Old salt mine is the first emission-free compressed air energy facility (2019) - <AUTHOR> https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/london/goderich-ontario-compressed-air-energy-storage-1.5369478 <comment><USER2> Sometimes I hate the quality of science reporting due to obvious mistakes.

> The Hydrostor facility can keep up to 10 megawatts of power, enough to keep > the lights on in about 2,000 homes, or approximately half the town of > Goderich for about five hours.

Megawatts instantaneous power, but the sentence wording makes it sound like capacity. That's how much energy it can supply at any moment vs how big the battery is.

And they talk about X number of homes for Y hours. Did they mean 10 megawatt- hours? Or did they mean 10 megawatts for 4 hours? That's 40 megawatt-hours or MWh.

Judging from this other site, it is 1.75 MW max and a capacity of 10 MWh. Which means someone messed up units in the article. Possibly even they read "MWh" from a technical summary and just guessed it meant megawatts. Because they spelled it out in the article.

[http://www.energystoragejournal.com/hydrostor-and-nrstor- ann...](http://www.energystoragejournal.com/hydrostor-and-nrstor-announce- worlds-first-commercial-advanced-caes-facility/)

<comment><USER3> It seems to be very common to not understand, or misunderstand, the difference between _power_ (watts) and _energy_ (watt-hours). Even amongst technically- minded people who should know better.

A respected UK newspaper once printed a dramatic article claiming "20 new nuclear power plants" would be needed to power electric vehicles in the UK. This was nonsense and all based on confusing the estimated energy use of an EV fleet (in GWh) for instantaneous power (in GW).

They did publish a tiny sheepish apology several days later[1], and changed the online version of the article, but the damage was done and the claim still gets repeated today.

[1] [https://twitter.com/dpeilow/status/831717762259099648](https://twitter.com/dpeilow/status/831717762259099648)

<comment><USER4> I don't even know why we need Watt-hours? Joule work just fine, don't they?

<comment><USER3> They're measuring the same thing. Except a joule is one watt- _second_ , which is an inconveniently small unit when talking about large energy storage like an EV battery.

It would be like road signs measuring distances between cities in inches.

Besides, energy has long been accounted for in hour-based units. Your power bill, for example. It's just easier to use those same units when thinking about storage, rather than rebasing everything around seconds.

<comment><USER4> I know that they are both measuring energy. It's just that Watt is usually defined as Joule / second, so Joule seems more fundamental.

> They're measuring the same thing. Except a joule is one watt-second, which > is an inconveniently small unit when talking about large energy storage like > an EV battery.

That's what we have SI-prefixes for.

A Watt-Hour is also pretty small. We usually use Megawatt-hours or so. Using Giga-Joule instead wouldn't be too much of a difference.

> Besides, energy has long been accounted for in hour-based units. Your power > bill, for example. It's just easier to use those same units when thinking > about storage, rather than rebasing everything around seconds.

Yes, tradition seems to be the real reason.

<comment><USER5> Unfortunately seconds & minutes & hours aren't metric

<comment><USER4> True scientists use natural units anyway. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_units](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_units) ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This type of storage, whether it be water reservoirs or compressed air, is especially important in Ontario. We have a very strong base supply from our three large nuclear facilities and hydroelectric dams, but the rest is largely made up of wind, solar, and gas.

Because the peak supply from solar is midday and the peak load is often in the evening [1], you're left running the 'peakers' (gas plants) for most of the night to make up the difference. If we were able to store more energy short term, we could conceivably remove natural gas energy production and be 100% green/renewable. As of 2018 we were 96% renewable [2] so it's really not some pipe dream.

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

[2] [https://www.cer-rec.gc.ca/nrg/ntgrtd/mrkt/nrgsstmprfls/on- en...](https://www.cer-rec.gc.ca/nrg/ntgrtd/mrkt/nrgsstmprfls/on-eng.html)

And honestly, I'm okay with paying a little more on my energy bill for the next couple years knowing that my province has made the decision to be part of the solution.

<comment><USER7> You are aware that nuclear power is not considered renewable by the majority of people correct? That puts Ontario at less than 50% renewable.

<comment><USER6> You're technically correct, and what I should have said was 'zero-carbon emitting sources' as was in the source.

But for practical purposes there is so much Uranium on this planet that we'll most likely never even use 1% of it. Especially when you factor in newer or experimental reactor designs such as fast breeder reactors [1] that can generate even more power and use waste materials from current systems.

So yes, it is technically not a renewable source of energy, but there is such abundance of fuel that it's not 'non-renewable' the way Coal or Gas is.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor#Fast_breeder_r...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor#Fast_breeder_reactor)

<comment><USER8> Aren't waste disposal sites effectively non-renewable uses of natural space?

<comment><USER9> The same is true for solar that is not easily recyclable.

<comment><USER10> What part of solar is not easily recyclable? The glass? Oh noez, now the world is being polluted with silicates!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> In case anyone is curious, hydro is the general term for electrical power from a utility, at least in the part of Canada where I grew up.

<comment><USER12> That's ... weird. But thanks for clarifying that, that really confused me.

<comment> 52-6F-62 It's weird on the surface, but it's because our entire electrical utility has roots in hydroelectric power.

Adam Beck was one of the people chiefly responsible for the creation of a public electrical utility in Ontario. I like one of his quotes "the gifts of nature are for the public" referring to his slogan "Power at cost".

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

<comment><USER11> Thank you for this context. I vaguely knew of the term's connection with the names of utilities, but this is some fascinating Canadian history.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> At a certain point if photovoltaic panels become very, very cheap (far below the $0.20-$0.35/watt STC price to buy panels in huge quantities today), it will be economical to crack hydrogen from water and compress it into tanks, then use it to run massive fuel cells to feed power back into the grid.

Because of the significant engineering challenges in storing, transporting and refueling hydrogen at very high pressures, I am much more optimistic about the use of hydrogen in medium to large sized fixed, professionally-run facilities than I am about people driving around with hydrogen fuel cell powered cars. Or home use of hydrogen fuel cells.

<comment><USER14> Tank storage is challenging because at that scale you're competing with batteries which have much better round-trip efficiency. There was a DNV GL paper earlier this year which quoted a time of about 24 hrs as the cross-over point between H2 and battery tech.

Underground cavern storage lets you do inter-seasonal storage at a very low cost per MWh.

It's critical to understand that liquid and gas fuels have uncoupled per MW and per MWh costs in a way that batteries don't. You can adjust battery chemistry of course but fundamentally you're stuck with a narrow range of peak MW / MWh performance which means that if you want to build a massive battery for inter-seasonal storage (needs MWh >>> MW) you end up "buying" discharge capacity in MW that you don't need.

Hydrogen decouples the size of the production (in MW), the storage (MWh), and the fuel cell (MW) which lets you size them independently of each other.

I am also sceptical of the need for home use or vehicular hydrogen (certainly in passenger cars). You get a lot of efficiency improvement if you are able to use the waste heat from fuel cells. Yes that can be done domestically, but putting them in large urban centres and driving district heating schemes from them seems like a much more natural fit. Especially in places like Europe where total energy demand (heat and electricity both) peak at the same time in the winter as renewable generation decreases.

N.b. there are already times in the UK grid when prices are negative wholesale. Even one of the retail energy suppliers here had a few half hourly periods of negative prices a few months ago. The subsidy for hydrogen electrolysers in The Netherlands was set assuming 2,000 hours a year of operation (using the cleanest and cheapest 2,000 hrs) since that maximises the environmental benefit with the current Dutch grid.

</comment></comment><comment> 52-6F-62 Goderich is a beautiful town—I've been looking at getting out of the city for a while. Maybe we should look to head that way and I should start looking for a job with these guys.

This, to my naive understand, seems like an enormously good idea and seems like they would have a lot of opportunity for relatively cheap resources and developing solutions for stabilizing fluctuating power generation resources like wind/solar.

Please someone with more knowledge in this domain explain further what might be the benefits and shortfalls and pragmatism of this group.

<comment><USER15> Been tracking them for a long time. They've been at "pilot" stage since at least 2011.

Personally I don't think that any form of alternative energy storage has much chance against Li-ion, which has experienced unbelievable declines in cost (driven mostly by cell phones and electric cars).

A bunch of extremely well funded compressed air storage companies have already run aground against this problem: Lightsail (Thiel & Gates backed), SustainX, etc.

I'd be skeptical unless they can somehow actually prove economics against Li- ion, but these media pieces always seem to skirt that question.

<comment><USER16> From the article:

"compared to a similar capacity battery, it's not only half the cost, the facility has a service life of 50 years, five to 10 times longer than a battery."

It doesn't explicit say what kind of battery, but a service life of 10 years suggests Li-ion.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Left me wondering whether this would also work in Detroit? Detroit sits atop a huge abandoned salt mine. There's a mine across the border in Windsor (Canada) but that's still actively being mined.

<comment><USER18> Goderich also has active salt mines... I'm presuming this project is using a played out branch of them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I know people that live there. Many worry about the safety of using compressed air below the town and wonder if it would cause collapse of any tunnel in the current salt mine.

<comment><USER20> I'm definitely not a geologist but I can imagine the "breathing" motion of pressurizing and depressurizing the mines causes some movement and damage over time.

What pressures are we talking about anyway?

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> This is in my backyard (ish)! Strange given that I started [https://collective.energy](https://collective.energy) to create more dialogue around innovative climate solutions but never even saw the old salt mine as an opportunity

</comment><comment><USER22> Has anyone analyzed the viability of a compressed-air energy distribution system? It could be simpler and safer than electricity distribution.

<comment><USER16> Yes, apparently that has been done.

[https://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2018/05/history-and- future-o...](https://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2018/05/history-and-future-of- the-compressed-air-economy.html)

<comment><USER22> Thanks for sharing that article.

I think the most promising application of distributed compressed air is in refrigeration, especially if the power source is not an adiabatic process.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> But is it scalable?

<comment><USER24> To get a salt cavity just pump in water in salt deposit and pump out brine. It can be used to store H2, CH4 or compressed air, from 70 to 200 bars. H2 is way more energy dense, but has a lower efficiency round trip. There is many salt deposit around the world.

<comment><USER25> Disposing of the brine is a bit complicated when you have nothing but freshwater lakes around :)

I'm guessing they're planning on using the existing caverns from mining.

Unsure if they plan on expanding.

<comment><USER26> Can't they just evaporate off the water and use the remaining salt to treat roads in the winter?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> 66% efficiency sounds amazing for compressed air. I was expecting 10%.</comment>


Inside the Secretive World of MegaUpload - <AUTHOR> http://owni.eu/2011/12/20/inside-the-secretive-world-of-megaupload-kim-schmitz-megaworld-the-mega-song/ <comment><USER2> > He made a name for himself infiltrating some the best protected computer > systems in the world (including NASA's)

funny. anybody who was part of the scene back then would tell you that NASA was far from the 'best protected' network. jpl.nasa.gov became a running joke.

I had multiple runins with Schmidt back then (many people did) - the guy was a poser and a script kiddie, all too happy to talk up other hacks as his own in the media.

but anyway, most people know Kim Schmidt is behind the Mega companies. nothing new here. He went from being rich to being broke again a few times in his life (including a pump and dump that he was charged for) and started fresh out in Asia with Megaupload.

Though I wouldn't be surprised if these celebrities were paid to be in the video. I wonder if anybody has thought of asking them.

<comment><USER3> Actually, it never even came into my mind to think that the celebrities were _not_ paid to be in the video.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is a pretty cool and well designed attack piece. I like the introduction of issues such as as "he bought the largest house in new zealand" coupled with the innuendo "while refusing to say where he got his riches", suggesting it is criminal activity and he must be a gangster. Gosh, I wonder who ordered this piece up.

<comment><AUTHOR> Here's another "attack piece", by Kim himself: [http://torrentfreak.com/from- rogue-to-vogue-megaupload-and-k...](http://torrentfreak.com/from-rogue-to- vogue-megaupload-and-kim-dotcom-111218/)

<comment><AUTHOR> I love the way he boasts about how unflattering his wikipedia article is.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Whenever I come across stories like this, I wonder if I'm doing startups wrong. The blogosphere is full of stories about being transparent, raising money from well-known angels and VC etc. but I wonder if there are 10 secretive companies making tens of millions for every one that makes it on TechCrunch.

<comment><USER6> There are many. Chances are you're focusing on startup ideas that appeal to "modern hipster".

Usually, white, middle-class, male, nerdy, tech savvy, 20-35, easily whipped into a frenzy.

The founders of these startups, being of the same demographic, have a high visual appeal to their prospective customer base. They're photogenic and in some ways, aspirational. Hence, they make popular blog posts possible. Giving them high marketability and value to online news organisations (your main source of news) who are also targeting this demographic.

For example, notice on kickstarter, who gets the most funding?

On the other hand, other profitable startup ideas that do not appeal to the demographic of the blogs and websites you visit are missed. When's the last time you visited a traditional forum? or any site other than your top 10 bookmarks and a bunch of links you got from them?

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> This is such a fascinating story. I mean I would just love to know how a company so secretive got all those celebrities to sing a its praises.

<comment><USER8> My guess is they did it the same way all the interviews for Borat were set up. Send in a few legit looking people in business suits with some good marketing speak and contracts, and it should be easy to get the celebs to say a line you wrote about a website they don't know for 10k.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Check out this video of the founder thanking his users: <http://www.megavideo.com/?v=TKY5290L>

What a big-dog!

<comment><USER9> He's only mega because so many people are happy. How cute!

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> When you access megaupload.com from Hong Kong, you will get

"This service is temporarily not available from your service area."

<comment><USER11> Isn't this for tax reasons? A lot of tax paradises do not allow you to offer your services locally.. Correct me if I'm wrong.

<comment><USER12> True for International Business Corporations (IBCs) and free trade zones in many places.

However, in Hong Kong you just pay local taxes on local income (8% I believe), and no taxes on overseas income (although if you're a US citizen it becomes a lot more complex, with Controlled Foreign Corporation rules, etc.).

It's much more likely that he doesn't want to face local legal issues in Hong Kong. i.e. "never sell no crack where you rest at, I don't care if they want an ounce, tell em: bounce".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> 50 million visits would make up 4 percent of the Net? That seems high.

<comment><USER14> They could be talking as a percentage of accessible data? Although, that seems like a difficult thing to calculate.

EDIT: Seems like a few people have tried, so they could just take those numbers. For example:

"5 billion gigabytes" - WiseGeek 2011 - <http://www.wisegeek.com/how-big-is- the-internet.htm>

According to Megaupload, they store over 100 petabytes of data. Which equals 102m GB - <http://megaupload.com/?c=faq>

That would put them at roughly 2%.

EDIT 2: Alternatively, google has them at about 1.8% reach - [https://www.google.com/adplanner/planning/site_profile#siteD...](https://www.google.com/adplanner/planning/site_profile#siteDetails?identifier=megaupload.com)

<comment><USER2> when you are talking about total internet traffic, 2% reach with a page that weighs 100KB is very different to having a 0.1% reach of people downloading pirated movies</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How do you handle cron mails? - <AUTHOR> I'm part of an organization that does a lot of IT operations, much automated, some manually. Lots of it is "traditional" metal or VMs, not k8s.
We get a lot of automated events; the two biggest sources are our monitoring system, and failed cron jobs.
What do you guys use to store and manage such events?
Currently we have a ticket system (OTRS) that can be used by email, but it is approaching its capacity limits, and it's simply not designed for this task.
Ideally I'm looking for:
* A way to make events visible to anybody interested
* Some sort of deduplication: if a cron job sends an email every 5 minutes, there should be a way to deal with them all at once
* Some sort of triaging: a way to mark an event or stream of event as not important / dealt with / whatever, and only give me a few of events that haven't been triaged
* Escalation: some events must trigger alerting to the appropriate teams
I'm sure we're not unique in needing a way to deal with this, but my searches haven't turned up a ready solution for this. <comment><USER2> My system could be improved, but I wrap cronjobs in a shell script that doesn't output anything on non-error exit codes. It doesn't do de-dupe, it's a quick hack.

Wrapper:

[https://git.eeqj.de/sneak/hacks/src/branch/master/cronify/cr...](https://git.eeqj.de/sneak/hacks/src/branch/master/cronify/cronify)

In /root/.forward:

        |"/usr/bin/envdir /etc/environment.d /usr/local/bin/email_to_webhook"

That email_to_webhook can be found here:

[https://gist.github.com/sneak/2b7d5348efcf00e7537a69dccef93d...](https://gist.github.com/sneak/2b7d5348efcf00e7537a69dccef93da6)

The script isn't mine, I found it somewhere.

I try to set up my cronjobs so that they don't output anything to stdout (they can log to syslog, logs are collected) if the process doesn't need attention. If it shows up in slack, I deal with it.

To do what you're trying to do, I'd figure out some way of getting my cron output into Sentry, or maybe just Sentry-ify all of my cron processes like you would do with any other program, and then ignore their output/return codes when running from cron.

</comment><comment><USER3> not sure if this will solve all your problems, but i am using [https://healthchecks.io/](https://healthchecks.io/) for my cron stuff (backups mostly). It only pings me (Email and pushover, but other options available) when a cron task misses a schedule... it can talk to other services, so it might help...</comment>


The Ketchup Conundrum - <AUTHOR> http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2004/09/06/the-ketchup-conundrum?currentPage=all <comment><USER2> interesting, but oddly switches to italic half-way through</comment>


Weev Is Free - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/11/weev-is-free/ <comment><USER2> _Hopefully the federal prison where he sat in solitary for months hasn't beaten the zeal out of Weev._

I doubt it. When I went away for hacking, mine was a camp, but I made 2 products in couple weeks right when I got out. It'll be interesting to see him hit the ground running (on a full system) and too see what he'll make...I coded on a (new at the time) iPhone 4 ;)

<comment><USER3> "Zeal"? Fucking seriously? Ask Kathy Sierra what Weev's "zeal" adds up to.

Weev was a test case for some shitty law. The shitty law lost, and that's good, but it doesn't magically make Weev a worthwhile human being, much less some kind of hero.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Correction based on article text: 'Weev To Be Freed'.

<comment><USER5> I bet that in 5 minutes someone will re-title this: "Memories of Weev".

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I wonder what the rationale was for him to be placed into solitary confinement.

<comment><USER7> Probably because he's pissed a lot of people off with his trolling in the past, so they figure he might not be safe for one reason or another? I mean he's pretty much a white supremacist.

Edit: downvoter want to explain themself? I'm not lying, go read up on weev. I've known him from IRC for years and he is most definitely racist/bigoted, that doesn't make the CFAA charge right, it just explains why they put him in solitary.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Say, would weev be allowed to leave the USA?

If yes, I would immediately do so if I were him.

<comment><USER9> Allowed to leave? Probably (unless he's on probation). Able to leave? That's another question. Many countries will refuse entry if you are a convict.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is sort of an aside, but I noticed this quote from weev: "I say this is the duty of all decent citizens left." I hope he is not implying that he is a decent citizen.

</comment><comment><USER11> Main discussion here:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7573317](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7573317) (70 comments)

</comment><comment><USER12> maybe AT&T should have protected those innocent people better...

<comment><USER13> Let it be a reminder that you can go to jail for pointing out another party's negligence. Not saying weev is the poster boy for responsible disclosure, but how the situation was handled is troubling.

<comment> k-mcgrady >> "Let it be a reminder that you can go to jail for pointing out another party's negligence."

Let it be a reminder that you can go to jail for _exploiting_ another party's negligence.</comment></comment></comment>


Who said what inside the Trump tech meeting - <AUTHOR> http://www.recode.net/2016/12/15/13976806/immigration-maternity-leave-grid-software-president-trump-tech-meeting <comment><USER2> You just got to look at that photo and you can tell there wasn't a single person except Trumps kids that wanted to be there.

Even Peter Thiel looked like he wanted to jump out the window.</comment>


Show HN: Tavern, a simple but powerful RESTful API testing library - <AUTHOR> https://taverntesting.github.io/ <comment><AUTHOR> OP here - we made Tavern as an internal tool at overlock, due to problems of running RESTful integration tests with postman in our CI pipelines, as well as needing to rely on a CI.

What really kicked this all off was the javascript testing functionality in other projects which we found to be nearly unusable in more complex tests where say, you want to verify the contents of a JWT. We liked the ability to write simple tests quickly, but needed more power to be able to extend when needed - that's why we wrote the ability to hook in to python functions with Tavern as required.

We're just getting started with tavern and the next things on our agenda are: 1) Reference schemas from Json schema or OpenAPI documents 2) Command line deamon to ping your API regularly for functional uptime monitoring

We'd really love to know what you think - either in the comments or github issues!</comment>


How do you keep the files you are working on in your head when programming? - <AUTHOR> I find that this is the biggest pain point for me. When I am working on a task, it usually ends up spanning several files. And I just don't have very good memory.<p>I struggle to remember if I had some new variable in the Logger or the Worker, etc. It's usually trivial to see the list of files I'm working in and check between a couple, but I'd love to know if anyone has a memory palace kind of technique they use for programming. <comment><USER2> I think 2 things are helpful.

(1) Know that your memory and concentration will suffer if you are distracted or have lots of context switching. Try and change your coding environment (IRL) to suit this fact.

(2) Make sure you are using the tools provided by a good IDE. Many IDEs will autocomplete variables/functions/modules which are in scope of where the cursor is. Make sure you have convenient+relevant IDE extensions/plug-ins for your language+libraries running.

There are exercises you can do to increase your memory, but I think your programming ergonomics are bad if you have to resort to that.

</comment><comment><USER3> vim buffers and splits. And a paper notepad and pen.</comment>


Kid from Uganda creates app the replaces ATMs - <AUTHOR> https://www.qappgo.com <comment><USER2> "Q:Is it safe? A:Yes, very. Qapp uses two-step verification within the app as well as advanced SSL encryption technology to keep you safe from attackers."

I don't think they mean from hackers. I think they mean in the day-to-day interactions with people (You never know who you are interacting with.) I think this is a really cool idea and has a lot of potential.</comment>


Universal Basic Automated Food and Shelter - <AUTHOR> https://bot-watcher.github.io/ <comment><AUTHOR> Please discuss the idea of universal basic automated food and shelter vs. universal basic income. More discussion here.

[https://www.reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/6sppn2/universal...](https://www.reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/6sppn2/universal_basic_food_and_shelter/)

<comment><USER2> Money is the most flexible thing in the world because you can use it to buy what _you_ want, not what others want you to have. Thus $100 of cash is actually worth more than $100 worth of food, for example.

<comment><AUTHOR> You can stretch $100 further with universal basic food

<comment><USER2> No, you probably can't.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Cardpool (YC W10) acquired by BlackHawk Network - <AUTHOR> http://www.cardpool.com/blog/2011/10/21/cardpool-has-been-acquired-by-blackhawk-network <comment><AUTHOR> I used Cardpool once to consolidate many baby shower gift cards into a single one from Amazon. They executed a smart idea very well: the whole process was a breeze and their commission was a small price to pay for having a gift card at a store I actually use.

Congratulations to the team!

It looks like BlackHawk Network is the company behind the gift cards stands that have flourished in grocery stores, so that seems like a great match. The good news is also that it's going to be run as an independent business according to the PR, so the service shouldn't change much for now.

<comment><USER2> _It looks like BlackHawk Network is the company behind the gift cards stands that have flourished in grocery stores_

Which I believe is the same company that actually runs and controls the operations for these cards too (I don't have time to check + confirm).

But if that's the case, then I'd be cautious as to whether they've acquired Cardpool to shut it down or at least change it's direction. Blackhawk's customer is the retailer the gift card is for, and they may have views on whether they like people exchanging cards on the secondary market.

If they already control the underlying technology + fulfillment, then they probably could have created CardPool functionality already if they really wanted themselves.

<comment><USER3> You're right, Blackhawk manages many of the operations related to gift cards.

On the other point, however, I can guarantee that Cardpool is about get a whole lot BIGGER, and won't be shutting down or changing directions anytime soon ;).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> My quick analysis:

Their margin is 7-12%, and they probably spend 5% on processing fees and postage, for a net margin of about 5% which on a volume of $100k/day is roughly $5k or $1.8M. The marketplace is also highly competitive and they probably spend a large amount on ads, but still a nice business.

My guess is the founders have been eating ramen the whole time because of the working capital requirements of this business, so this looks like a well deserved payday.

</comment><comment><USER5> Congrats, Anson! You guys deserve it.

</comment><comment><USER6> I used these guys in the past, excellent customer service, 100k daily is a great metric to have!

</comment><comment><USER7> Wow! Are we going to see a Cardpool machine at Safeway sometime in the near future?

</comment><comment><USER8> Does anyone else smell talent acquisition? I've been following them for a while and they seem to never have over 400 cards at any given time. Didn't seem to be too active after all the hype.

Regardless congrats on the acquisition!

<comment><USER9> This wasn't a talent acquisition. They were doing ~$35M top line a year.

<comment><USER10> Is that $100k in profit (or their take on the cards) or is it their total revenue?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> BlackHawk put together some of their own Bed Bath and Beyond gift certificates and redeemed them for a Cardpool Gift Card.

A interesting combo. It's almost like TicketMaster buying Craiglist.

</comment><comment><USER12> BlackHawkNetwork says 'Acquisition of Carpool' on their website at <http://www.blackhawknetwork.com/>

I hope they knew what they were buying..</comment>


Employees refuse to return to work as long as they're getting extra $600/week. - <AUTHOR> https://www.wsj.com/articles/our-restaurants-cant-reopen-until-august-11587504885 <comment><USER2> That restaurant owner who closed two days earlier than he needed out of the goodness of his heart? Yeah, the reason for that was there was a snowfall in Portland that kept people home earlier than the order would require. So yeah, he just avoided being open, paying staff for a day when nobody was going to be coming in anyway.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> [http://archive.is/sm6Cy](http://archive.is/sm6Cy)

</comment><comment><USER3> If were them, I'd not return too. Why would anyone take risk to permanently damaging their lungs for some money they'll not need to survive!?

I've taken 2 year vacation and going to stay at my homestead

</comment><comment><USER4> How many of these employees saying "no" have to take care of elderly family members or children that are home from school? Seems mighty presumptive to assume their reason for not coming back, especially considering he moved to lay them off so quickly. Who would want to go back to working for someone that might change their mind again?

</comment><comment><USER5> I'm amazed at the lack of shame in writing an article admitting that the wages one pays are less than government assistance. And the entitlement: "where's ma cheap laborz?!"

And, of course, it's all about the business owner. Here's a thought: your workers have other shit going on, and working a hard, minimum wage job isn't high on the priority list right now. But, no, it's a personal slight to you, Kurt.

</comment><comment><USER6> I thought you couldn't collect unemployment unless your work has not offered you work?

</comment><comment><USER7> Market will fix this. Competitors will come in their place, paying more to workers and charging higher price.

IMO, restaurants we're always a luxury, and only Americans could afford them everyday, at the expense of cheap labor. Glad to see it's fixing now.

</comment><comment><USER8> I've heard that is an ulterior motive for the Republican governor "open it up" push. Then they can blame closed businesses on straw men like this, when the real reason is workers fearing for their and their family's health.

<comment><USER9> Another reason is that the states run a very real risk of running out of unemployment funds. Mitch McConnell made clear today that he is fine the states going bankrupt over this as opposed to giving them federal funds. So its going to end up with no one getting unemployment, everyone out of work and the federal government sitting on its hands while blaming everyone else.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Never link to the WSJ Opinion section. It's where the 'Fox News affiliated' really shines through.

</comment><comment><USER11> If your employees don't want to come back, whose fault is that exactly?

Who laid these people off again?

I'm continuously aghast by the number of employers who don't see it as their job to make the job more attractive to employees.

<comment><USER12> Would anyone older care to confirm or deny a related observation? It seems the Great Recession shattered many employeer minds to become absurdly entitled to the detriment of even their own direct earnings let alone society.

Things like demanding a pegasus-unicorn canidate after they consolidated two jobs into one with the exact oddball combination of skills and experience - and not just seeing it as a bonus target to ask for but holding out for months or years looking for them when they could have been making money by hiring two realistically available competent employees.

<comment><USER11> I feel like there is some sort of weird world now where in some companies "hiring someone" is sometimes held hostage / run by people who despite their job title, made it their job not to hire people.

At least for me when I worked at a very large company hiring someone and getting the go ahead was this opaque system that went back and forth with recruiters and HR and involved a lot people who did not know anything about the job...

Later on I was looking for work and found myself in recruiter hell or corporate HR hell talking to these people endlessly on the phone about jobs that they clearly did not understand in any way and wasted my time endlessly.

By the time I got to talk to someone at a company that was technical... I finally understood what the job was in a few minutes, they knew who I was, and after a sensible interview they offered me the job.

Side note, big company I worked for was broken up and I was told I should apply for my old job back. Mostly because I liked my coworkers I applied ... and never got a call back because I didn't have a CS degree (folks inside the company figured that one out), for a job that very much doesn't need a CS degree... and a job that I did for 15 years and my coworkers all wanted me back...

That seemed to confirm my theory that hiring has sort of lost its way / gone off track in a lot of ways.

<comment><USER9> That is indeed the issue. Recruiters are for the most part not technical so they just read words on the page. Does your resume have all the words on the page or doesn't it? If not, sorry you are not qualified. Its maddening and one of the reasons resume writing is so important. Quite often your resume is not even seen by a real person, its filtered through a word matching algorithm.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> What an absolutely shit article.

Here's the key quote

"When we asked our employees to come back, almost all said, "No thanks." If they return to work, they'll have to take a pay cut."

Or maybe the employees are concerned about, you know, the current worldwide pandemic and are in the 72% of Americans that would prefer to stay at home 'until the doctors and public health officials say it is safe.' (1)

Or risk their health for <$600/week.

(1) [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election- poll/despite...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-poll/despite- scattered-protests-most-americans-support-shelter-in-place-reuters-ipsos-poll- shows-idUSKCN22336P)

<comment><USER3> There are some countries in the world who don't have lockdown. I am wondering, what if US imports them to work in US as stopgap solution? Ofc, many of them might be infected but so can be employees sitting at home for now.

<comment><USER14> They cannot as the President put immigration on halt.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> It's called unemployment INSURANCE. Workers paid into this insurance through their state and federal taxes. The insurance is now fulfilling its end of the bargain. This content is pure clickbait and shameful.

<comment><USER16> The $600 is in addition to unemployment insurance

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> > I'd have to offer my cooks $25.40 an hour to match what the government is > paying them not to work.

So… why doesn't he offer them $25.40 an hour?

<comment><USER18> Why would you work instead of not working if you're getting the same money anyway?

<comment><USER19> It sounds like these companies have to account and compensate employees for the risk they're asking them to take.

Long term health impacts, the risk of infecting loved ones at home, the risks of incurring thousands of dollars of uncovered hospital bills... all of these risks have real costs and I think it's fair to compensate employees who are willing take them in service of their corporations.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Summary: My furloughed employees refuse to take a pay cut and risk death so that I can reopen my business and make money.

In the article it says his cooks start at $15 + $1 in tips. Currently with the extra $600 they are making $25.40 per hour. If he wants them to come back he is essentially asking them to gamble their guaranteed unemployment income on his business doing well in this time. On top of that he asking them to literally risk their lives. I see no reason that he should not take the additional financial and physical risk he is asking his employees to take into consideration when hiring them back. Offer them $30 an hour with a guaranteed minimum number of hours in writing. Labor in a very limited sector is a limited resource for once, employees should take advantage of it. Isn't that what capitalism is all about?

<comment><USER20> One of the things I think that's interesting (a potential ticking time bomb) about the "forgivable small business loans", is that they have to have their payroll back to 100% and wages AT LEAST 80% by June for the money to be forgiven.

Employees can refuse to return to work for fear of the virus and still get unemployment til later than that date.

Feels like it's going to be awfully hard getting employees back to work at less than $25/hour.

A lot of businesses could be stuck with loans when they thought they were getting "free" money.

<comment><USER9> honestly the entire country would have been better off with just giving every adult in the US 2k a month for 6 months. Would have cost about 2.5 trillion. Country could have been safely shut down, everyone would have been able to cover their bills. When the country reopens, everyone would have money to burn which would have flowed into businesses.

Spend another 2 - 3 trillion on true small business loans / grants. Forbid stock buy backs in the future.

McConnell has also indicated he has no interest in giving states any more money for unemployment. So desperate people are going to be even more desperate soon.

What the federal government has done instead is an abomination aimed at falsely propping up share prices. We are very possibly looking at the onset of a massive depression spurred on by just plain poor crisis management at the federal level.

<comment><USER20> It's not quite that simple.

If you give people $2k and businesses nothing, people aren't going to spend that money on businesses. They're not allowed to do a lot of things they usually spend money on. Retail, restaurants, hotels, live entertainment, airlines, movie theaters, etc would go bankrupt en masse. I'm not sure that's actually a problem. The responsible businesses that had cash would buy the poorly managed businesses at a discount. Long term, this could possibly lead to even worse inequality. Not to mention, a lot of the jobs might be destroyed permanently.

I do agree that I think it would've been better for most people to only give people the money. There would still be a lot of losers.

On the simplest basis, most restaurants and hotels are small businesses. The majority of them would lose their business. $2k would do nothing for them. And the majority of these business owners are decidedly not rich.

<comment><USER9> I do agree, but note I did say another 2 - 3 trillion in small business loans / grants. Is that enough? I am not sure, but I do agree that if not managed correctly much like the housing crisis those with cash will swoop in and buy the distressed businesses. I just don't see how what we are doing currently is going to prevent that though. The white house is actively picking winners and losers in the business world with almost no congressional oversight and has fired the IG responsible for it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> The solution to this is super simple. Offer 600+n where n increases until they agree to come back. Don't have a viable business at those labor costs? Bummer.

<comment><USER22> "Employees better compensated by unemployment benefits than minimum wage that hasn't been appropriately adjusted for inflation and cost of living by Congress and states." would've been a more appropriate title, but not as inflamatory.

<comment><USER23> It's not just the unemployment benefits, though, people are getting an extra $600/week ON TOP of their regular unemployment benefits. And that's what's making this situation a little different.

<comment><USER22> Thanks for pointing out that traditional state unemployment benefits alone are also insufficient for adequately cushioning citizens from job loss, and that federal intervention was required. Otherwise, your state unemployment benefits are going to be right around or somewhat above US poverty level guidelines for an individual.

If you want people to stay home to not exacerbate a pandemic, you pay them to stay home.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Winter Precipitation: Graupel - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graupel <comment><AUTHOR> Just experienced heavy amounts of this in Chicago, and had no clue what to call it. It feels really weird, like rain that bounces off of you.</comment>


Ask HN: What are the best books to self study models of computation? - <AUTHOR> Need an introductory text first. Would like it to cover all or few topics from each category.
Sequential models
* Finite state machines * Pushdown automata * Turing Machine
Functional models
* Lambda calculus * Recursive functions * Combinatory logic * Cellular automaton * Abstract rewriting systems
Concurrent models
* Kahn process networks * Petri nets * Synchronous Data Flow * Interaction nets * Actor model <comment><USER2> Free e-books / lecture notes:

[http://cs.brown.edu/people/jsavage/book/](http://cs.brown.edu/people/jsavage/book/)

[http://joshua.smcvt.edu/computation/book.pdf](http://joshua.smcvt.edu/computation/book.pdf)

[https://doc.lagout.org/science/0_Computer%20Science/4_Theory...](https://doc.lagout.org/science/0_Computer%20Science/4_Theory%20of%20Computation/Computability%20and%20Complexity.pdf)

[http://web.cs.ucdavis.edu/~doty/fall2015ecs120/notes.pdf](http://web.cs.ucdavis.edu/~doty/fall2015ecs120/notes.pdf)

[http://web.cecs.pdx.edu/~black/CS311/Lecture%20Notes/Lambda%...](http://web.cecs.pdx.edu/~black/CS311/Lecture%20Notes/Lambda%20Calculus.pdf)

[https://arxiv.org/pdf/1607.02291](https://arxiv.org/pdf/1607.02291)

[http://www.lsis.org/poccim/phd_thesis_marco_pocci.pdf](http://www.lsis.org/poccim/phd_thesis_marco_pocci.pdf)

Collage of machine models:

[https://www.revolvy.com/page/Finite%252Dstate- machine](https://www.revolvy.com/page/Finite%252Dstate-machine)

Github repo of models:

[https://github.com/topics/theory-of- computation](https://github.com/topics/theory-of-computation)</comment>


Opera Mini, desktop browser gets Ad-blocker that is bad for Free Press - <AUTHOR> http://phoneradar.com/opera-gets-ad-blocker-double-standards/ <comment><USER2> The sites that I use too often, including PhoneRadarblog doesn't use ad part that annoys me.If opening that site helps the person who fills me the knowledge and entertains me,why I need to use some adblockers.Please ,Opera don't destroy their hard works.Let them entertain us,most of us don't care swiping a little to skip the ad. In this way Atleast I can contribute something for their works for us.

</comment><comment><USER3> Instead of putting Ad-blocker, let people decide who want it or not. Don't be Double-Standard.

</comment><comment><USER4> Vgood article frm PhoneRadar</comment>


Russian Federation Anti-Gay Laws: An Analysis and Deconstruction [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://gallery.mailchimp.com/d0e55f3197099944345708652/files/RussianLGBTLawWhitePaper.pdf

<comment><USER2> "10 Things You Didn't Know About Russia's Anti-Gay Law & LGBT Rights" on page 7 is a good summary

</comment><comment><USER3> Finally someone who takes the time to actually INVESTIGATE a news story, who goes to actual sources (not talking heads grabbed off the street) and analyzes what is going on.

Unfortunately this guy is not a journalist, and this so-called "Putin's anti- gay law" is only one of a number of news stories in which the media seem to be driven by a hidden force to toe the party line, and therefore investigative journalism has almost disappeared. Even the most elementary investigations are no longer done by the state controlled media in the USA, namely all the major TV networks and newspapers.

Even the most elementary falsehoods are repeated and repeated. As the analysis points out this is not an anti-gay law, and it is not Putin's because it was introduced and voted on by the Russian parliament with almost unanimous support in the legislature and in society at large. Even some gay groups have spoken in support of this child protection law.

Now I don't happen to agree with the law and the way it was created because I think that child protections laws should focus more on mandating positive things and less on fining people for negative things. But that is another discussion which we are NOT HAVING because the media have hijacked this issue to tar Putin as black and evil.

Funny thing is that all of this twisted Western media coverage is just increasing the amount of support that Russians give to Putin, and is suckering Russsia's neighbors into incredibly stupid moves like Georgia's attack on Tskhinvali which led to Russian President Dmitri Medvedev ordering Russian troops into Georgia. Yet the media still call this Putin's war. And look at Ukraine? It doesn't take much digging to come up with a realization that Ukraine is a seriously confused country, that the EU was strong-arming them into a fat punitive association agreement and that Russia's bond purchase deal was remarkably free of strings attached. There are dozen's of questions that the media simply ignores about Ukraine. Somebody shot a couple of foreigners dead with hunting rifles and this is being painted as police brutality. Yet a study of the media reports paints a pictured of a fractured protest movement that contains factions that are strongly racist and nationalist. One should at least suspect that this is some kind of internal cleansing in a neo-nazi group and do some investigation. And what about the videos of a guy who is reported to have had his ear cut off while videos show that he has two ears on his head. And he had no bruises, just a stream of dried blood that could have come from a single cut or scrape. And the claim is that his hands were nailed to a cross, but in the video he picks up and uses a mobile phone. No visible nail holes in palm or wrist and his hands are only a bit scratched up like I myself have done by pruning blackberry bushes without gloves.

When will some journalist at least ask how Ukraine can become a part of Europe if the protest groups will not come together and democratically agree on a single position?

And when will a journalist ask the EU why they demanded Ukraine to sign a mammoth punitive association agreement instead of negotiating a series of agreements, one subject at a time like they did for the early members? Why couldn't Ukraine maintain its existing trade deals with Russia until it is ready to shift its trade flow to the EU?

And the most interesting question of all. Given that the Eurasian Union is modelling itself on the EU, and given that a core part of the EU is a large number of product standards that a product needs to meet in order to be sold in the EU, when will Russia itself be demanding its own trade partners to meet a higher set of standards than exist today? I'll bet that such things are waiting in the wings except that the Eurasian Union is looking for a collective way of bring all of its industries up to a higher level of quality rather than trying to lock out products the way that the EU tends to do.</comment>


Well, duh (1996) - <AUTHOR> https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v18/n14/dale-peck/well-duh <comment><USER2> They totally missed the mark on this one: "What's meant to distinguish Infinite Jest (the book) from various artefacts that precede it is the conflation of entertainment with drug addiction, and this notion is, I think, fundamentally flawed."

It's now pretty clear entertainment can be neurologically addictive, as evidenced by the social media companies and their abilities to predict improved engagement.

On top of that, we've now got an attention + an opioid addiction.

If anything, DFW was just very early at predicting the medium term state, complete with national secession movements.

Not bad for a 'verbose' fiction writer.

<comment><USER3> Also I'm quite sure the idea of conflating entertainment with drug addiction precedes IJ, it can be traced back at least as far as the idea that religion is the opiate of the masses.

<comment><USER4> Here's the full quote:

> Religious distress is at the same time the expression of real distress and > the protest against real distress. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed > creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a > spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people.

That is, "opium" here is references a painkiller; religion is viewed as a way to deaden pain and suffering. It's not about addiction.

<comment><USER3> I highly doubt the idea of opium was invoked without intention to reference its addictive nature.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I had a ton of fun reading Infinite Jest, it took me two months of reading daily but after a while I couldn't wait to get home from work to read it (I didn't have a kid yet mind you). There are many things about it that are dissatisfying, frustrating even maddening. But there are so many points of brilliance it makes the whole thing worth it. The ambitiousness, audacity and shortcomings are part of it. I felt similarly about Pale King, DFW's posthumously published unfinished novel. Was it a great book? No. But there is about a 50 page section in the middle that makes the whole damn thing worth it.

<comment><USER6> What 50 page section? Are you referring to the Eschaton game? If so, its not in the middle, nor is it 50 pages.

<comment><USER3> The 50 page section refers to Pale King I think.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Seems the author is oftentimes taking whats meant to be a purposefully sardonic reflection of American culture to be an actual direct attempt at humor by DFW.

A good example of this is his point that the "level of humor" in the book is low because of a reference to "butt products". The joke isn't, "butts, haha", the joke is the satire that yea, that would be true... I mean, have you seen Instagram? Or SuperBowl ads?

<comment><USER8> "both, most importantly, work up an elaborate – and elaborately digressive – plot which deliberately ends as unsatisfactorily as possible."

I've only read about DFW's work, I haven't actually read them yet. But the quote above, in addition to your first sentence, sounds exactly like what DFW would be attempting to demonstrate an unspoken life parallel, or that it's about the journey not the destination, but even so, once the destination is reached the journey is pointless and forgotten.

There's definitely an unrealized expectation at the base of this review.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Well that's just like your opinion man. Infinite Jest is a masterpiece imo.

My favorite book of all time and oddly prescient in many ways.

For instance, I'm aware of at least one startup developing the vid-chat masks Wallace wrote up with a straight face. See also snapchat filters.

<comment><USER10> I haven't read IJ, but the review made it sound like a sober variation on the "Illuminatus Trilogy".

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> here's a hack for reading infinite jest: use two bookmarks - one in the main story and one in the endnotes. here's another hack that is tougher: read it in less than a week. you simply cannot appreciate the book if you do not have all of the different plots and characters fresh in your head (BTW I make the same recommendation for all long classics eg war and peace).

about the merit of the book: it is one of the few books that i've read that evoked a visceral reaction in me - i _felt_ manic and strung out (like many of the characters) while reading it. social commentary aside i think that passes bar for worthwhile literature.

<comment><USER12> I shudder to imagine the experience of reading Infinite Jest in physical form. Having an ereader that could jump back-and-forth between the main text and the endnotes was invaluable.

<comment><USER11> One thing about long books on e-readers is you don't have the psychological satisfaction of feeling like you're making it through the book (which you can feel by the number of pages that change hands with the paper book)

<comment><USER13> There's one footnote that ends up being a punchline, about five words long. The few seconds spent flipping from the page to the footnote lent it a certain comedic timing that would usually be impossible to portray in a book. That really stood out in my mind and I don't think it'd be quite the same by clicking a hyperlink.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Not a very convincing criticism in my opinion. I liked the plot, but even if you don't like the plot or themes, I think the ideas, the sentences, the verbal invention and playfulness are the best things about the book. But, theme-wise, it's worth remembering that this basically pre-dates the modern internet:

>"The moment he recognized what exactly was on one cartridge he had a strong anxious feeling that there was something more entertaining on another cartridge and that he was potentially missing it. He realized that he would have plenty of time to enjoy all the cartridges, and realized intellectually that the feeling of deprived panic over missing something made no sense."

</comment><comment><USER15> The title of this piece is "Well, duh". The sentence from which this submission's title is taken is _If nothing else, the success of Infinite Jest is proof that the Great American Hype Machine can still work wonders, in terms of sales._ ; the submission's title doesn't get the full intent of that sentence.

Use the story title! It's in the guidelines!

Articles like this, it seems to turn out, are part of Dale Peck's schtick, as you'll quickly learn from a Wikipedia page that seems to think these kinds of takedowns are the most notable thing about him:

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

I'm always there for a good takedown, and while I like DFW's writing I think Infinite Jest is a rich, slow-moving, and inexplicably unharried target. But I do think it's kind of funny that Peck opens by saying that Infinite Jest is a book without much of a plot, in which not much happens other than a 700 page conversation, and then spends 2 gigantic paragraphs trying to explain all the details of the plot. Which, it turns out later, he actually enjoys, once the puzzle pieces fall into place and reveal the book's underlying simplicity. OK then.

The bit in Infinite Jest written in (attempted) African American vernacular is truly awful, though. Peck is clearly right about that.

<comment><USER16> OK, we've changed it above. The submitted title was "Infinite Jest is proof the Great American Hype Machine can work wonders (1996)".

Since the submitter was attempting to use representative language from the article, I figure they thought the original title was baity and were trying to follow the guidelines by changing it.

<comment><USER15> You're right. I dialed back my comment a bit. Thanks! And thanks to the submitter for finding this.

<comment><AUTHOR> You're welcome and thank you for the comment.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Its weird because the only people who are going to respond to this type of criticism are people who were so invested in Infinite Jest that they will read this lengthy critique. So its going always going to be extremely biased and poorly received by the biased audience, especially 20+ years later. So its basically just a conversation starter for all the snobs who inhaled this book and maybe a tiny minority who didn't enjoy it but are still motivated enough to discuss it.

The criqitue is mostly well-written and there's some issues I agree with, but they get pretty smarmy and smug by the end.

<comment><USER18> A Very astute observation, chum!

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> The erudite of the LRB might never understand the simple and unexaggerated beauty of Mark Twain nor David Foster Wallace. Perhaps the only thing less appealing than a dissenting opinion is an op-ed to ride the coattails of success and make a name for oneself through dissension. Yeah Shakespeare sucks too, here's my card.

</comment><comment><USER20> I resent the length of my time the author spent, verbosely and banally, telling me that he resents the length of his time Wallace spent through banal verbosity in Infinite Jest.

</comment><comment><USER21> Very interesting review. I read infinite jest once as a teenager, and once a couple of years ago - and yeah, on second reading, I could see it doesn't really deserve its hype.

The one weirdness of the review is kind of related to the main weirdness of Infinite Jest - why on earth is it related to Pynchon? I never really understood the similarity. Sure, they're both digressive writers - but so is everyone and their dog since Virginia Wolf. Why did Infinite Jest become _the_ postmodern novel?

I think ultimately, what killed Infinite Jest to me is, on second read, it seemed dated. The driving concern - authenticity - seems to be one that sort of faded in relevance in the late oughts, then merged fairly seamlessly into a sort of teenage angst - a merger that's pretty well enacted by Infinite Jest, to be honest.

<comment><USER22> For starters: Hal Incandenza's character development, or rather character devolvement, is reminiscent of Slothrop in _Gravity 's Rainbow._

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> "And herein is Infinite Jest's (the book's) major theme: the United States has become a culture addicted to entertainment, and like all addicts we pursue that entertainment to our detriment."

It seems like the reviewer dislikes the book because he disagrees with this notion, citing our attachment to entertainment is more of a choice than an addiction. I however find this very profound and will be finishing the book thanks to this review.

<comment><USER24> I think you will also like this quote/thought then:

> The theory is this: Infinite Jest is Wallace's attempt to both manifest and > dramatize a revolutionary fiction style that he called for in his essay "E > Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction." The style is one in which a new > sincerity will overturn the ironic detachment that hollowed out contemporary > fiction towards the end of the 20th century. Wallace was trying to write an > antidote to the cynicism that had pervaded and saddened so much of American > culture in his lifetime. He was trying to create an entertainment that would > get us talking again.

\- [http://fictionadvocate.com/2012/09/19/the-infinite-jest- live...](http://fictionadvocate.com/2012/09/19/the-infinite-jest-liveblog- what-happened-pt-2/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> _Infinite Jest is proof the Great American Hype Machine can work wonders_

Funnily enough I think DFW would agree, in an interview somewhere (I think it was in Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself) he talks about the surreal experience of seeing all the hype and raves about his book immediately after release, when he knew no one had actually had time to read it.

</comment><comment><USER26> I will agree with the writers sentiment about Infinite Jest. I read about 1/3 before deciding I could not make it the whole way through. I think a good chunk of the reasons for the books popularity is the persona of DFW. His personality, physical looks, melancholic and thoughtful disposition make a him a quintessential writer. He looks the part very well, and produces this obscure monstrosity called Infinite Jest. My impression is that tons of people who read the book are never quite sure if its pure genius or complete non sense. His persona tips them over the edge.

<comment><USER27> It's an enjoyable read mostly. It doesn't claim to contain profound social commentary in every character and subplot. Of course his persona makes a difference because it's a fiction born of his imagination. DFW did have a point though, about how we would become addicted to instant gratification, and you can see a grain of truth to this in the contemporary internet and the "attention economy".

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I was intrigued by this comment, read the review, and posted it:

"Infinite Jest is one of my fave books — but it's still fun to read this vicious @LRB review from 1996."

Tony O'Shaughnessy

</comment><comment><USER28> This is such an oversimplification of the book but I guess critics have to criticize. I imagine that DFW would probably say the book failed the author of this piece if this was his takeaway.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> It's worthwhile comparing the criticism to other works such as James Joyce's Ulyssess. Take this quote from a review in the NYT:

Few intuitive, sensitive visionaries may understand and comprehend "Ulysses," James Joyce's new and mammoth volume, without going through a course of training or instruction, but the average intelligent reader will glean little or nothing from it- even from careful perusal, one might properly say study, of it- save bewilderment and a sense of disgust. It should be companioned with a key and a glossary like the Berlitz books. Then the attentive and diligent reader would eventually get some comprehension of Mr. Joyce's message.

[http://www.openculture.com/2013/10/the-very-first-reviews- of...](http://www.openculture.com/2013/10/the-very-first-reviews-of-joyces- ullyses.html)

<comment><USER4> "Ulysses" is trash, sorry. The equivalent of a three-hour long Simpsons gag compilation marathon Youtube video, except for academics.

"Infinite Jest" is okay, but needs an editor badly.

<comment><AUTHOR> Other than The Simpsons allusion, can you be more specific in how James Joyce's "Ulysses" is "trash"? Quotes from the novel with your criticism are welcomed. I'm interested in knowing how you came to this conclusion. No need to be sorry. Thank you for the observation.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Like many others in the comments, I loved Infinite Jest, for many reasons, but just to go into one in particular, I feel like David Foster Wallace's viciously smart, sardonic, ironic, and often deeply depressing sense of humor is at its peak in IJ. There are so many things from the book that stick out to me as being memorably funny: the woman with an artificial heart who dies because a purse snatcher takes it, chasing the snatcher for several blocks while yelling, "Stop her, she's stolen my heart!" while onlookers laugh and think it's just some sort of couple's tryst; the party for someone's dissertation defense where a bunch of pretentious academics are all doing this kind of anti dance consisting of moving as little as possible so as to look like you're not dancing, but with a kind of jerking rhythm; the description of the 90s TV special about a guy with paranoid schizophrenia afraid that the government wants to inject radioactive fluid into his brain and that he's being chased by giant machines that will eventually catch him and consume him, who for science is injected with a radioactive solution for a PET scan and then stuck into the giant whirling scanner, a look of horror on his face as he sees his worst fears coming to life; the Canadian government minister who dies because he has a cold and cannot communicate with the person robbing his house that he cannot breathe through his nose; the teen tennis player who wears all black and is called The Darkness, meanwhile the other teen tennis player who tries to get people to call him The Viking but no one does; the whole thing with the wheelchair assassins and "to hear the squeak"; the absurdity of Helen Steeply and the even more ridiculous absurdity of Orin falling for him/her; Avril losing her shit and running around the yard with the mold her son ate held aloft, screaming for help; and so on.

Plus this all often leading into scenes that are just relentlessly tragic. Joelle freebasing way too much cocaine in the bathroom at that same party; Poor Tony winding up having a seizure and swallowing his tongue on the T; the viscerally accurate depiction throughout the book of addiction and depression; Joelle's entire life story; Himself's slide into madness and suicide while basically no one tried to help; the short bit of Himself talking to his alcoholic father when he was younger; and so on.

In a way it reminds me of the show Bojack Horseman, with the mix of high brow and low brow humor, unflinchingly dark narrative, and deeply flawed characters.

All of which is to say: it's not always an easy book, but it's definitely worth at least two reads, one to get the story and another to appreciate all of the interleaving of the various stories throughout the book.

<comment><USER30> Thank you for all the examples! I've read the book, but don't have all of it in active memory, so I appreciate your list as it helped me remember different parts. I have to look up the mold-eating part because I remember it as hilarious.

Three other more or less absurd parts of the book that I enjoyed was the (apparently true) concept of different sized arms of tennis players, subsidized time (Year of the Whopper, Year of the Trial-Size Dove Bar, Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment) _, and how half a state in the US is turned into a giant landfill that waste is catapulted into.

The two things I remember vividly from reading the book is how funny it is, and how it would take me a page or two in the beginning of each session to get into the rhythm of the language. It's similar to Cormac McCarthy (I currently read Blood Meridian), where the special cadence of the language makes both IJ and BM very pleasurable to read.

_ [https://infinitejest.wallacewiki.com/david-foster- wallace/in...](https://infinitejest.wallacewiki.com/david-foster- wallace/index.php?title=Subsidized_Time)

<comment><USER29> You're absolutely right. I can't believe I forgot to list subsidized time and The Great Concavity (or Convexity, depending on whether the speaker is American or Canadian)! Thanks for the chuckle on my bus ride to work :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> "Gore Vidal, who's had his dick sucked more than a few times and been taken to task for it, has written far more persuasively that the novel as an art-form has become a cultural irrelevance, but you don't hear him whingeing about 'artistic invalidation'."

It's not too often that I see words like 'tentacular' and 'bathos' in the same article as phrases about metaphorical dick-sucking (see above).

More seriously, I've been getting more into literature and literary critique recently, and am a bit surprised about how personally affronted he seems by the book - is this sort of reaction common in literary criticism?

<comment><USER32> The problem with any big book is that, at the end, the author has you over a barrel: either you loved it and the author is a genius, or you hated it and you are a sucker. Lots of people claim to love long, ponderous books just to avoid being the sucker or for fear of appearing unsophisticated.

I prefer great authors who were serialized, e.g. dostoevsky. The works are brilliant, but the individual chapters read well, so you rarely feel like you have to just slog through the damned thing.

<comment><USER33> _> The problem with any big book is that, at the end, the author has you over a barrel: either you loved it and the author is a genius, or you hated it and you are a sucker. Lots of people claim to love long, ponderous books just to avoid being the sucker or for fear of appearing unsophisticated._

I think this all the time. If you've made a huge commitment to something that turned out to be worthless, it's tough to admit that to yourself and others. So I'm a bit more skeptical when I hear positive reviews of long books, colleges, investors, religions, marriage, having kids, etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> The first time I tried reading Infinite Jest I felt that I was dealing with DFW's own personal trauma. I think I made it about 10% of the way through before putting it down.

The second time I picked up the book, I made it all the way through and thought it was absolutely brilliant. I see this in the same vein as Paul Beatty's _The Sellout_. There's a lot of stream of consciousness, there's a plethora of characters, and you have to really be paying attention to figure out exactly what's going on. These books aren't for everyone, but they're certainly important parts of American Literature.

</comment><comment><USER35> I do not like author X. A very, very long article about it. The end.

</comment><comment><USER36> People love to hate David Foster Wallace. The irony is palpable when reading critics of his writing; they at times perfectly channel Wallace in their very critique of him. Heck, I was accosted (well, maybe the recipient of a snide remark) on the subway in Boston while I was reading a DFW novel on my commute. The person said that only coddled, white suburban men read his work -- when I am _none_ of those things and sitting right on front of the person. I immediately forgave the cynic, though, once I caught a peek of their Boston University sweater hidden inside the crevasse of a parka's open zipper. :)

David Foster Wallace is the embodiment of a particular 20th and 21st century zeitgeist, and one that if you read between the lines, predicts all the ailments we will be facing in the decades ahead.

</comment><comment><USER37> Most of Infinite Jest is highly indebted to Wittgenstein's Mistress. Markson's is the better novel.

</comment><comment><USER38> I am sympathetic to that review, as I didn't manage to finish the damn book.

</comment><comment><USER39> I choose to believe that review, as I have only recently sold my unread copy of IF on ebay.

</comment><comment><USER40> Rang true. But true believers gotta believe just as haters gotta hate.

</comment><comment><USER41> Funny, I found this book over a decade after it was published, having been exposed to almost none of this "hype" whatsoever---and I still liked it. I don't buy his thesis that its success was due only to the "hype machine." I suppose I respect his opinion---or at least his right to having it---but I simply do not agree with it or with many of the things he says.

> The novel has moved some 60,000 copies and racked up a stack of glowing > reviews as thick as it is.

As far as I know, it wasn't nominated for a single major literary award that year (at the very least, it didn't win any), and I wouldn't remotely agree that the reviews were "glowing." A quick search finds two at best ambivalent reviews: [^1] [^2]. Though their comments came later, Harold Bloom and James Wood were highly critical of Wallace, the former declaring him to have "no discernible talent." It feels terribly one-sided to mention only the stack of positive reviews. IJ was by no means a universal critical success.

> ... both [The Broom of the System and Infinite Jest], most importantly, work > up an elaborate – and elaborately digressive – plot which deliberately ends > as unsatisfactorily as possible.

While I can't speak for Broom. which I didn't finish, I can say that my reading of IJ's ending was that it was not at all deliberately unsatisfactory. In fact, I felt it was the opposite: it's beautiful, and it marks the moment when Gately finally gets out of his recursive cycle of addiction. I think it's where the book (whose structure is itself fascinating---a circle and/or a Sierpinski Gasket) ought to have ended, and while some could say it was unsatisfactory for them, I don't think they could claim it was deliberately so.

> There is first of all Hal Incandenza, a teenage tennis prodigy and marijuana > addict who during the course of the book plays tennis and gets high a lot, > and then tries to stop getting high – that's his plot.

Isn't there a bit more to Hal's story? What about the struggle the ghost of his dead father makes to connect Hal to the world and to feelings? To exit his head, as it were? What about Hal's finding that same dad dead in the house up the hill from his school dorm? What about his recession into himself and his dislocation from language, his Kafkaesque inversion?

> Then there's Don Gately, a former housebreaker and narcotics addict who goes > straight before the book even opens and merely attempts to stay that way > throughout the course of the novel – that's his plot.

Nothing of his struggles to pray daily to a God he doesn't believe in, simply in an effort to stay sober for another 24 hours? Nothing of his role as a leader and mentor at the Ennet halfway house, or the scenes where he transcends his identity as a witless muscle-for-hire criminal upon whose head friends would close elevator doors for a laugh to connect with and care for his community? (The scene where he, in a joke apron and chef's hat, he makes pasta for the housemates brought me to tears.) Still nothing of his falling in love with Joelle? Nor of his fight in the resident's defense, his hospitalization, and his transition into a vivid memoryscape of his days as a junkie and crook?

> All of which, I suppose, is just a polite way of saying that if the author > of Infinite Jest shut off his word-processor and actually went to a wine- > and-cheese party he might find out what the word 'reading' really means

He wrote it longhand and was a recovering alcoholic/addict. No word processors or wine parties for him.

Yes, I have in certain ways fallen out of love with Infinite Jest, but I still refute the claim that there was nothing there in the first place. There was something in it for me when I read it alone in rural Thailand over a summer in 2013, and there's been something in it for many other readers I know, too. This wasn't just because we were told something was there, but because we found something there.

IJ's not perfect. It deserves critique, and it is certainly flawed. (Parts of it do make me cringe.) But I admire it nonetheless. It took courage to write a novel that strived towards the real---more, I'm afraid, than it required for this LRB review.

[^1]: [https://www.nytimes.com/1996/02/13/books/books-of-the- times-...](https://www.nytimes.com/1996/02/13/books/books-of-the-times-a- country-dying-of-laughter-in-1079-pages.html)

[^2]: [https://www.nytimes.com/1996/03/03/news/infinite- jest.html](https://www.nytimes.com/1996/03/03/news/infinite-jest.html)

<comment><USER42> "Nothing of his struggles to pray daily to a God he doesn't believe in, simply in an effort to stay sober for another 24 hours?"

One of the novels that affected me the most as a teen, and turned out to have even deeper meaning to me than I originally realized, I happened to look up on Amazon a decade or two on, and was startled that some reviewers said things like (paraphrasing) "this book sucks because all the characters are losers!"

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> "ultimately the novels strike me as more crudités than smorgasbord"

...ok dude. :)

</comment><comment><USER44> A real book "not worth the paper it's written on" simply falls out of print and is not reviewed; it does not generate twenty more pages of overpretentious literary diatribe decades later. Readers are advised to skip this article.

<comment><USER45> The article is a contemporary review.

<comment><USER46> That's exactly the point of the comment you're replying to.</comment></comment></comment>


A.I. Could Be Weaponized to Spread Disinformation - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/06/07/technology/ai-text-disinformation.html <comment><USER2> That job should be left to the NYT.

More seriously, what do we think about all of the recommendation algorithms that Reddit, Facebook, YouTube, HN, and all of these platforms do?

Why recommend that one video/article which damages our company when we could spin it with our own version of it?

</comment><comment><USER3> Fake news and propaganda used to sow hatred against America's so-called enemies, small countries with little ability to do much to America hated mostly because of blow-back from America's imperial aspirations... vs. fake news propaganda used by their allies to try to protect them from unprovoked military actions and covert terrorist actions against them. Who is in the right? It's just another tool in the war against people fought by deceit by all sides.</comment>