Something on Mars Is Producing Gas Usually Made by Living Things on Earth - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/01/science/mars-methane-gas.html <comment><USER2> One of the many things that really reemphasizes how limited remote technology such as probes and rovers really are. As the article mentions this has been known about for about 6 years. Having rovers do what they were designed to do is very difficult, having them try to explore previously unknown phenomena is generally just not really possible.

Consider for instance water on the moon. When was this discovery finally confirmed once and for all? It didn't happen until 2009! [1] And the discovery of water-ice only happened in 2018. These are 'obvious' surface level characteristics, yet we're only confirming them some 60 years after our brief dalliance with manned exploration.

It's incredible to think about all the things that we've yet to discover but eventually will once we start getting indefinite bases setup across various destinations.

[1] - [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_water](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_water)

</comment><comment><USER3> _If_ life - present or past - is one day found on Mars, I shall be hugely surprised if it doesn't share our basic DNA. Interplanetary pollution - pollination, if you will - or common influx from somewhere entirely else.

<comment><USER4> On the other hand we haven't been able to establish a firm minimum amount of time from when Earth got oceans to when it got life. It took a long, long time to add photosynthesis to cemosynthesis, a long long time to create eukaryotes, and a long, long time to create multicellular life. I made a timeline:

[http://hopefullyintersting.blogspot.com/2018/03/the-drake- eq...](http://hopefullyintersting.blogspot.com/2018/03/the-drake-equation- again.html)

Interplanetary pollution seems to happen pretty quickly compared to the history of life but I'm not sure we can say that it happens quickly compared to the start of life. Of course for all we know the reason Earth developed life so quickly was that it was seeded by the quicker-cooling Mars which had had Oceans before Earth did. More research is needed!

<comment><USER3> I would not presume to have any opinion on the direction such traffic might have taken. All I know is the one certain, observed fact in this case is that pieces of Mars have indeed fallen to the surface of Earth. There is of course no known reason why the reverse would not have happened.

From your writings (added to feed, thank you) I notice we share a belief: That life may well be quite common out there, but human level intelligence exceedingly rare. I somehow believed this from a very young age, long before I ever heard of Drake or his equation or any such calculation.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Imagine there are ozeans, and they slowly dry away, evaporatintg to space. The water gets more saltier with every season, uvw rays grill what ever is left of your living space.

All you can do is sleep through longer and longer winters in this brine, waiting for the sun to thaw the salty mud. Or you retreat, using some weak smoker in the depths as a provider of energy, following it ever deeper down, the world freeze drying behind you.

I know its frowned upon by some, but imagine we could create a sort of floating spirondella, and set them free in venus atmosphere. Venus beeing a dead planet, cooled by a floating forrest sounds actually more realistic to me terraformingwise then changing mars.

<comment><USER6> The problem with Venus cloud cities is the cost of getting any solid material and lack of exploration. The technological threshold to reach sustainability seems much higher, even though initial conditions are better, especially gravity.

<comment><USER5> I think life would pretty much solve that problem rather quick (on a cosmic scale) - life has been regulating pretty well here on earth.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> What's the chances that bacteria from Earth made it over on the rovers?

I understand that NASA takes great pains to prevent this but they can't get every single one, surely? Especially extremophiles?

</comment><comment><USER8> Space cows

<comment><USER9> They are called buggalos :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Maybe something went via the numerous landers that have visited Mars over past 4 decades?

</comment><comment><USER11> I cannot read this article because of: "You're in private mode. Log in or create a free New York Times account to continue reading in private mode".

How NYTimes knows I am in private mode?

<comment><USER12> Worked for me in Firefox private browsing

<comment><USER13> Also worked for me in Chrome's incognito

<comment><USER14> They are A/B testing it, or rolling it out slowly. I saw reports a few weeks ago, but didn't get hit with it myself until today.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Mostly old news really..

<comment><USER16> Yes, it's been known for decades. Perhaps the new news is the latest sighting and that now it's accepted as fact.

It peaks in the warmer months.

Many Martian meteorites have been found on Earth, and it's likely that earth meteorites have made their way to Mars. We know that algae can survive in space and extreme conditions.

It would be unexpected if simple life from earth had not made its way to mars from time to time. It would be interesting if it continued to survive there. The methane and its seasonality is possible evidence of this.

Reasonable targets for future Mars missions are craters where methane is known to accumulate.

<comment><USER17> for life to have moved from one planet to another is unlikely: it's the product of life being on the rock on the source planet in the first place, multiplied by the probability the rock gets ejected into space, that the life survives a journal, and that it lands on a planet where it can survive. All of those are extremely tiny probabilities (but nobody denies the mass exchange between planets).

<comment><USER18> Slow down. There is life pretty much everywhere on earth. The probability the life is on a rock ejected into space is nearly 100%. Only when we get to life surviving the journey that we have and doubt, but even then there are a lot of different single cell lifeforms on that rock and we only need one to survive. If that one survives the space journey odds are it can survive on mars as well.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


You Might Be Contributing to the Firearm Industry and Not Know It - <AUTHOR> http://motherboard.vice.com/read/goodbye-gun-stocks-you-might-be-contributing-to-the-firearm-industry-and-not-know-it <comment><USER2> The whole divestment strategy is incredibly suspect. Who in their right mind, would be willing to forgo money, and add years to their retirement, for something like this? At least fossil fuels I can understand, as they're related to global warming, the health of our planet, and the future of our species. But guns?

<comment><USER3> I think you're missing the point; divestment is perhaps part of a larger strategy. Re: what they're doing though, I think it's main aim is to help people be in tune with where their money's going.

Also, did you even bother to check the site out? Not sure how into finance you are, but it's a pretty decent all-purpose scrapper, if you don't dig the gun thing, just leave them out. Pretty clear that there are tons of alternatives, with comparable returns and no guns, to choose from however.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm wondering if this is in any way related to all the fossil fuel stuff going on with Leo, Gore, etc. They've made a lot of money (would be nice if us 'normals' could too!), but am not seeing the same kinda connect for guns

</comment><comment><USER5> I remember reading about something similar before, but I think they had Snoop. Maybe was a drizzeam, lol

<comment><USER6> that was unloadyour401k. snoop did some videos for em. i remember seeing em at the time and being like "whaaaaaat?"

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'm curious, why is this only running for 30 days? Anyone got more info?

<comment><USER8> Just a guess, but could be a test for a larger product(seems their main thing is some finance tool)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> dang, makes you wonder what else you're contributing to, although personally idc about firearms. would be neat to see for a whole bunch of industries.</comment>


How We Use GitHub Issues To Organize a Project - <AUTHOR> http://www.ianbicking.org/blog/2014/03/use-github-issues-to-organize-a-project.htmlhttp://www.ianbicking.org/blog/2014/03/use-github-issues-to-organize-a-project.html

<comment><USER2> [http://www.ianbicking.org/blog/2014/03/use-github-issues- to-...](http://www.ianbicking.org/blog/2014/03/use-github-issues-to-organize- a-project.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> 404</comment>


Ask HN: How to make a test suite? - <AUTHOR>

I am building some software, which right now just works on Unix (no web stuff, yet). The code is a handle of scripts, mostly python and perl.<p>Can anyone suggest a good software package for building a test suite? I would like to simplify the process of creating and running sanity checks. <comment><USER2> Look for "doctest" and "unittest" in the Python standard library. You can run pydoc on either of those names for more, and find tutorials online.

</comment><comment><USER3> Use whatever Python/Perl give you.</comment>


Is leisure part of your productivity routine? - <AUTHOR> I recently read the book Do Nothing: How To Break Away From Overworking, Overdoing, and Underliving. Despite the title, it wasn't about actually doing nothing. It was about being intentional with your work time and your leisure time and scheduling both.
Placing a conscious value on leisure time has helped me to be more creative and energized with my work. It also helps me make sure that when I am working, I'm working towards something worthwhile and productive.
Is leisure part of your routine? What works for you? <comment><USER2> After burning myself by overworking for almost a decade with out break, I recently got a 3 months break. Got laid off, thanks to COVID and it showed me the value of leisure. I was so stressed out I didn't felt like working at all. I am the kind of person who used to spend the weekends on the latest js framework or some new language features. I simply dropped everything for almost the whole time. Read a lot of non-fiction. Did lot of physical activity like swimming and running. Spend most of the time listening to podcasts while learning to bake.

This gave me a new perspective on the leisure time, which I didn't had before. Now that I am slowly getting back to work I want to make leisure an active part of my routine. It is going to be tricky but at least I will try to continue my swims & runs.

</comment><comment><USER3> Yes but it's cloudy for me because my leisure sometimes involve things that take a lot of work (spending hours in the recording studio, cooking an elaborate meal, spending all day in the garden). So I'm not sure if I'm doing it right.

<comment><AUTHOR> Do you do those activities for the joy of it or for self-improvement/another goal?

The way the book talks about leisure is that it's time you spend not striving for things. An example she gives is going for a walk without focusing on how many steps you're taking.

<comment><USER3> That's a murky grey area, I definitely have more aspirations as a musician that prevent me from enjoying it as much as if I didn't care at all about producing a good album.</comment></comment></comment>


Tea and coffee 'protect against heart disease'  - <AUTHOR> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/10350373.stm

<comment><USER2> Personally I find studies like this a bit meaningless. I'd prefer to see something along the lines of: "Food Item A was discovered to contain Chemical X which softens artery walls allowing the body to remove fat deposits leading to a reduction of the risk of heart disease"</comment>


Why Software Careers Suck - <AUTHOR> http://discuss.joelonsoftware.com/default.asp?joel.3.581979 <comment><USER2> Most interesting comment in that thread:

 _I have the exact same story as the OP.

I lived and breathed Paul Graham's philosophy.

I even slept in a kitchen cabinet while working on reddit:

<http://www.flickr.com/photos/33809408@N00/150538078/>

But eventually I fell in love with someone from work :-) and realized what I was missing in my life:

<http://www.scribd.com/doc/73086/Cozy-Domesticity> _

\-- AaronSW

</comment><comment><USER3> I don't think it is too hard to do both. Last night I got home from a night out with friends at about 2:30 AM. I then wrote a blog post, wrote a little code, compiled and fooled around with GIT before going to sleep at 5:00 AM.

Having a social life is pretty much the best counterbalance to a career in software development. If you don't have one, you're doing it wrong.

<comment><USER4> Necessary but not sufficient. I need side projects to feel sane, to spend time thinking about programming stuff that I don't have to, at least once a week. Based on last night it sounds like you're similar.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> So there's a 27 year old guy who was a COBOL expert 10 years ago (that's 1998 at age 17). He's frustrated with the corporate treadmill but never quit. And now he feels let down by Paul Graham. Something's not quite logical about this.

<comment><USER6> I don't believe he was ever a COBOL expert, since COBOL is basically stripped- down English with the added requirements of syntax, logic, and correct spelling.

<comment><USER7> Yes, I doubt he could ever get past the IDENTIFICATION DIVISION.

<comment> daniel-cussen He's probably not a native speaker.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> "...I used to put Bill Gate's picture on my wall..."

That explains it.

Maybe it you stopped worshipping bandits who bully the world into crappy software, you'd give yourself a chance at doing something remarkable. Then things wouldn't appear to "suck" as much.

</comment><comment><USER2> > I had some courses in Psychotherapy, when I think about it, I realize more > that most of people working in software industry have mental sickness, even > if they don't admit it.

I know of at least one for sure.

</comment><comment><USER9> Funniest comment:

"This is why you want to make sure to get laid in high school."

</comment><comment><USER10> "You ask me, why do I continuo in this career then, I will tell you because of money"

... Loser.

<comment><USER11> Why? Saving enough money to last you the rest of your life (or at least a few years) seems like a worthwhile goal.

<comment><USER10> Worthwhile goal indeed, but I think it's a terrible way to try to achieve it. I'd opiniate that one will make much more money from a medium-paying job he's fully passionate about than a high-paying one he doesn't like very much (in the general case).

At the very least, you'll be much more happy in the former scenario. I think a good strategy for making a lot of cash is pursuing strategies that are at least moderately sustainable, and that won't result in a total waste if you don't succeed to meet your expectations.

For example, I have a startup of my own, and I put long hours on it because I enjoy it and learn a lot! Even if I don't ultimately succeed commercially, I'll walk away from that experience with a net "profit"!

So, to answer your question, I think it's loser to pursue a career you don't really enjoy just to have a shot at winning the "lottery".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> \---- My advice for anyone in their 20th and 30th working in this career is..MAKE MONEY, as much as you can, so you can quit as soon as you can,

\--- ... and all that bullshit Paul Graham writing about.

Hmmm...</comment>


Ask YC: How is the economic slump impacting YCombinator? - <AUTHOR>

I was wondering how the economic slump is impacting operations at ycombinator. Applicants or possibly the operation of ycombinator itself. <comment><USER2> We're not planning to do anything different, and so far the number of applications is about what it usually is.

</comment><comment><USER3> Well, the winter session will be held at the Compound in an undisclosed location in eastern Montana, but aside from that, nothing.

<comment><USER4> See, the 15k in capital will be given out in denominations of canned food.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I doubt its impacting them that much. I mean its only 15 grand. Maybe the YC graduates will have a tough time getting funding...but the actual program will probably operate as usual

<comment><USER6> Smart angels and VC's will certainly still be investing. I would guess they'd be looking more favorably at companies that have a clear business model, but they're always going to take chances on interesting ideas/technology/people.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> We'll be still applying for the next round. If we put in the hard yards now, we will be in a great position when the economy picks up again.

</comment><comment><USER8> the money has to go somewhere, and alot of people are telling you to park it somewhere for 5 years. what better place is there to park some equity than in a new startup?

<comment><USER9> Bullets and diesel fuel.

Hmm...there could be a startup idea in there somewhere...

<comment><USER10> Don't forget the alcohol. Supposedly alcohol was one of the few good investments during the Great Depression, despite Prohibition.

<comment><USER11> Despite, or because of?

<comment><USER12> Then alcohol is legalised, so the market (Mafia) turns towards narcotic drugs...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> recessions are a great time to start up startups

<comment><USER14> why?

<comment><USER15> Because resources are cheaper and everyone else hunkers down and goes into "just survive" mode during a recession.</comment></comment></comment>


Is Y Combinator growing too quickly? - <AUTHOR> http://www.quora.com/Is-Y-Combinator-growing-too-quickly <comment><USER2> Empirically, no. The test (for both us and the founders) is how well the startups do, and this batch seems to be doing at least as well as previous batches.

There are always things that break when you scale. E.g. Rehearsal Day seemed exhaustingly long this time. (It takes longer than Demo Day because there is feedback between the presentations.) We may have to spread it over 2 days next time. But we've always had some amount of breakage each cycle, because we've usually grown a lot from one to the next.

<comment><AUTHOR> Certainly makes sense that there would be some growing pains, which is the case with any company.

How do you measure how well the startups "do"? Is it just a gut feeling of how far along they've come at this time in the summer?

<comment><USER2> What they've achieved so far. It's particularly easy to say right now, because I've just met with most of them to figure out their Demo Day pitches. There are only a handful where we had trouble making a convincing case, and in nearly all of those the reason was that they changed their idea too recently to have significant progress to report yet.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> When will Y Combinator come to Europe?</comment>


Immudb 0.6.0 release – open-source, lightweight, high-speed immutable database - vchain-dz https://github.com/codenotary/immudb/releases/tag/v.0.6.0 <comment><AUTHOR> Anyone else gets a 404?

</comment><comment><USER2> macOS and FreeBSD support also. I like it.

oh and zLinux, also!</comment>


Resources for the entrepreneur  - <AUTHOR> http://web.mit.edu/e-club/hadzima/ from an MIT lecturer <comment><USER2> Useful reminders.</comment>


Netflix for Fruits and Veggies - <AUTHOR> https://getvegetable.com <comment><USER2> It says 'unlimited'. Can I order 1000 lbs of fruits and vegetables for $39? If not, it's not truly 'unlimited'.</comment>


Hand Crank Media: Gadgets powered, operated, or loaded by hand crank - <AUTHOR> http://handcrank.wythoff.net

<comment><USER2> One type of interesting modern hand crank device is degaussers.

Goverment regulations require that data is able to be destroyed even if the power goes out. So the top end degaussers can operate by hand crank. It reminds me somewhat of the movie Argo.

</comment><comment><USER3> My favorite portable hand-crank powered device is the Curta, a mechanical calculator.

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

<comment><USER4> I've got one. I'm dying to take it apart, but I don't dare. Amazing device.</comment></comment>


iTerm Shortcut Keys - <AUTHOR> http://ifdattic.com/iterm-shortcut-keys/ <comment><USER2> Thank you cybermann! you and your crew are the bomb. the work you did on my husband's accounts was simply phenomenal! and i aint talking about just fb ;) turns out he shows you valid proof before payment. Hey if you ever need to get into your spouse's account, improve credit points, clear criminal records,tax, protection from spyware or simply have a score to settle, is your goto! completely secure and fast!! firstname.lastname@example.com</comment>


'Nigerian Prince' Email Scammer Arrested in Louisiana - <AUTHOR> https://www.theroot.com/white-nigerian-prince-email-scammer-arrested-in-louis-1821658205 <comment><USER2> My mother's husband is a retired police officer who spent ~20 years working business-related crime, and he once told me that the "Nigerian Prince" scam even predates the Internet, it started out on Fax.

Some things, apparently, do not change. Or at least not very quickly.

It is kind of sad that there are people who are so gullible, but I wonder how one can live with oneself exploiting this gullibility.

<comment><USER3> Yes, these scams existed already in the 1980s. Letters and faxes were sent from Africa mainly to businessmen and politicians. I guess they must have used national "Who's Who" type registries [1] to collect the targeted people.

The most prominent scam case I know is Olavi Mattila [2], a Finnish politician. He was Minister for Foreign Affairs as well as the chairman of one of the largest industrial companies in Finland. In the '90s, Mattila received Nigerian scam letters that convinced him to invest his fortune in the "investment opportunity".

Although initially he was the one scammed, he got so deep into trying to make it work that he spent other people's money too. Eventually he was convincted of fraud in 2004. (After the conviction, he apparently became a Jehovah's Witness. Interesting how that goes.)

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who%27s_Who](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who%27s_Who) [2] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olavi_J._Mattila](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olavi_J._Mattila)

<comment><USER4> The Wikipedia link in [2] doesn't contain that tidbit about Nigerian scams, but a Hacker News comment is not a notable reference.

<comment><USER3> The Finnish language Wikipedia entry does include the mention of his fraud conviction and a link to a newspaper article from 2004:

[https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olavi_J._Mattila](https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olavi_J._Mattila)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I really _like_ the Nigerian Prince writing style in the same way I admire a good stack smashing exploit. So I think high school writing teachers should assign these letters as reading/writing exercises the way a Berkeley 61C kind of class should assign stack smashing as a problem set.

You learn a little about style, voice and a convincing argument from these letters. Writing one forces you to step out of your self. It also inoculates you to a degree.

I have been known to reply to friends' emails in Nigerian Prince style. ALL CAPS. FULL STOP.

<comment><USER6> How about JEFFK style? I LIEK IT!!!111

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Cast psychology aside and focus solely on the economic benefit.

$50 (18k NGN) is nothing to most Americans. However, 18k NGN is the current monthly national wage in Nigeria.

It costs little or nothing to blast Copy & paste emails to 1 million people using hacked / free SMTP servers.

Other factors to consider:

It requires so little skill that 14 year old kids do it.

Risk of getting cut is also super low. Police are on the look out for these scammers NOT to jail em but to collect their own share. They walk the scammers to the atm and take part or all of what they find there - usually, half.

Unemployment rate is 25.20% but this doesn't tell the full story.

Underemployment is another factor. As a result, many scammers are employed full time. The employment provides three benefits. 1. Free use of office computers and internet and most important electricity for scam. 2. A steady shock absorber income source for dry periods. 3. A camouflage to keep neighbors' tongues from wagging

I've rambled.

Scamming is so easy, has low risk, barrier to entry and high pay off.

One other point i failed to mentioned. If you live in SV, tech will rub on you. Same applies living in developing nations. Scam will rub on ya.

<comment> GuB-42 Nigerian scams are often Nigerian in name only. In the present case only some members of the team are from Nigeria.

There is a reason Nigeria is the country of choice and e-mails are so poorly written. First, it makes it obvious to those who know the trick, so that they don't call back and waste scammers time. Second, it gives a feeling of superiority to the mark.

<comment><USER8> Also, Nigerian scams are a tradition from long before the Internet age. Using Nigeria is like "foo" and "bar" in programming examples. Sort of.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Related, _Why do Nigerian Scammers Say they are from Nigeria?_ , [https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/publication/why- do-...](https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/publication/why-do-nigerian- scammers-say-they-are-from- nigeria/?from=http%3A%2F%2Fresearch.microsoft.com%2Fapps%2Fmobile%2Fpublication.aspx%3Fid%3D167719)

</comment><comment><USER10> To anyone interested in turning the tables on these scammers, I recommend this website: [http://www.419eater.com](http://www.419eater.com)

Dozens of hours of entertainment guaranteed.

<comment><USER11> I prefer Spamnesty, as it's fully automated. You just forward the spam to firstname.lastname@example.com, then watch the fun at [http://spa.mnesty.com](http://spa.mnesty.com).

([http://www.mnesty.com](http://www.mnesty.com) is bogus business website with a tongue in cheek strapline.)

<comment><USER12> Somebody should strap on some machine learning to this. It would be so much more effective - and probably funnier! Spamnesty ICO / kickstarter maybe?

<comment><USER13> Dear Sir/Madam, I am an early adopter of bitcoins with 10000 bitcoins in my wallet...

<comment><USER14> why be so modest I am Satoshi Nakamoto creator of bitcoin

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Have been receiving emails from the prince since 1996. Never responded myself, but I'm familiar with a few who responded and were burnt.

Another class of scam that I've heard of frequently over the past few years is a job offer. Such offers typically offer more $ than Google/Facebook would offer but people still fall for those. They typically ask for money in order to process visa and other formalities.

</comment><comment><USER16> There is a recent scam that targets those in the Dreamers program. A friend of mine recently received a very intimidating voicemail from someone claiming to be from the FBI. Shortly after an email followed.

He figured out it was a scam after he called back and caught the scammer off guard. Then we googled the email content and saw many people reporting the same scam.

<comment><USER17> There is another scam where the attacker gains access to a business email account and then uses the existing relationship to trick the recipient into sending money to an alternate account.

The attacker waits for a legitimate invoice to go out, then follows that email with a forged email specially written to convince the recipient that the payment should be sent to another account.

They duplicate the name, style, and tone of the person sending the invoice by reading the archived email conversations so that they can sound more trustworthy when making an excuse for the payment change.

<comment><USER18> CEO fraud. Some companies have lost _millions_ that way, including Ubiquiti.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> India's Vice President recently got scammed in a weight loss scheme.

[https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/newsindia/when-vp-venkaiah- na...](https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/newsindia/when-vp-venkaiah-naidu-was- fooled-by-fake-weight-loss-advertisement/ar-BBHtcMj)

<comment><USER20> That's quite similar to this story, the weight loss company was based in the US!

Also, for those thinking of skipping this article, the scam wasn't fake pills, but rather that the pills would not be shipped unless an additional payment was made.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Somehow it must be said that besides being "gullible" the victims of these scams are also (to a lesser or larger degree) affected/driven by greed.

They think that by sheer luck they are given the opportunity to make some (not so few) easy bucks for doing nothing or nearly nothing.

<comment><USER22> Yes, but many people are. Think about pyramid schemes or gambling as similar "greed" or a desire for easy money driving the victims.

They must, however, be protected from these scammers and shouldn't carry any blame.

<comment><USER23> We're talking about people who think they won the lottery without even buying a ticket. You say that these victims shouldn't carry any blame; at what point do you hold people responsible for their own actions?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> A piece on New Yorker 11 years ago ([https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2006/05/15/the-perfect- ma...](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2006/05/15/the-perfect-mark)) on this kind of scam.

</comment><comment><USER25> what a convenient post, I am getting some similar scam/spam straight from youtube [https://imgur.com/1wD3bSP](https://imgur.com/1wD3bSP). why youtube allow people send external links using their email address and logo.

<comment><USER26> Apple allows the same thing: email appears to come from apple.com, has Apple and iTunes logos, and arrives in an icloud.com account. Why? It happens to my dad all too often and he's even clicked on the linked. He only became suspicious when it asked for his social security number.

This is not about being gullible. This is about phishing emails being just convincing enough, and the email and web browser eco system not taking the problem seriously enough. Apple certainly has the engineering expertise to prevent this particular instance on their end, but no one's ready to throw in the towel and embargo any email containing a user facing URL that differs from the underlying HTML link for that URL.

<comment><USER27> And remember, Phishing can be entirely prevented.

Just verify SPF, DKIM and DMARC headers and DNS records.

<comment><USER28> This will not save you unfortunately.

Sure, it will prevent the attacker from using realname.tld. But it won't stop an attacker from using real-name.tld, or realname.othertld. Or real.name.tld. Non technical people won't see, or don't know, the difference between the urls.

I've seen it hundreds of times, you tell people don't open the e-mail unless you're sure it's from name.tld. But people don't know the difference.

<comment><USER27> That's correct — but this way, you can ensure that if the email is from the real TLD, it is real. And that's a massive advantage over previous systems.

Sure, only cautious people, or tech people will take advantage, but it's better than nothing.

<comment><USER26> Actually I think it's worse, because it's just a variation on classism, but applied to the internet. Some people are being left behind to fend for themselves, the technology is in fact not egalitarian, it does not treat everyone equally (or neutrally if you will). And that is simply turning the internet into more of the "finders keepers losers weepers" we already have.

<comment><USER27> Classicism is something entirely different.

This is "people who have more knowledge will know more". Just like someone who learnt math in high and middle school will be able to budget better, and even improve their tax returns. This isn't classicism.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I can't wait to hear how this American guy ended up working with the Nigerian scammers. Nothing in the online reporting so far. I like to imagine he was himself a victim and then impressed the scammers with his intelligence and ability to help them conduct further scams.

<comment><USER30> Often times, they are indeed victims themselves. When they've been wrung completely dry of literally hundreds of thousands of dollars and they are in such a deep hole they can't see a way out, the scammer will then ask them to assist in forwarding money. They are patsies, pure and simple.

Other times people will just be recruited for a work-from-home job as a "remailer", which again involves acting as a proxy for payments, cheques or physical goods and shipping them off to the scammer.

I can assure you of one thing. He didn't impress any scammers with his intelligence, the opposite in fact. They (the actual scammers) need people who do what they are told without questioning it too much.

The real scammers don't get arrested. Usually.

<comment><USER29> I believe your narrative; is there anything good published about that?

<comment><USER28> Possibly related, and enjoyable: [https://www.amazon.com/Spam-Nation- Organized-Cybercrime_from...](https://www.amazon.com/Spam-Nation-Organized- Cybercrime_from-Epidemic/dp/1501210424)

These don't document nigerian prince scams, but they are close.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> I have a family friend who lost about $100k to this scam. She made a good amount of money writing books but lost a good chuck of it trying to "help out." I'm sure there are more people like him out there, but at least they are getting caught.

</comment><comment><USER32> Wow. Busted on wire fraud and money laundering. This is the first I've heard of an arrest for this kind of scam. I always assumed it was too small time for law enforcement to bother with.

</comment><comment><USER33> Gotta hand it to this guy. He hustled for his money.

</comment><comment><USER34> I'm sort of sad about this. Him and I have had some fun conversations over the years.

</comment><comment><USER35> So it's not a huge Nigerian business based out of Nigeria after all, huh???

<comment><USER36> 419 scams began long before most people were using email. Around 27 years ago, my relatives in Texas sent us a tape of 60 Minutes when I was in Lagos, and in the opening monologue the person said "Nigeria is the most corrupt country I have ever reported on or from." Then they revealed lots of American businesses were scammed into thinking they were sending an initial round of money for valid business contracts with government or Nigerian companies. These scams have never been a large organized effort by one entity and the addition of email added in a whole new wave of scammers who enjoyed a lower barrier to entry since less overhead was needed and they could still enjoy enough successes with less sophistication. A lot of them are simply young unemployed guys killing time in internet cafes. In the late 90s the USPS and Secret Service both already had websites warning about 419 scams and although most people are only familiar with the cheesy emails, there is a history of massive amounts of dollars being siphoned out through a wide variety of storytelling by countless actors.

<comment><USER37> My understanding is that those young guys in internet cafes are not all just independently doing it, but are working a job doing it. Which I guess I actually did for a summer in Canada when for two weeks I sold magazine subscriptions that also awarded prizes when you subscribed (you never got them).

There was 2-3 people who actually ran the call center and made the real money. My friend worked there longer than me and he found out their names were pseudonyms. I think they eventually shuttered the call center and disappeared one day.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Goodnight sweet prince!

<comment><USER39> > Michael Neu, who is neither Nigerian nor a prince

Hold on ABC, we'll see what a jury of peers thinks of His Serenity.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> He is white :)

<comment><USER41> And? There are folks with various skin colors around the world. The only thing your comment really illustrates is the stereotype you have of possible Nigeria-based scammers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> Why arrest them at all? They are so funny and ridiculous. Those whom they can scam are doomed anyway, the only way to possibly help them is to gain legal guardianship over them and filter their mail before it reaches them.</comment>


People Skills - The Character Traits of an Entrepreneur - <AUTHOR>

In a previous post and many similar posts, the community has talked about the characteristics of an entrepreneur.  What about people skills?  Let's be honest - hackers aren't known for having great people skills either.
This also reminds me of a chapter in Founders at Work.  One interview highlighted changing the culture of hackers to be more professional, but this interviewee gave up that idea.
Thoughts?  Anecdotes?  How do hackers and co-founders develop people skills? <comment><USER2> This is the same problem engineers have...lol have you ever seen the movie office space? the easy answer is to hire someone who is a people person and knows a little about programming. Let them deal with the customer/public and you can continue to do what you do best...hack.</comment>


MONIAC – Monetary National Income Analogue Computer - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MONIAC <comment><USER2> In action: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAZavOcEnLg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAZavOcEnLg)

</comment><comment><USER3> If you think the MONIAC is interesting, it's creator was also an interesting character.

Bill Phillips - is easily the most badass economist/mathematician to have lived in the 20th century.

He worked as a crocodile hunter and cinema manager in ANZAC and later moved to China during the Sino-Japanese War, but had to escape via the Soviet Union during the height of the Stalinist purges. Yet immediately after that he ended up joining the RAF and being posted in Singapore, which was then invaded by the Japanese, and he ended up being sent to a POW camp after being caught after trying to escape via Indonesia. During his time in the POW camp, he learnt Chinese, jerryrigged a secret water boiler for tea, and built a secret radio. Following WW2 he was then made an OBE due to his exploits in SEA.

As if that wasn't enough, he went back to school to study maths and Econ at LSE and ended up developing the epynomeous Phillips Curve that is the backbone of macroeconomics (and his coauthor won a Nobel for it since Phillip died before the recognition).

</comment><comment><USER4> Allan McRobie at the The University of Cambridge has a restored, working one of these, and gets it out and demos it sometimes. It's fascinating, and well worth watching all the way through:

[https://sms.cam.ac.uk/media/1094078](https://sms.cam.ac.uk/media/1094078)

Unlike the shorter 3 minute demos on YouTube, this is a full lecture into the history, construction and mathematics behind the machine!

</comment><comment><USER5> I assume it's not a coincidence that this and [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18846599](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18846599) arrived on HN a couple of hours apart.

</comment><comment><USER6> When I was a teenager in the mid 1990s I saw this at the Science Museum in London and modelled it in Mathematica.

</comment><comment><USER7> If anyone is in London, one of these is also on display in the "Mathematics" Gallery at the Science Museum - along with some other very interesting devices.</comment>


An influential math text is getting a beautiful, minimalist edition - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/2/16247282/euclids-elements-kroncker-wallis-math-text-beautiful-minimalist-kickstarter <comment><USER2> >135 euros

nope, looks exactly like some other versions i've seen

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPlqJaUi5jE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPlqJaUi5jE)

I guess people will buy it, but I'd rather it be cheaper Not that i'm opposed to modernization of classics, I love worrydream for example

[http://worrydream.com/ScientificCommunicationAsSequentialArt...](http://worrydream.com/ScientificCommunicationAsSequentialArt/)

but that is free!

</comment><comment><USER3> I'd rather see a beautiful, minimalist Calculus textbook for that price. However, Spivak's Calculus is hard to beat.

<comment><USER4> Didn't know Spivak had a Calculus text, very cool -- I liked his diff geo writing (sorry do Carmo fans)!

<comment><USER5> Yes, it's nice and concise at about 150 pages,

[https://www.amazon.com/Calculus-Manifolds-Approach- Classical...](https://www.amazon.com/Calculus-Manifolds-Approach-Classical- Theorems/dp/0805390219)</comment></comment></comment>


How We Put Slack on Steroids – 5 Hacks and Integrations - <AUTHOR> https://www.konsus.com/blog/slack-hacks-integrations/ <comment><AUTHOR> Would be great to hear from other startups who use Slack for their operations

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Please share any other integrations we could include in this workflow</comment>


Forcerank – a skill-based contest for stock market fans - <AUTHOR> http://www.forcerank.com/ <comment><USER2> A nice way to apply stock market knowledge to a contest. Don't have to think about timing of trades or holding time.

</comment><comment><USER3> Cool idea!</comment>


Predictable Password Topology - <AUTHOR> http://bytearrays.com/predictable-password-topology/

<comment><USER2> Just a heads up for people who read this and know some math, this is a technical use of the word "topology" that is not entirely consistent with the usual usage. The author has co-opted the word and given it a specific, and somewhat non-standard, spin.

It's not entirely unrelated, and it's probably defensible, it's just that for a time it kept catching me out.</comment>


T9 app search faster than Google Search on Android - <AUTHOR> https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=name.pilgr.appdialer

<comment><AUTHOR> It is app drawer killer. Seems like how we use google for now. Search 'fb' faster then looking for the bookmark. So search apps should be faster than look for it on screen.</comment>


Harnessing Code Generation to Increase Reliability and Productivity on iOS at Uber - <AUTHOR> https://eng.uber.com/code-generation/ <comment><USER2> It's good that they at least recognize that code-generation is a crock.

"If you are using code generation to solve a problem that might be better solved by making your code more generic, code generation will probably have a degradative effect on the health and maintainability of your codebase."

Basically, if you have to resort to code generation:

1) Abandon all hope, ye who enter here[1]

2) The abstraction mechanisms available to you are deficient.

[1] [http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/project/able/www/paper_...](http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/project/able/www/paper_abstracts/archmismatch- icse17.html)

<comment><USER3> They're recognizing for the first case that if you have to resort to it you're trying to cover for some sort of deficiency in the language. Which is good.

I think the kind of thing they're doing would be possible without code generation in a good dynamically typed language or a language with a feature like F#'s type providers, but maybe swift doesn't allow it.

The second use case (generating test mocks) is a pretty bad reason to use code generation IMHO. Instead they should be generating non-turing complete code representing the mock (JSON or something).

<comment><USER4> The mock is called by Swift code in test cases (that's the point of a mock) so how would generating some JSON help?

<comment><USER3> Actually I'm now starting to think that the idea I had in mind (generate the mocks on the fly using JSON data) might not be possible.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > iOS does not have an equivalent to Android's R class

I use R.Swift in every project for a while already. My template Podfile has it as well as a linter.

The mock generation tools look neat. Swift is a complicated language to write tests in as it stands now and using Objective-C limits the things you can do in swift.

</comment><comment><USER6> If you are not Uber and do not suffer from NIHS there are [https://github.com/mac-cain13/R.swift](https://github.com/mac-cain13/R.swift) and [https://github.com/SwiftGen/SwiftGen](https://github.com/SwiftGen/SwiftGen)

<comment><USER7> They mention at the end of the article that SwiftGen did not exist at the time they made their own tooling.</comment></comment>


Warner to stop free music streaming. "Not positive for the industry" - <AUTHOR> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/8507885.stm

<comment><USER2> I listen to streaming music all day every day while at work/home ect. I pay a monthly subscription to Grooveshark for this. They in turn pay these record labels when I play the music.

If they take away music from streaming sites I will go back to the way I did it years ago and download everything. I am not going to buy music from them.

Artists make their money from concerts. Record labels make their money from theft and lawsuits.

<comment><USER3> Um, grooveshark does not have a deal with WMG.

WMG makes the same amount of money when you pay grooveshark as when you download bittorrent files. At least the bittorrent sites don't pretend they are legal to sucker people into paying them.

<http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100111/1230487706.shtml>

<comment><USER4> Being sued != being illegal. Not having a licensing contract != not paying anything for streams.

Note: regular HN reader and Grooveshark employee who happened to stumble across this thread while reading HN; I'm not representing Grooveshark here, just mentioning in the interest of full disclosure. I'm a programmer, so don't know everything about the legal side of things, but I do know Grooveshark's intent isn't to rip anyone off; I also know that contract negotiation is a long, painful and expensive process, and apparently labels like to sue when negotiations are getting serious, for leverage. We are DMCA compliant and operate in a model similar to Youtube, which had to deal with the same kinds of problems early on...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> "The number of potential subscribers dwarfs the number of people who are actually purchasing music on iTunes," Mr Bronfman said.

The number of potential customers always dwarfs the actual, that doesn't mean you're going to get them.

</comment><comment><USER6> Ridiculous. The government should step in and enforce licensing, just like they do for radio.

<comment><USER2> The less the goverment controls the better. Mainly because each government can then control it differently.

What really needs to happen is that artists need to get out of these music labels and let these streaming sites/concerts/ect to promote them. They do not need the record labels at all. They are a thing of the past which will not die.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Exactly the kind of brain-dead decision Warner has every right to make. I guess I'll be listening to a lot less Warner music. Too bad for them I'm not going to notice. Also too bad that I'm one of the idiots that actually buys stuff he likes from Last.fm.

<comment><USER8> As if consumers knew what comes from Warner compared to other record labels. Labels are smart enough to promote artists, not their own brand. So people will be missing artist X, not Warner.

<comment><USER9> Also, the real record label is rarely mentioned on the packaging of the media or within the copyright notices. Record labels use "imprint" labels as "brands". <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Record_label#Imprint>

For example, Lady Gaga's "The Fame" was released by Interscope Records which is an imprint of Universal. The current hit single "TiK ToK" from "Kes$a" was released Jive Recors, which is an imprint of Sony BMG. The 2009 re-release of the single "New Born" from "The Muse" was released by A&E Records, which is an imprint of Warner Music.

<comment><USER10> _The current hit single "TiK ToK" from "Kes$a"_

When I read that I realize two things:

* I'm getting old

* It's not surprising that the music industry is in trouble

Maybe it's a great song, but the title and artist's name definitely don't make me want to find out. But maybe I'm just getting old and grumpy.

<comment><USER9> I didn't say I like that song either, but it's a fact that that song is currently No. 1 on Billboard Top 100, which is the leading top chart in the United States and possibly worldwide.

It's an "engineered" song, it has a catchy tune, lyrics that might appeal to pre-adolescents, features "cameo appearances " from other well-known "musicians" and is heavily promoted by the record label. You probably already heard that song countless times even though you don't realize it.

Pop charts are like that, the fact that the song currently leading top charts are targeted at different age groups or social groups than you doesn't mean that you're getting old, it's just that it's "not your turn" now. In a few months, there's going to be a hit song that you'll actually like. Or maybe you don't like mainstream pop music at all, in that case, you shouldn't worry about pop top charts at all.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Two things that would help the music industry I think is to move have free streaming music on sites like Lulu and Last.fm but for a limited number of times. This will still let people discover new music int he manner that many do it online now and will let them decide if they want to spend 50-90 cents to buy the song.

Secondly, more profits from song sales should go to the artists themselves. It's hard to feel bad for recording industries please when you read that only minute percentage of CD sales actually go to the artists.

</comment><comment><USER12> On the contrary it is the continuing existence of dinosaurs like Warner Music that is "clearly not positive for the industry". Artists are doing quite well out of the new reality of the internet -- it's only the record companies that are losing out: [http://labs.timesonline.co.uk/blog/2009/11/12/do-music- artis...](http://labs.timesonline.co.uk/blog/2009/11/12/do-music-artists-do- better-in-a-world-with-illegal-file-sharing/)

</comment><comment><USER13> _"Not positive for the industry"_ vs. _"Positive for the listener / potential consumer"_ No surprise which one they're going to choose given their history of treating digital music consumers like criminals.

<comment><USER14> What the hell is a 'digital music consumer'? How do they differ from analogue ones? Lol.

<comment><USER13> I would describe it as someone who primarily finds new music via online sources and also buys most or all of their music online. An analog customer would be someone who primarily finds new music via FM radio or TV. They probably still buy CDs.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I wonder when they will start trying to charge for the music that is stuck in my head.

</comment><comment><USER16> How is this that different from radio? Is radio not a free music streaming service?

<comment><AUTHOR> And radio is paying for the right to broadcast music and payments are based on estimated listeners etc.

<comment><USER16> So does Pandora.. that is my point

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I hope that this is not the beginning of the end for Spotify, etc.</comment>


On Scala's future - <AUTHOR> http://antoniocangiano.com/2009/08/07/on-scalas-future/ <comment><USER2> Every time I've tried to use Scala, I couldn't get through the tutorial without a version incompatibility. It just gave me the impression that they don't really have things together. Until I can get all the way through the tutorial without unexplained error messages, I'm not going to bother too much.

</comment><comment><USER3> My guess is (a). Scala is a really interesting language, and has some serious (and undeniable) benefits, but the Scala community seems to have the same permafrost problem that torpedoed Python, as well as a bit of 'technical excellence over everyday practical value' (e.g., Scala's proliferation of operators and syntactic magic).

<comment><USER4> What happens when you don't have operators and sugar? You get ten-times-worse unreadable mess like anonymous inner subclasses. You get a dirty mix of a+b and a.add(b). And finally, you get a language that has to be extended with revisions of the core, rather than with libraries.

Scala's operators are OK, but Haskell's are better yet because of the concept of a typeclass. You can't abuse + because it comes bundled with -, instances which support < are guaranteed to support ==, and so on. Operators actually have meanings that aren't arbitrary.

<comment><USER5> Beyond that, in Haskell you can make your own infix functions with arbitrary symbols, arbitrary meaning, and arbitrary precedence when that's what you want.</comment></comment></comment>


Microsoft Windows 10's Matchbook Liner-Sized Configuration UI - <AUTHOR> 1 Using most recent Windows 10, "Anniversary Update"
2 Heard 'bling' noise after changing volume, decided to change 'bling' sound for volume changed event. Saw this window: http://imgur.com/II6IJEY
3 Could not resize window. Became frustrated, 'f* 2016', etc.
4 Found contradictary UI advice by Microsoft: "If your window deals with lists of any sort—especially ListViews—this becomes even more important. Resizing allows the user to look at more data at the same time." https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ff728831(v=vs.85).aspx#provide_resizable_forms_when_possible
5 Posted, oping for explanation from peers describing how this inconsistency will be resolved by MS or can be by me. <comment><AUTHOR> Perchance, to linkify: * [http://imgur.com/II6IJEY](http://imgur.com/II6IJEY) * [https://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/windows/desktop/ff7...](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/windows/desktop/ff728831\(v=vs.85\).aspx#provide_resizable_forms_when_possible)

<comment><AUTHOR> Now which Program Event for Windows to change, all have the same sound: "Asterisk", "Exclamation", or "System Notification"?</comment></comment>


Colorful socks in bulk - <AUTHOR> http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/258782061/nice-laundry-a-fresh-start-for-your-sock-drawer

<comment><USER2> I like the "bundles" idea. Plus, it is clever that we can send you back all our old socks to recycle.

</comment><comment><USER3> Wow, I am absolutely not the target audience for these socks. It is a great idea tho - i'm clearly just a very boring sock person.

</comment><comment><USER4> This combined with the stunner shades-of-the-month club will make me the coolest sysadmin ever.</comment>


Do people prefer under-patent drugs to generics? - <AUTHOR> http://www.iodine.com/blog/do-people-prefer-under-patent-drugs/

<comment><USER2> [I'm a member of the Iodine team]

This is based on a massive (125,000 person) Google Consumer Survey we ran on America's experience with medications. Happy to answer any questions people may have!</comment>


Heroin in the Midwest: A hydra-headed scourge - <AUTHOR> http://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21665009-how-midwest-battling-drug-epidemic-hydra-headed-scourge?fsrc=scn/fb/te/pe/ed/ahydraheadedscourge <comment><USER2> Legalize it or decriminalize it so that people can get help. In the meantime, it seems needle exchanges are legal in Illionis and there are some methadone clinics, though it's hard to gauge the available help in the area just from a few searches. Allow more, easier buprenorphine and methadone prescriptions. Create more methadone clinics and needle exchange programs. It's frustrating to see this kind of shit in America when everyone and their retarded brother knows the simple solutions to this problem. It's even more frustrating when you've seen that these things work and have worked on close family members (though not without it costing a lot and the system putting roadblocks (sometimes literally) at every single step).

It's shameful that this country treats its sick addicts like criminals and the people who continue this travesty honestly deserve at least life in jail if not the death penalty. They are truly the ones committing crimes against humanity in our society, filling up the jails, etc., and should be punished accordingly.

<comment><USER3> I've lost a couple friends to heroine overdoses, most were people that got hooked to pain pills, and when the "pill mills" were shut down they turned to heroine. With street drugs the potency is unknown and they caught hot shots.

Removing the pseudo legal pill mills resulted in my friends dying. This drug and all drugs should be made legally available so that addicts don't die left and right. It's a fucking travesty that any politician who even begins to mention it is considered soft on drugs and gets crucified.

<comment><USER4> >> I've lost a couple friends to heroine overdoses, most were people that got hooked to pain pills, and when the "pill mills" were shut down they turned to heroine.

The law of unintended consequences...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> While I agree this needs to be treated as a public health issue (rather than treating users as criminals) I think pinning the blame on doctors is myopic.

One of the biggest factors that leads people to a life of opiate abuse is when people can't envision a future for themselves.

You see it throughout the rust belt- people who worked in manufacturing were left without a job, in a town without prospects, and disability rates skyrocket. Along with the disability wave comes opiate abuse and alcoholism.

Doctors could stop prescribing opiates entirely, and the problem will continue. Epidemics like this are the result of a confluence of factors. If increasing amounts of young women are feeling hopeless about the future, if women (and men) are left without a plan for how they want to live, they're going to look to take their minds off it whatever way they can, and drug abuse is a simple pathological way to do it.

<comment><USER6> Yes, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park) for more. Opiate addicted rats weaned themselves off of opiates when moved from cages to a nice playground.

See also, Halfway Houses.

<comment><USER7> I'd like to believe the conclusions of Rat Park, but I've heard there were problems reproducing their results.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> For two years, I worked down the hall from David Ferguson, mentioned in the article. Small world.</comment>


Inequality Is Killing the American Dream - <AUTHOR> http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/inequality-is-killing-the-american-dream/ <comment><USER2> The real problem, IMO, is not inequality. Inequality has always and will always exist. The real issue is a decrease in _income mobility_. When the poor stay poor and the rich stay rich, that's the real problem.

<comment><USER3> Quick rebuttal to both you and Paul Graham:

"Okay, we get it -- it's both position _and_ velocity. But when people talk about "income inequality", trust me, that's exactly what they're talking about -- both _relative income_ and _income mobility_. In other words, they're not as dumb as you think - they're just simplifying. Go that? OK, good. Because we'd really really appreciate it if you'd at least _begin_ to acknowledge the core issue at hand. Instead of just throwing your hands up the air and saying, in so many words, 'Yes, salary differentials kinda suck but hey, anyone can, in theory, apply for a software engineering job at Google or a YC startup -- so it's all good.'"</comment></comment>


Wow, Microsoft And Google Are Punching Each Other In The Face In Front Of Us - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2011/02/01/bing-google-fight/

<comment><USER2> If copying is going to stop, I'd like Google to stop copying Bing's look and feel, it's getting really annoying.

ps. I want my old image search back and my old map controls back

<comment><USER3> Right on. 2010's changes to Google Image Search left it an enormous pile of ass. Just give me simple, paginated results, please.

<comment><USER2> I forgot to bookmark it but once I followed a link from reddit to google images and it somehow defaulted back to the old method. So something on the URL can toggle it, I just have no clue what it was and feel stupid for not researching it right there and then.

Just recently they are tinkering with maps and the new controls are so sluggish and non-intuitive, I have to dig two or three levels constantly. Every so often it reverts to the old interface but the new one looks like it's here to stay. Very fustrating.

<comment><USER4> Add "&sout=1" to the URL.

Or click "Switch to basic version" in the page footer :)

More information: [http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Web%20Search/thread?ti...](http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Web%20Search/thread?tid=5c4cc2fede82d16c)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I hate to say it, but Microsoft has a _lot_ more experience in bare knuckle fighting than Google does. And, I'm betting that Microsoft is very interested in getting into a brawl over this one.

I really don't think that Google wants to get into a fight over who sucks up users click streams to advance their business...

Those who live in glass houses really flick boogers.

<comment><USER6> > _I really don't think that Google wants to get into a fight over who sucks > up users click streams to advance their business..._

Presenting your competitor's clickstream as your own takes it to a new level.

> _Those who live in glass houses really flick boogers._

And bloggers!

<comment><USER7> > Presenting your competitor's clickstream as your own takes it to a new > level.

Clickstream is still of bing toolbar users.

<comment><USER8> Point is, they have a script thingy that goes "when our user searches Google for some word and then clicks on a result, make that Bing's result for the same word (plus 999 other things)". I would say most of the intelligence there is being extracted from Google doing the search, not from the user choosing the result.

I'm not saying Bing should go to jail or anything. The rules of the search game are still being written. But let's give credit for search engineering where credit is due.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This exchange serves to further highlight the perverse appeal of Twitter: we get to watch powerful people act childish. I love it.

<comment><USER10> Profound issues of right and wrong are rarely this entertaining. Conclusion: this isn't serious. But holy smoke is it fun to watch.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I guess Eric Schmidt was wrong; it sure _looks_ like adult supervision is still needed.

<comment><USER10> If he's available, Microsoft is in the market.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> This is worth an upvote in spite of MG's authorship just because of the inclusion of relevant Tweets.

<comment><USER13> What are they using to embed tweets like that? Is it publicly available software?

<comment><USER14> yes.. twitter released it a few months ago, Blackbird Pie. <http://media.twitter.com/blackbird-pie/>

edit: actually they use the Blackbird Pie wordpress plugin [http://themergency.com/twitter-blackbird-pie-wordpress- plugi...](http://themergency.com/twitter-blackbird-pie-wordpress-plugin/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> What the hell does Dave Winer do these days other than insert himself into everything? Is he involved with something important that I'm overlooking?

<comment><USER16> Was it ever otherwise?

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Microsoft's behavior comes across as sleazy to me, which no doubt is Google's intention. I respect mathematical advancements and clever algorithmic solutions to search which Google has always been impressive with. The method Microsoft is using with their toolbar just comes across as lame and uninteresting.

</comment><comment><USER18> Is it one of those one-shall-stand, one-shall-fall simultaneous face punches like I saw on UFC?

Because that would be sweet...

</comment><comment><USER19> Who the hell is in charge of the PR for these two companies to allow them to late night bitch at each other over Twitter??? These companies rake in billions per quarter and are acting like they're gonna be on TMZ tonight.

<comment><USER20> MG's post quotes <http://twitter.com/#!/fxshaw>. This should answer your question- <http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/exec/shaw/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> as opposed to TC and Engadget punching each other?

<comment><USER22> Remember, in any corporate fist-fight, it is the media that is going to benefit the most, so if there isn't a fight occurring in the wild, it makes sense to stage one.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Dingus.

</comment><comment><USER24> those twitter zingers are absolutely hilarious!

</comment><comment><USER25> The thing I find most interesting about Microsoft's tweets here is that at no point does Frank ever actually deny copying Google's search results. Well, except to tell a bald-faced lie that obviously isn't true. I mean, if Microsoft _really_ had evidence that Google had its employees report the sites to MS customer feedback, I have a feeling they'd be making it known some place other that Frank Shaw's twitter account.</comment>


Ask HN: What information to ask for when doing a contract? - <AUTHOR> I have taken up my first software contract with a client, and I would love some help with what I should be asking them when we meet tomorrow to discuss the project. I'm not entirely sure what is appropriate to discuss and what things I should ask that may end up being critical down the line but that I can't think of now.
Some things I definitely know I want to cover in the meeting are:
1) Payment, both how much and when
2) What exactly is being expected of me, and any dates associated with various parts of the project
3) What kind of communication is expected, and how they would like to be updated
I have never done anything of this sort before, so any help / advice would be greatly appreciated! For reference, I am being asked to make an iOS app version for a webapp. Thanks! <comment><USER2> Not directly answering your question, but giving you some general advice since this is your first contract:

1) Make the other party agree that all IP belongs to you until the final invoice is paid. This is often your only leverage should your client decide to stop paying you.

2) Send weekly updates VIA EMAIL to your client on what you've done. Do not do this over Slack or any other communications medium that they control. If they decide to revoke your access on Slack, you will no longer have access to those logs and no proof.

3) Set terms for post-contract support. Under no circumstances should you be providing unlimited free support after the contract is over.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the advice, makes sense to keep all the bases covered.

Do you have any suggestion as to how I should set up post-contract support?

<comment><USER2> Some people will only bill for invalid bug reports (wasting contractor's time). Others will allow X hours free support. Personally, I just charge as I normally would.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> You have seen Mike Monteiro's talk 'Fuck You Pay Me'? [https://youtu.be/FKSvdlFO638](https://youtu.be/FKSvdlFO638)

<comment><AUTHOR> Wow, this was amazing! Thank you!</comment></comment>


Ask HN: What is your rolling deployment/release schedule? - <AUTHOR> We're working with a weekly deployment schedule, Friday morning 3-330AM, so we can catch any bugs on Friday before the weekend. Why do you or your company deploy when you do? <comment><USER2> We never deploy on a Friday unless it's a truly trivial change or a fix to a critical bug. That way we can avoid staying late on Friday or coming in over the weekend.

Other than that, we deploy whenever we have something deploy-ready, tho usually not last thing before packing up for the evening.</comment>


Show HN: I made a Forth-Based OS for the TI-84+ Calculator - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/siraben/zkeme80
As a successor to my previous project[1], a Forth interpreter that runs under the TI operating system, I decided to go all the way and write my own assembler and OS.  This is a project I've been working on for just over a month, but there's still a long way to go.  The idea is to have a kernel + the Forth interpreter and compiler, then users can modify how their operating system works through the Forth files.  My Forth implementation is mostly ANS-standard conforming, so most code should work right out of the box without any problem.  See the GitHub repository for more, along with building instructions (you only need Guile and make build!)
[1] http://github.com/siraben/ti84-forth <comment><USER2> Recent discussion, [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18605882](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18605882)</comment>


Japan needs more workers and it can't find them - <AUTHOR> http://money.cnn.com/2017/05/30/news/economy/japan-labor-shortage/index.html?iid=hp-toplead-dom <comment><USER2> Sounds like they don't mean 'Japan', but Japanese businesses. The purpose of business is not to create a 'strong economy', profits, or any other such nonsense - it's to serve its people.</comment>


Ask HN: any Brazilians HN readers here? - <AUTHOR>

Just curious, i need to survey your opinions about my startup.
Please reply or email me at <my nick> AT yahoo . com if you can help me. :)
Thanks. <comment><AUTHOR> i guess no brazilians here? :(</comment>


Show HN: Text-message based app to discover artists playing at Coachella - <AUTHOR> Hey Everyone
 Me and a buddy have been working on this project that send an automated text to you every day with a new artist playing at Coachella.
We wanted to make this for people who wanted to find new artists playing at Coachella but don't have time to check out every artist individually.
Just text this number hi and you'll get a text every morning with a countdown and a new artist of the day.
+1 (650) 539-0580
We saw that there were a lot of similar applications that were mainly built in web or mobile app based formats. I find these pretty cumbersome for most people as it is hard to convince the average person to download an app or visit a website more than once.
We felt this format was the best way to encourage users to subscribe and remain engaged with minimal effort on their part.
Would love any feedback. <comment><USER2> Can you guys do this for Firefly too? i'm going to that one and would love to use it!</comment>


Demystifying React's Virtual DOM - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/nybles/demystifying-react-s-virtual-dom-eb0f2dc0717a <comment><USER2> The article suggests that using virtual DOM you can avoid the 6 steps described after

        document.querySelector('#elementId').innerHTML="New Value"

But this is not the case, the virtual DOM ensures you that if you have a complex component it will only update the nodes that actually needs updating, but the 6 steps still must take place.

[https://reactjs.org/docs/rendering-elements.html#react- only-...](https://reactjs.org/docs/rendering-elements.html#react-only-updates- whats-necessary)

</comment><comment><USER3> this article is really misleading.. the authors writes as if direct Dom manipulation is slower than react, then uses a strawman of someone just changing a huge chunk of the Dom tree at once when only a text label needed to be changed. no good developer ever does that. reacts selling point is not blazing speed imo it's good performance (not best) with the plus side of being easier to write good code.

<comment><USER4> > imo it's good performance (not best) with the plus side of being easier to > write good code.

I would even argue it's the other way around: React's primary selling point is making it easier to write good (as in: easy to follow) code. That its performance is very much acceptable is a nice plus or even a requirement, but would never be the reason for me to choose it.

<comment><USER5> I'm not even sure React helps much in creating cleaner code, because Facebook's UI, which is written in React, still has many problems.

<comment><USER6> UX/UI != code quality.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> *remystifying</comment>


YouTubes first video (2005) - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNQXAC9IVRw <comment><AUTHOR> Uploaded by Jawed Karim - the cofounder of youtube.

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

This is the only video Jawed ever uploaded.

Recently he created a poll, asking whether we want to see a new one:

[https://www.youtube.com/user/jawed/community](https://www.youtube.com/user/jawed/community)</comment>


Let the sin begin - <AUTHOR>

Wikileaks + Facebook = LeakFace<p>http://leakface.com <comment><USER2> something about the site leaking facebook information but wanting me to login with my facebook just doesn't feel very appealing to me

<comment><AUTHOR> try it, then talk</comment></comment>


Dependency-Injection framework in JavaScript - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/di-ninja/di-ninja <comment><AUTHOR> Hello there, Take a tour to Dependency-Injection framework for javascript with Di-Ninja [https://github.com/di-ninja/di-ninja](https://github.com/di- ninja/di-ninja) It rocks ! We're now able to use Composition-Root and IoC with babel It work very well with node and the browser (especially with webpack)</comment>


The Future of Microsoft Is Chatbots - <AUTHOR> http://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-microsoft-future-ai-chatbots/ <comment><USER2> Not only Microsoft, but Amazon, Apple, Google, and probably Facebook too, at some point. The virtual personal assistant is the new OS.</comment>


Ask HN: What open-source tool can I use to organize my life/identity? - <AUTHOR> I'm looking for a self-hosted solution that can manage my personal identity by aggregating data from various sources. It would preferably track the shows I've watched, websites I've visited, my exercise routine, my books, my location, etc... Basically I'm seeking a secure and nonsocial Facebook.
I'm currently just using text files with a little automation, but I've realized that this method is both limiting and tedious. I'm hoping that I can find something better to organize my data before all my knowledge becomes fragmented.
If I don't find anything that fully meets my criteria, I'll probably just create a personalized dashboard or integrate my data with something like Grafana. Has anyone had any luck with this method? If so, are there any tips you'd like to share? <comment><USER2> I would find it unlikely that you'd find a single tool that could do all of those things. If you are using something like Sandstorm.io or Cloudron.io, you might find apps that can do various things that you need, bundled into one hosting solution though.

Personally I tend to use a lot of EtherCalc spreadsheets on Sandstorm, particularly for the "TV shows I've watched" category, since I can never remember which episodes I've seen of each given show I try and watch. The books I own are actually in a web app I wrote myself (and continue to hack on some nine years later), and while I don't track my personal location, I do track my car's in a little SQLite database.</comment>


The IT behind Alan Shepard's space flight - <AUTHOR> http://www.zdnet.com/blog/btl/the-it-behind-alan-shepards-space-flight/48271 <comment><USER2> I wonder how much of this would have been possible without computers.

The Germans, after all, could semi-reliably lob V2s at London without anything more complicated than a slide rule. If we'd been significantly faster with rocket technology and significantly slower with electronics I wonder what an uncomputerized space program would have looked like.

<comment><USER3> > without anything more complicated than slide rule

The V2 was quite complex for it's time. It had two gyroscopes, an accelerometer and an analog computer to reach the target.

As always, wikipedia knows more: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-2_rocket#Technical_details></comment></comment>


A Software Engineer's Learning Goals for 2016 - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@sawant/a-software-engineer-s-learning-goals-for-2016-7f53c04b0bdb

<comment><AUTHOR> Getting stagnant in your field is never an option for a software engineer. One of the core aims of a software engineer/developer ought to be updating your existing skills and learning new stuff.

Thus, it's time to learn something new and improve upon some of my half-baked skills that will take me into 2016, with the right boost to my skillset and my career.</comment>


HTTPS support coming to Blogspot - <AUTHOR> https://googleonlinesecurity.blogspot.com/2015/09/https-support-coming-to-blogspot.html <comment><USER2> Now it's your turn, Tumblr! It can't be that hard to obtain a wildcard certificate and enable SSL on Tumblr.

If there is any remote content that might not work with SSL, either inform your users about it, or use an SSL proxy like GitHub's [0].

0: [https://github.com/atmos/camo](https://github.com/atmos/camo)</comment>


WikiLeaks – The Podesta Emails - <AUTHOR> https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/ <comment><USER2> Why hasn't WikiLeaks released information on Donald Trump?

<comment><USER3> Trump's campaign does a good job at embarrassing itself - do you think they need help?

<comment><USER4> From [http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential- races/29345...](http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential- races/293453-assange-wikileaks-trump-info-no-worse-than-him)

 _"We do have some information about the Republican campaign," he said Friday, according to The Washington Post.

"I mean, it's from a point of view of an investigative journalist organization like WikiLeaks, the problem with the Trump campaign is it's actually hard for us to publish much more controversial material than what comes out of Donald Trump's mouth every second day," Assange said._

But the article closes with a statement made 9 days earlier that they'd be happy to publish any authentic internal documents "from inside the Trump campaign".</comment></comment></comment>