that could be true from some of the non-population-center schools. It sounds a bit heavy handed for OKC, Tulsa, Norman, and Edmond, at least.

<comment><USER7> I agree that the well-funded suburban districts like Edmond will be the last to show signs of distress, but even Edmond has "emergency certified" teachers on staff. This term "emergency certified" means "uncertified". My sister lives in Edmond and her kids are going to private schools.

If you graduated ten years ago you probably got, according to aggregate measures, an education on par with the one being offered 25 years ago. The real crisis has accelerated in the last five years. Per-pupil spending is declining not only in real dollars, but even in nominal dollars, and stood fourth-lowest among the states in 2014. It is even lower today.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> "Governor Mary Fallin had an answer: prayer. The governor issued an official proclamation making 13 October Oilfield Prayer Day."

With such leadership is it any wonder the state is failing? Oil is over. Either find another industry or accept the inevitable poverty. If the cities are indeed doing well, however, then it's hard to say the state is failing. Of course rural areas are poor, though the police and public workers could have some empathy and compassion, both sorely lacking. Rural areas will fail as they are failing and have been failing everywhere in the world. Only entitlement created by some unusually prosperous years due to oil have made the people not realize this.

</comment><comment><USER11> On the economic numbers, at least on an accounting basis, Illinois and Connecticut are also failing states, and are in imminent risk of bankruptcy.

<comment><USER12> On the crime numbers, Illinois looks pretty bad, too. (That's relevant to the "failing state" claim, because anarchy in the streets means that the state's law enforcement efforts are ineffective.)

<comment><USER13> it also makes the law enforcement more expensive and, in this case, more wasteful.

<comment><USER11> And potentially more desperate, which can result in collective punishment, various civil rights violations, and expensive lawsuits.

This is about what you expect from kakistocracy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Oklahoma has always been on the short list of "poorest states", even before the dust bowl.

</comment><comment><USER15> Does anyone know if there is some mechanism for the general public to provide funds to the education system in Oklahoma? Something like a gofundme page where it is clear the money is going to the system and not getting mis-used or mis-directed?

<comment><USER16> Taxes?

<comment><USER17> That would certainly be nice, but from what I've seen there is quite of bit of waste with the funds we do have...

I think this article touches on at least one of the problems: [https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/aug/21/univer...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/aug/21/universities- broke-cut-pointless-admin-teaching)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> What a difference between California and these stupid states. Calfornia is about to become the 5th largest economy in the world. And these guys are trying to prove a failed ideology over and over.

<comment><USER8> California is succeeding despite it's "stupid" government and policies. Not because of.

Add to that, shipping ports and the fact that both Hollywood and tech started there and a nice eternally warm climate and you have a recipe for a thriving economy. None of which have anything to do with political leanings.

<comment><USER18> Sure it just works well without good government. Keep believing those myths and you should go and live in the states run by the "proper" governments.</comment></comment></comment>


Algebraic Data Types for Ruby - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/txus/adts

<comment><USER2> I'm not a ruby guy but the implementation is quite interesting.

The syntax looks very readable compared to other library-level implementations. There seems to have been some abuse of the "::" constant access operator and a lot of meta-magic + eval but the results are pretty nice.

I find the type-mapping in the Constructor class pretty interesting as well.</comment>


Douglas Lenat's Cyc is now being commercialized - <AUTHOR> https://www.technologyreview.com/s/600984/an-ai-with-30-years-worth-of-knowledge-finally-goes-to-work/ <comment><USER2> Marvin Minsky said "We need common-sense knowledge – and programs that can use it. Common sense computing needs several ways of representing knowledge. It is harder to make a computer housekeeper than a computer chess-player, because the housekeeper must deal with a wider range of situations." [1]

He named Douglas Lenat as one of the ten or so people working on common sense (at the time of the interview in 1998), and said the best system based on common sense is CYC. But he called for proprietary systems not to keep the data a secret, and to distribute copies, so they can evolve and get new ideas, and because we must understand how they work.

Sabbatini: Why there are no computers already working with common sense knowledge ?

Minsky: There are very few people working with common sense problems in Artificial Intelligence. I know of no more than five people, so probably there are about ten of them out there. Who are these people ? There's John McCarthy, at Stanford University, who was the first to formalize common sense using logics. He has a very interesting web page. Then, there is Harry Sloaman, from the University of Edinburgh, who's probably the best philosopher in the world working on Artificial Intelligence, with the exception of Daniel Dennett, but he knows more about computers. Then there's me, of course. Another person working on a strong common-sense project is Douglas Lenat, who directs the CYC project in Austin. Finally, Douglas Hofstadter, who wrote many books about the mind, artificial intelligence, etc., is working on similar problems.

We talk only to each other and no one else is interested. There is something wrong with computer sciences.

Sabbatini: Is there any AI software that uses the common sense approach ?

Minsky: As I said, the best system based on common sense is CYC, developed by Doug Lenat, a brilliant guy, but he set up a company, CYCorp, and is developing it as a proprietary system. Many computer scientists have a good idea and then made it a secret and start making proprietary systems. They should distribute copies of their system to graduate systems, so that they could evolve and get new ideas. We must understand how they work.

[1] [http://www.cerebromente.org.br/n07/opiniao/minsky/minsky_i.h...](http://www.cerebromente.org.br/n07/opiniao/minsky/minsky_i.htm)

<comment><USER3> > We talk only to each other and no one else is interested.

OK.

> There is something wrong with computer sciences.

Or there is something wrong with you (Minsky). If you're brilliant, and the rest of the world doesn't follow you, it doesn't mean that there's something wrong with them. It may simply be that you are brilliant and wrong.

<comment><USER2> Do you mean {inclusive or exclusive} "Or"? I'd say there's something wrong with computer sciences, and Minsky was brilliant, and right about some things, and wrong about other things.

>He [Aaron Sloman, one of the small group of "each other" who talk to each other] disagrees with all of these on some topics, while agreeing on others.

<comment><USER3> I meant exclusive or. I was getting at the arrogance: "Out of all the AI people, only the 5 of us talk to each other. There must be something wrong with the whole field, because they can't see how right we are!"

The arrogance - that "we" _clearly_ are right, so "they" _clearly must be_ wrong - grates on me. Minsky may in fact be right, but he should at least have the humility to see that, in a difference of opinion between the few and the many, it is at least _possible_ that the many are right...

<comment><USER4> > The arrogance - that "we" clearly are right, so "they" clearly must be wrong > - grates on me.

I don't think he meant it that way. He was well aware he didn't have all the answers. What I believe he was talking about was not the answers but the questions: which ones are people spending their time on? I think he's saying that the questions that most people in AI are spending their time on are not going to give us strong AI. Is that such a controversial claim? I expect most people in the field would agree with it.

<comment><USER2> I agree that he didn't mean it in an arrogant way, didn't think he had all the answers, and was asking big questions. He was all about integrating multiple methods, including commonsense knowledge like CYC. But it's hard to get commonsense knowledge methods funded by the current "benefactors of AI".

Here is something he said to me in April 2009 in a discussion about educational software for the OLPC:

Marvin Minsky: "I've been unsuccessful at getting support for a major project to build the architecture proposed in "The Emotion Machine." The idea is to make an AI that can use multiple methods and commonsense knowledge--so that whenever it gets stuck, it can try another approach. The trouble is that most funding has come under the control of statistical and logical practitioners, or people who think we need to solve low-level problems before we can deal with human-level ones."

Maybe (I'll venture a wild guess) it's just that investing in statistical AI research currently makes more financial sense for the goals of the advertising industry that's funding most of the research these days... You're the product, and all that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Been a while since I heard about my once-favorite project aiming to imitate common sense. I think I even contributed to its knowledge base a bit. Broken memory is unclear there. I loved that Lenat was one of the few to see (a) the need for common sense representation, (b) many people would need to train it, and (c) good algorithms to integrate it with other things. The part I strongly criticized was locking it up in proprietary fashion: worst thing you can do for stuff needing this much training data.

Good to see it's being commercialized... again? Swore he had a company. Anyway, probably the most valuable thing is the knowledge base they built. It was structured, curated, and very general. It would be great if AI researchers working on different architectures, including adaptive NN's, re-encoded and used that knowledge base. Might speed up training and catch blind spots w/ common sense checks.

Note to other researchers: it would be worth the effort to re-create a similar knowledge base more open to public but with careful moderations. Make sure the knowledge base and decent engine are open source. Gotta be for best results here.

<comment><USER6> It seems terrible that such a project would lock up all that knowledge in a proprietary form.

Fortunately, my scan of their website seems to indicate they have released their ontologies, their under a creative commons license.

[http://www.cyc.com/platform/opencyc/](http://www.cyc.com/platform/opencyc/) [http://www.cyc.com/documentation/opencyc- license/](http://www.cyc.com/documentation/opencyc-license/)

<comment><USER7> OpenCyc is only a fraction of the ontology, unfortunately. There's a lot of internal desire to update and expand OpenCyc, but my understanding is that at present the company hasn't secured funding that they're really allowed to use for that purpose.

<comment><USER5> Oh no! I take it back! We're still missing the knowledge base we need. Least OpenCyc might be a nice start on it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> It's odd to speak of Cyc just now being commercialized -- Cycorp has been in business using Cyc as its core tech for a long time. Military contracting, among other stuff.

<comment><USER9> Which makes one wonder what exactly 'Lucid' is doing different from Cycorp Inc (1995, described in WP article for Cyc), and is exactly what the TR article doesn't cover. /sigh

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Have some respect and don't call him "Doug", please! He's always been "Douglas Lenat"! Although questioned, Eurisko [0] (circa 1976) to me is a bigger AI achievement than the much fanfared AlphaGo! I have great respect for Douglas Lenat!

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

<comment><USER10> Wow! Just found this [0]!

[0]: [http://lesswrong.com/lw/10g/lets_reimplement_eurisko/](http://lesswrong.com/lw/10g/lets_reimplement_eurisko/)

<comment><USER5> The one person who had the papers said what was in them didn't tell them enough to even understand how to implement the main loop. It was too vague. So, no detailed papers, no source, good results that might have been done by hand, steady funding for decades, and a commercial spin-off. One commenter said it looks like a Xanatos Gambit:

[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/XanatosGambit](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/XanatosGambit)

I thought Cyc project was worth a long-term investment but other theory might be simultaneously true.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Wow. I did not realize it was time for the yearly Cyc article again. Cycorp has been a thing for a long time, but I think history has shown that the path Doug and Cyc have taken is not the way forward.

</comment><comment><USER12> > Cyc has been given many thousands of facts

Are thousands enough? Maybe the article misstated this.

<comment><USER13> The free version of cyc has about a quarter-million _terms_ alone, so they are likely wrong.

[edit]

According to this, it has "about seven million assertions" and notes that cyc can infer many more assertions from those.

[http://www.cyc.com/kb/](http://www.cyc.com/kb/)

<comment><USER14> I wonder how well Cyc could build assertions from fuzzy or only semi- trustworthy data from sources like Wikipedia.

<comment><USER13> My guess is quite poorly. Remember the assertion that all humans have two arms and two legs isn't even 100% true, which is one reason of many why the majority of the AI field abandoned the formal logic approach for statistical methods.

The other side of the story would be that the majority of the AI field didn't want to spend 30 years formalizing the large body of general-purpose knowledge.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I have played with OpenCYC.org for years. It hasn't been updated since 2012 but version 4 is still interesting.

After seeing the utility of Google's Knowledge Graph, I wish there were a free open source project to combine all the public data sources like OpenCYC, DBPedia, the Freebase dumps in MediaPedia, etc.

</comment><comment><USER16> Douglas Lenat recently gave the following talk at CMU about how Cyc works and its current capabilities: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mv0nCS2mik](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mv0nCS2mik)

</comment><comment><USER17> fwiw: A related project but with a different, I hope more complete, vision for storing ~"any/all knowledge": [http://onemodel.org](http://onemodel.org) . (AGPL)

</comment><comment><USER7> I'll say this much: Cycorp is an interesting place to work.

</comment><comment><USER18> There are some 3d-printable / 2d-laser-cutable examples of auxetic materials on thingiverse[1].

The creator describes two interesting mechanical properties his parts exhibit:

> synclastic bending and auxetic behavior. Synclastic materials have the > fascinating ability to assume compound curvature along two (often > orthogonal) directions. One can wrap a sphere easily in a synclastic > material without folding it whereas attempting the same with an anticlastic > material, such as paper, would require numerous folds. Auxetic behavior is > found in materials with a negative Poission's ratio, which relates the > deformation in one direction when the material is stressed in a > perpendicular direction. When compressed in one direction, auxetic materials > contract in the other, and when stretched, they expand. In other words, an > auxetic nail would become narrowed as it was hammered into a board and > expand in diameter when pulled out of the board.

[1] [http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:289650](http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:289650)</comment>


Google's new business model - <AUTHOR> http://stratechery.com/2014/googles-new-business-model/ <comment><USER2> >That is why I ... am inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt with regards to Nest data.

What is with the paranoia over Nest's data? Yes, google is a data-hungry company. but Nest doesn't collect any valuable data that google doesn't already have. Sure, the motion sensors in a nest thermostat can sense when somebody is in your house, and what the temperature is. But Google already has your cell phone, they know where _you_ are at all times, that's a hell of a lot more valuable than knowing whether somebody is currently inside whatever building where you installed your thermostat in.

I suspect that the nest acquisition is about finding new uses for all the data they have, not about collecting more data. Google already knows, without installing sensors in my house, when i leave for work. they know when i'm heading home, and when i go on holidays. That all seems like information that a home automation system would love to have access to.

<comment><USER3> Disagree a bit. Even though google knows where am I or my cell phone data I have choice to turn off GPS, can turn off cell phone. Can you afford to turn off thermostat ? Also, as of now they don't collect data. What is guarantee that they won't do in future ? All they say is we have changed our terms and conditions and don't even ask or care about whether we accept or not. Having motion sensor that sense your presence and having that data on someone's server is always scary. Right now Google is king, but will it always be, given the race to top in SV ? So why won't they make further efforts to collect more data ? Not that I am naysayer but I didn't like the news when I read it yesterday.

<comment><USER4> > All they say is we have changed our terms and conditions and don't even ask > or care about whether we accept or not.

Well, in that scenario you can always change to a different thermostat...

> Having motion sensor that sense your presence and having that data on > someone's server is always scary.

Is Google more scary than Nest? You signed up for that data to live on someone's server when you bought a Nest, the only difference now is that it's Google's servers instead of a small startup's.

<comment><USER5> Why does Nest need to store data on a server? I could understand an optional network connection to download weather reports, but what user state needs to be stored on a server instead of the thermostat itself?

<comment><USER4> That's the entire selling point of the Nest, the online smart connectedness thingy. Remote control & machine learning to avoid spending 30 seconds programming a thermostat.

<comment><USER6> To be fair, Iv'e considered a Nest for the main reason that my programming changes every few weeks - weather gets colder, folks visiting, kids get sick, etc etc. These events last several days or weeks.

I want something that learns and adapts constantly. I'd really love something that also controlled window openings and my whole-house fan, but for now I'll take something that controls the central air/heat.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Google clearly has an unprecedented (well, maybe except for sun..) set of technologies on the horizon. Between network infastructure, mapping, energy, robots, and now home automation, their dominance in the future is easy to forsee.

However, there was no mention about Google's rise to power being centered around a focused set of high-quality web services. And now they are starting their "3rd business model leg" of consumer devices before they have truly mastered their second, the SaaS market. I find it funny how the OP quickly glances over Apples unprecedented focus, althewhile highlighting and admiring Google's unwarranted diversification.

The obvious question is: can Google get away with it all, or will they fail without focus? They have managed to stay cohesive so far, but as the author rightly points out, Google's true diversification has only just begun.

<comment><USER8> _The obvious question is: can Google get away with it all, or will they fail without focus?_

It will be interesting to see how Google handles quality and customer service if it increases its efforts to sell consumer devices.

You can get away with a lot of ignoring people unhappy about the quality of your service if you're giving away that service for free in return for showing them advertising. Their only option is to stop using your service and go somewhere else, which doesn't cost you much if they're still a small proportion of your user base.

However, you can't get away with a lot of ignoring unhappy people if you sell them expensive consumer gadgets that don't work properly. They'll do things like returning the item (substantial overheads for you even if it's in resaleable condition) or charging back the purchase fee if you don't make a return reasonably easy (more immediate overheads, and if you develop a pattern of this happening it's going to hurt your long-term overheads with the card companies as well).

I'm a little surprised Google aren't going for the huge-value business model that the linked blog overlooks: being the on-line distributor/middle man. This position typically rakes in much of the profit while taking on relatively little risk and doing relatively little work to create the underlying value, and it always has; see: record labels, book publishers, app stores, cloud hosting, and of course the granddaddy of them all in the Internet age, Amazon.

<comment><USER9> > However, you can't get away with a lot of ignoring unhappy people if you > sell them expensive consumer gadgets that don't work properly. They'll do > things like returning the item (substantial overheads for you even if it's > in resaleable condition) or charging back the purchase fee if you don't make > a return reasonably easy (more immediate overheads, and if you develop a > pattern of this happening it's going to hurt your long-term overheads with > the card companies as well).

People keep saying that, but is it really true? People buy lots of things from companies famous for terrible customer service all the time. I understand wanting it to be true, for sure...

<comment><USER8> It probably varies a lot with the nature of the product and the wealth of the individual. It's a hassle to return things and someone busy might not bother returning something that was not, to them, very expensive. Still, I suspect it's true to a much greater extent for physical products than ad-funded on- line services. If you spend real money on something and it really doesn't work, I think most people I know would err on the side of returning it and claiming a replacement/refund.

It might also be worth mentioning that many places have explicit consumer protection laws that cover this kind of situation, so vendors/manufacturers can't just brush their responsibilities under the carpet because providing actual customer service people to deal with customers is expensive.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This article shed credibility in the 1st paragraph, calling the Motorola purchase a patent and panic-driven deal. Au contraire, it was a heck of good deal for Google. It's not clear that Google panics about anything.

Forbes put it like this: [http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2013/10/22/motorola-...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2013/10/22/motorola- mobility-isnt-a-disaster-for-google-it-only-cost-them-1-5-billion/)

<comment><USER11> This tax "analysis" doesn't even pass the smell test and appears to be based on the assumption that Motorola losses will continue at the Q3 '12 record level and makes hay of the $700 of reduced taxes Google would have to pay in that case while ignoring the actual $2 bln losses a year that would pile up on the side.

<comment><USER12> The tax analysis is based on past losses not future losses, that's why the tax expert says they'll get them up until 2019, rather than indefinitely.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> This submission links to the blog's top level. The article's permalink is [http://stratechery.com/2014/googles-new-business- model/](http://stratechery.com/2014/googles-new-business-model/)

</comment><comment><USER12> Two of the references given seem incredibly sloppy:

1\. "a surprisingly large amount of Google's ad revenue is driven by just a few adwords." links to an inept infographic pie chart organized by volume (so "keywords" that earn more money can have smaller slices) and the "keywords" are actually "keyword categories", The authors of the infographic do make the claim he repeats, they just don't seem to present any evidence to support it, since they snip the long tail of the data and are more interested in selling software to those who want to make money on the high CPC terms.

2\. suggesting that Google's revenue and profit will peak when the growth _rate_ of internet adoption peaks seems odd enough that without further explanation I'd assume basic innumeracy as the cause. The source suggest internet growth until 2040 which seems a bit more positive for those betting on the internet and/or Google given the article's premise that they're linked.

2.b Also, that growth is a binary use/don't use metric, it takes no account of e.g. someone with a laptop buying a web enabled phone, or simply using either device more.

</comment><comment><USER14> In all honesty, Google's apparent predestination as the world's preeminent data corporation has me strongly considering looking for employment with them. So many opportunities, so many potential benefits, and a fantastic way to hedge one's bets against ever being unemployable. Working for Google allows exposure to just about any interesting technology, whether it be robotics/AI/NLP, health/genetics, knowledge mapping & information organization, general web services, infrastructure, hardware design, sensor tech, consumer products, automotive, geographic mapping, mobile devices, media, marketing & communications, social networking, ... the list goes on and on.

</comment><comment><USER15> Hmm, I didn't quite get what the new business model was from the article. I got it that they were diversifying and I can understand it as an investment for the future but that doesn't explain what the new model is. Could someone help?

<comment><USER16> Selling you stuff directly. You pay, instead of advertiser pays. Namely, you pay $$$, and fancy electronic consumer device arrives at your doorstep. B2C consumer electronics.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Oh, this is the proof of the new business model? Not the Motorola purchase, which was far more money for a far bigger consumer device company?

<comment><USER18> As the author explains, and I agree, Motorola gave Google a large amount of patents and a way to enter the phone market. The latter lets Google have more influence in how that market expands, in order to tie it even more with their existing services.

Nest doesn't offer either of these, I see the potential to tie in with Google devices and services, but not the other way around; drastically different to acquiring a phone company. We'll definitely see Google Now cards saying "Heaters turned on at Home, expecting your arrival", I very much doubt we'll be seeing articles about thermostats posting feed updates to G+.

...or will we?

<comment><USER17> Sure, everyone thought the point of Android was to protect Google's ad business on mobile, and therefore they needed Motorola's patents for defense.

But what Ben is proposing here is that Google is actually adding a separate, additional business model that generates profits directly from product margins. If that is his thesis, then it's practicially intellectually negligent to rest on the conventional wisdom about the Motorola purchase.

Only one of these can be true:

1) Google is adding a products business model - If this is true, then everything we thought about the Motorola deal needs to be re-examined. It wasn't just about patents.

2) Google is not adding a products business model - If this is true, then the conventional wisdom is right about Motorola, but Ben is wrong in this article.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Maybe I'm imagining, but weren't there rumors that Google's new business was taking small fees from online and real world purchases? Especially those expedited through Google hardware and software?

It certainly would make Google Shopping, Glass, and self-driving cars seem like legitimate business decisions.

</comment><comment><USER20> Completely ignores Google's aggressive acquisition of robotics' companies. I'm not sure how those two fit together but unless this is two branches of Google moving in different directions I think they must both fit into the same vision.

<comment><USER21> Interesting comment. Can you please elaborate or offer some reference about Google's vision on these two hardware effort or any of these two?

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> OP URL isn't a permalink, for future viewers: [http://stratechery.com/2014/googles-new-business- model/](http://stratechery.com/2014/googles-new-business-model/)

</comment><comment><USER23> This post reminds me a lot of Benedict Evans' post from October.

[http://ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2013/10/27/simplicity](http://ben- evans.com/benedictevans/2013/10/27/simplicity)

</comment><comment><USER24> From what I've read they've also entered the defense industry through Boston Dynamics and are now (I guess) "officially" in the business of war.

<comment><USER25> You've read incorrectly then. Google had said they will honor Boston Dynamics current contracts, but will not take new ones.

<comment><USER24> Well, I stand corrected then.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Analyses such as this suffer from an overly simplistic model that is wholly detached from actual business reality. One where every company collapses down to one single thing they do.

But that has _never_ been the case for Google, or pretty much any company for that matter. This isn't "new", and Google has always been diverse.

Do people remember what Google's original "business model" was (meaning "how can we scramble to pay the bills on the technology we've built")? They sold search appliances for business: You could buy little rack mount units that would build a search corpus of your network and allow in house searching. The search engine was largely just a demonstration that Google knew search.

They grew from there. Over the years they've sold virtual machines, mail accounts, backup storage, computer cycles, smartphones, entertainment units, laptops, smart glasses, and eventually self-driving car technology and robotics. The Nexus line started as developer units, but it grew into a mainstream set of technologies that _clearly_ Google wishes was much more successful and lucrative. Recall the ill-conceived Nexus Q.

Because they're a big, diverse company. They want to make money however they can. While the common sentiment on the Motorola purchase is always the "for patents" line, is it not possible that they wanted to start benefiting more financially from Android, getting directly in the business that Apple was make so much money in? Success or failure is irrelevant, Google's actions have spoken loudly that they want Motorola to succeed as a device maker, benefiting Google in the long run.

There is nothing new here. Company wants to leverage their strengths to make money. In the same way Apple has never been only a smartphone or computer hardware company -- they want to make a little coin on that app you purchase, the software you buy, the movies you watch, the music you listen to, the services you use, and even the ads they feed you. In the real world businesses tend to be like that.

<comment><USER27> |Over the years they've sold virtual machines, mail accounts, backup storage, computer cycles, smartphones, entertainment units, laptops, smart glasses, and eventually self-driving car technology and robotics.

All of these account for less than 3% of Google's Revenue, many probably operate at a loss. What this article is saying is that Google is finally putting together a SERIOUS challenger to their Ad revenue business in the form of consumer devices. The diverse products you listed were more about Google swimming in money, being open to new ideas, and having lots of clever and creative people.

<comment><USER26> _What this article is saying is that Google is finally putting together a SERIOUS challenger to their Ad revenue business in the form of consumer devices._

Google is now "serious" because they bought a company with $300 million in annual revenue? If you must talk percentages, that is less than 1/2 of 1% of Google's revenue. It is 1/10th Motorola's revenue last year.

That argument doesn't fly at all. Google bought Nest to continue the same strategy they've been using for many years, which is finding ways to leverage their technology and name[^1]. That Google makes enormous sums from advertising doesn't diminish those attempts, nor does it undermine the intention of the people behind them.

^1 - I've seen quite a few people talk about how "most" people are now concerned about Nest/privacy, etc, where their most is a minuscule sampling of their blogging and twittering peers. Among the mainstream public sentiments are extremely positive regarding Google, and I would wager that the overwhelming majority would see "A Google Company" on the box as a huge positive.

<comment><USER27> Serious because they invested $3.2 billion in cash, not 20% of a brilliant engineer's time or released a niche product for developers and techies. I'm not trying to diminish the importance of these, I'm just trying to clarify the difference between Google Glass (amazing technology, but not a huge investment or profitable endeavor for Google) and Nest (huge investment, already profitable and comparatively ubiquitous tech)

I agree, and I think the author of the article agrees that Motorola was another step in this direction, except it also came along with an added bonus of a large patent portfolio.

<comment><USER26> Google is currently burning R&D cash at some $10 billion+ a year. This money goes towards developing things like smart glasses, self-driving cars, etc. Calling these niche products or flippantly discounting them as 20% activities misses the whole notion that Google has been diversifying, for a very large price tag, for as long as they've been Google. There is nothing at all new in this, doubly so given the much larger purchase of Motorola (which the article flippantly writes off as a panic purchase for patents. I said Motorola had 10x the revenue of Nest, when actually it has about ~28x the revenue).

Have people not seen the mainstream Nexus 7 commercials? Chromebooks are being pitched to every-person.

There are too many write ups like this that want to take a complex and shifting reality, melt it down, and then make clear delineations and pivot points. The world doesn't work like that.

<comment><USER27> I think the point the article is making is that Google has, in the past, made lots of "little" long-shot bets, (making up the $10+ billion/yr R&D you mention.) The Nest purchase is Google pushing a LOT of chips into consumer tech.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>