Facewatch 'thief recognition' CCTV on trial in UK stores - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-35111363 <comment><USER2> > We later discover my thick-rimmed glasses are the problem. It's something > easily fixed by adjusting the system settings, Simon tells me.

Facial recognition is a hard problem; allowing for thick-rimmed glasses is _not_ 'easily' fixed.

<comment><USER3> Well, you can't admit that to a reporter/the public...

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> So, how would a reformed thief go in to buy basic goods once this becomes more widespread?

Do we no longer believe that someone can pay off their debt to society and become a useful member of said society?

<comment><USER5> We're talking here about thieves that hadn't been caught by the Police.

Maybe the way to handle it could be that if you're a thief and had a change of heart, report to the local Police station and agree to serve your time in exchange for getting your face removed from the database.

<comment><USER4> The database only has convicted thieves in their Database, so in theory they've already served their time for their crime. The problems is that they are then put on an apparently un-auditable list maintained by a private company, and discriminated against.

<comment><USER6> > The database only has convicted thieves in their Database,

From this article:

> and other potential offenders

And from this article about a different system:

> Police forces are already using face-recognition to identify people, much as > they might with DNA or fingerprints.

> A national police database contains up to 18 million "custody suite" photos > - hundreds of thousands could be of innocent people.

Many of those people will be those arrested for an offence, but not cautioned or tried. (To be clear here: they really didn't do the crime, not just they weren't convicted of a crime).

<comment><USER4> Thanks for the clarification. Not a point in favor of the system, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I wonder if the CV Dazzle[1] style will take off in the UK. Maybe we'll finally get the exact cyberpunk future promised us by Gibson, etc.

[1] [https://cvdazzle.com/](https://cvdazzle.com/)

<comment><USER8> No need to go that far: every system I'm aware of fails when there are no eyebrows. (I'm in the FR industry.)

<comment><USER9> Your eyebrows must be [<\</comment></comment></comment><comment>-- this </comment><comment>-->] long to enter this store/view this content.

</comment><comment><USER10> I wonder if places using systems such as this will have to declare it plainly?

If they do, seems like there might be some backlash, with people preferring not to go to businesses starting down the path of using this sort of tech and spending more time in those which could, but choose not to, use it.

Assuming of course it doesn't end up just completely ubiquitous like web ads etc, the market _could_ force tech like this into the high-risk margins, i.e. high-end jewellery shops etc, rather than it eventually popping up in every pub and high-street shop.

I will say though, having written that, I do think it's likelier it'll just end up ubiquitous.

<comment><USER11> Some pubs/clubs already require things like fingerprints to be taken before going in, it doesn't seem to stop people going there. If anything, something which is less effort for the customer (like the Facewatch system) would probably be preferred

<comment><USER10> It won't stop everyone, some people don't care, might be socially pressured to just going in anyway in a group, etc. But for customers who do care, it could actually work in the opposite way too.

If a club wants to take your fingerprints, it's usually after you've already entered the place, having possibly queued, at a point where it's very annoying and socially awkward if in a group to about-turn and say "you know what, no, let's go elsewhere".

If on the other hand there's a sign outside declaring "we use Facewatch here" then it's actually much easier for customers for whom that represents a problem to just continue walking past, and not be drawn in in the first place.

It may be that simply not enough people care about having their biometric data read and stored in databases etc, or that it'll be so ubiquitous that there's no alternative but to go along with it. But like I say, it's possible, if either of these things isn't true, that the market will suppress technologies like these becoming 'just the way things are'.

Again though, I honestly don't think that is likely looking at what's happened with web tracking, CCTV and the like. It's possible this, however, is a bit more 'in your face' (pun intended) and will spur a greater negative reaction in people.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Widespread facial recognition is going to add a whole new slew of data for GCHQ/NSA to data mine. Not to mention advertisers tracking exactly where you walk in shopping malls and shops.

From my understanding, UK law requires that you be informed if subject to facial recognition, but, analogous to online tracking/advertising, does not require your permission to begin it.

Sigh, _gets out my rimmed glasses_

<comment><USER13> > Widespread facial recognition is going to add a whole new slew of data for > GCHQ/NSA to data mine.

Less than you think.

We're all walking around with beacons in our pockets already. They already have the ability to "follow" a person to within a square mile, and that individual is far more knowable (i.e. less false positives) than facial recognition.

Between IMEI spotting and license plate readers surrounding central London, they have a real time SimCity-esk map of the city. The facial recognition stuff might be the cherry on top, but it is hardly going to be a major gain.

PS - And as far as I know they already have facial recognition cameras as most major tube stations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> What happens to a face after it's in a database, or multiple databases, gets arrested, spends time in jail, and then goes straight? Will it be as impossible to get off these databases as it is to get off the no fly list?

<comment><USER8> And that has nothing to do with FR and its technology. The contents of an FR database and getting items removed is purely human politics.

<comment><USER14> This technology, deployed, is without a doubt a political issue. Divorcing what we work on from how it's used is irresponsible. And I'm not saying don't develop technology, but we have to recognize and consider how it fits into society. We have to discuss.

The Stasi recruiting human spies from among the general population was both a logistical question and a political issue. The NSA weakening encryption, or parking on backbones or datacenters, is a technology and a political issue. The political urge to inflict both kinds of spying is just that, a political one. As technology improves, it makes the job of spies and other criminals that much easier, increasing the spy's reach, and changing the character of society.

The technology is fascinating, but it's not divorced from society. We're all swimming in the same soup.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I look forward to privacy conscious individuals taking steps: [https://cvdazzle.com/](https://cvdazzle.com/)

</comment><comment><USER16> This does not scale. It might work for a few people in a population of thousands, but beyond that false positives are going to be a real problem.

<comment><USER8> I work in facial recognition. When you say it does not scale, how so? I have a system with 975K people in it, the US registered sex offenders database, and with a single quad core laptop a lookup takes about 8 seconds. With a server class 32+ core system the lookup is nearly real time. How does that not scale?

<comment><USER17> I assume he more meant accuracy at scale - if you have a large population how does the accuracy do? Do you wind up with many close samples or are things pretty good?

<comment><USER8> Pretty much all FR systems generate a list of matches, ranked from closest match on down. The size of the list is configurable. It is also industry standard NOT to use the list as an authority. Given a list of high matches (greater than 90%) a human can quickly filter out obvious false positives, and then the remaining are retained for further consideration. It is also industry standard NOT to rely on FR alone; combining FR with other measures reduces the ability for a false positive.

The issue I find with FR is people expecting it to be some super technology, gleaming significant information from a dust spec. Its not like that. And the media is playing it up with unrealistic descriptions. Remember the original DOOM and it's quality of graphics? That is where FR is now. We've got a ways before the journalist hype is close to reality. And the mature technology will not be FR, but a comprehensive multiple biometric measuring system capturing far more than someone's face.

<comment><USER18> So, if you're looking for 1% of a total population your false positive rate before human intervention is 99%. That's not useful for automated systems.

Further, identical twins are going to show an image that would fool human verification making this questionable for many tasks even with human supervision.

PS: Almost 1% of the population has an identical twin. (% of births is lower, but you get 2 twins.)

<comment><USER8> There is only one true match. So the system will always be generating false positives. This technology is not an authority, but a filter. Yes, identical twins will both be identified if they are both in the system and no additional biometric measures are included. Identical twins still have different retina, and due to lifestyles identical twins beyond age 30 can be distinguished apart fairly easily.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I wonder what the data protection implications of this are? I presume there are many. You're storing personal information on people, possibly transfering it to another businesses, analysing it and using it to make decisions....

</comment><comment><USER20>
        A</comment>


Hacker News London meetup this Thursday - <AUTHOR> http://www.meetup.com/HNLondon/calendar/14910886/

<comment><USER2> I'm based in the North-West (near Liverpool), but I travel a lot. Sometimes these meetups coincide with my being nearby and I can distort my travels to catch them.

This one would've required minimal distortion, but just hours before it was announced I finalized my travel plans for the Thursday and Friday, so there is now no slack available.

Shame, really. The potentially quieter venue really appeals to me.

ADDED IN EDIT: Thanks for the downvote - nice to know that honest feedback is appreciated. I'm still trying to work out if I can change my plans and make it, but it's interesting how a single action by a single anonymous person can have such a negative effect. I'm not sure if I care to bother any more.

</comment><comment><USER2> Well, I managed to make it after all, rearranging my Thursday evening plans.

I like the new venue. It was spacious enough to house those of us who turned up - I didn't count (damn) - and enough space around to let the sound partially escape, so it was possible to chat.

Met and chatted with a few people, but I feel that I probably missed chatting with a few people I should've. It would be nice to have some sort of loose structure at some point to let everyone introduce themselves, or something. Not sure what, and wouldn't want too much, but I feel there should be something.

But having said that, a good evening, even though I had to leave quite early. I look forward to the next one I can get to.

It would be really good to have these on a regular schedule - perhaps the last Thursday of every month? (Except December ...)

</comment><comment><USER3> Too bad, i just left England this morning and won't come back at time. When is next time?</comment>


The Untapped Potential of Wasted Food - <AUTHOR> http://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-untapped-potential-of-wasted-food?intcid=mod-latest

<comment><USER2> The idea of environmentally friendly, non-food wasting burgers sounds good but I'm not sure if it's possible. Meat is so phenomenally resource intensive[0][1] that reducing waste at the restaurant to zero still leaves you with a pound of beef that required up to 1,800 gallons of water to make. That number gets smaller if the animal eats wild grass or what would otherwise be waste products but a cow is a an inefficient way of getting nutrients to your plate.

Livestock in general eat large amounts of corn and oats, and with their feed conversion ratios[3] that's a 40-95% food loss of food humans are perfectly capable of eating.

[0] - [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/13/food-water- footprin...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/13/food-water- footprint_n_5952862.html) [1] - [http://foodtank.com/news/2013/12/why-meat- eats-resources](http://foodtank.com/news/2013/12/why-meat-eats-resources) [3] - [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feed_conversion_ratio](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feed_conversion_ratio)

</comment><comment><USER3> In Bulgaria, food waste feeds the pigs, which are turned into food themselves pretty soon.

<comment><USER4> Most of our kitchen scraps go to the chickens, but most people don't have chickens (USA).

Is this institutionalized in Bulgaria? Is it collected from restaurants and delivered, or is it up to the individual/organization to arrange it?

<comment><USER3> This is for restaurants. People in villages feed their own livestock, so, no problem there either. But people living in the cities, unfortunately, still waste some food, but it's a lot less than here in the US. So much food is wasted here, it's a serious problem.

In general, in Bulgaria, wasting food is still planted in the minds of people as "sin", so, they try to avoid it in different ways.

I recently try something, which I call "distributed composting". For example, instead of throwing the test of an apple in the garbage can, I throw it in a bush or somewhere hidden where it will decompose and had to be driven away and burned or stored or whatever they do to our garbage.

<comment><USER5> > So much food is wasted here, it's a serious problem.

it's because restaurant portions are huge. i always eat everything i cook at home.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> That's great!</comment>


Lost Advanced Civilizations - <AUTHOR> https://www.overcomingbias.com/2020/08/lost-advanced-civilizations.html <comment><USER2> From the OP: _" On the other hand, we often hear reports of people uncovering old things that others had confidently predicted would never be found. Which makes many suspect widespread overconfidence in claims about what we know can't be there, because if so we would have seen them already."_

Hanson here appears to be backing up his claim with three hyperlinks. One thing that troubles me about rationalist-affiliated writing is that it tends to rest on what _looks_ , at first glance, like a decent evidence base, but this evidence often breaks down under a little scrutiny. For example:

• Hanson's first link is to a recent _National Geographic_ article that summarizes an archaeology finding from Bronze Age China. The summary is, IMO, misleading in one key respect. It calls the find "astonishing" because "parts" of the site "date back 4,300 years, nearly 2,000 years before the oldest section of the Great Wall—and 500 years before Chinese civilization took root on the Central Plains." The Great Wall reference is a non sequitur: it's a bit like saying that a find from the Old Kingdom of Egypt is astonishing because it dates back to two thousand years before the building of a Roman aqueduct. There's no real connection, and it's not at all news that agricultural civilizations existed in China circa 2300 BCE. Whether we want to call these societies "Chinese civilization" or not is debatable. But this finding, while really interesting and cool, is very different from what Hanson seems to be reading it as -- which is to say, as evidence for the belief that future discoveries might yield signs of "advanced civilizations" which _far predate_ the Bronze Age as it's currently imagined. After all, in 2300 BCE, written records and urbanized societies already existed in a fairly large swathe of Eurasia.

• His second link is simply to the Wikipedia page for Göbekli Tepe. Which is a totally fascinating site, I agree. It certainly does have unique features, such as the megalithic carvings. But again, it is _not_ evidence of an entirely unknown "advanced" civilization; instead, the people who built Göbekli Tepe clearly fit into the existing archaeological record relating to the Neolithic Near East. We've known for some time that early agricultural societies were emerging in the fertile crescent around the same time as this site. What's fascinating about this site is that it appears to predate agriculture in the region. However, it _is_ thought to fit into a transitional stage ("Recent DNA analysis of modern domesticated wheat compared with wild wheat has shown that its DNA is closest in sequence to wild wheat found on Karaca Dağ 30 km [20 mi] away from the site, suggesting that this is where modern wheat was first domesticated"). So again, IMO this has nothing to do with his claim about "lost" civilizations which don't fit into our existing chronology.

• The final link is to a _Nature_ write-up from two years ago relating to a contested claim about when humans arrived in the Americas. Again, this has nothing to do with evidence for an "advanced civilization" that has previously not been discovered.

All three of these links reference really interesting and important work which I very much hope continues to be funded and elaborated on. I'm convinced that there are incredible mysteries in store in the future, especially in the field of underwater archaeology. Yet to my reading, none of these reports relate to phenomena that scholars "confidently predicted would never be found." Any archaeologist or historian with a sense of humility will gladly admit that there are a huge number of unknowns in the historical record. None of this can be leveraged as a basis for the existence of "lost advanced civilizations" (by which he appears to mean agricultural or otherwise technologically-advanced civilization that far predate the Agricultural Revolution as its currently understood, and which were forgotten after some kind of hypothetical period of decline).

For that, you need what Hanson waves away: actual archaeological or historical evidence.

<comment><USER3> But by your own quote, he is not presenting these as evidence of advanced civilizations. He is presenting these examples as evidence of "old things that others had confidently predicted would never be found".

<comment><USER2> Right, and I'm arguing that none of these cited articles are valid evidence for that claim. Leaving aside the fact that his vague wording gives him enormous wiggle room, i.e. "others" could refer to anything from professional archaeologists to the _Ancient Aliens_ guy and "old things" could mean almost anything.

<comment><USER4> This is why a I think it is a bad article. He first proposes some far-outlier theories, which need extraordinary proof as he acknowledges himself. He does not give it in the article which propels his theory in the realm of fantasy. His article would be way more honest if he would describe it as pure speculation, instead of shoehorning all kinds of finds or theories into his flight of fancy.

I mean it is a fantastical idea, and if we ever find a laptop from 10000bc I would be stunned, or if we find marsian burial chambers, but the probability just isn't very high on what we observed sofar.

That isn't to say a lot is lost to history, which skews our interpretation, especially prehistorical, but that would warrant a different kind of article.

<comment><USER5> You mean like [https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/04/are- we-e...](https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/04/are-we-earths- only-civilization/557180/) which links to [https://arxiv.org/abs/1804.03748](https://arxiv.org/abs/1804.03748) ?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > Here the key question here is: what sort of things should you expect to have > already seen, if they were really there? On the one hand, we clearly have > seen enough to safely conclude that there aren't large dinosaurs roaming the > streets in our major city centers. On the other hand, we often hear reports > of people uncovering old things that others had confidently predicted would > never be found. Which makes many suspect widespread overconfidence in claims > about what we know can't be there, because if so we would have seen them > already.

This wording is very reminiscent of a lot of writing from conspiracy theorists. It starts with a very plausible claim that experts are sometimes overconfident in a mainstream belief about topic X, but then immediately leaps to the conclusion that we can therefore make up any claim whatsoever about topic X and it ought to be treated just as seriously as mainstream beliefs held by experts.

You see this all the time in government/political conspiracy theories. Yes, we have in the past uncovered real substantial government conspiracies and attempted cover-ups. But that doesn't mean that any claim whatsoever about a government conspiracy is true or should be treated "with the same priors" as any other claim. Likewise, the fact that some experts have been wrong about what artifacts they expected to find in a certain archaeological dig does not mean that all claims about human history should be treated with the same level of seriousness. The fact that sometimes evidence is hidden (either deliberately, or due to lack of resources, or due to misguided research, etc.) does not support any arbitrary claim made without evidence of its own.

<comment><USER7> > This wording is very reminiscent of a lot of writing from conspiracy > theorists

I think this dismisses the article as a whole a bit too quickly.

> The fact that sometimes evidence is hidden... does not support any arbitrary > claim made without evidence of its own.

Agreed. I didn't interpret the author as trying to imply this. I think the author was trying more to fight an instantaneous "no you're definitely wrong" than to convince the reader "yes this author's claim is correct."

<comment><USER4> I think it doesn't. A lot of conspiracy theorists use a technique where they start with something that is true, some facts A and B, and then C is controversial. You let your guard down with A and B, and are more susceptible with C.

He is honest with the extraordinary proof he needs, but his article never much strays from pure speculation. It's a nice flight of fancy.

A lot is lost to history, no doubt, which skews our understanding greatly, especially prehistorical. But that is Dozens of steps away from finding a laptop from 10000bc or marsial burial chambers and having your advanced civilization theory stick.

The article felt like shoehorning theories / finds to make them stick in his view.

<comment><USER8> ...but I think the author is being honest about it being speculation. If you read the article to the end, his conclusion is that outlandish speculative claims should be incentivized to be proven through a betting market that can reward proof proportionately.

ie. Having the mainstream put their money where their mouth is.

I don't see an issue with that. He isn't actually claiming that prior civilizations exist - simply that it's _plausible_ that they did (depending upon what you interpret as "advanced").

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> > Some supporting evidence comes in the form of writings from the earliest > authors we can find, who explicitly claim that they descended from more > advanced prior civilizations, who fell due to big cataclysms. This story is > actually quite common.

It's hard to know to what extent Golden Age and Age of Heroes myths were rooted in or developed out of real events, but by the time many of these myths were written down civilization _really had_ collapsed across the Near East and Mediterranean some 800 years earlier [1]. The Late Bronze Age collapse was in many ways more catastrophic than the fall of the Roman Empire 1500 years later.

But the civilizations that fell during this time period were civilizations from which we have ample evidence like the Mycenaeans (who may have been the inspiration for Greek Golden Age myths), not some mysterious civilization that had invented Segway scooters tens of thousands of years in the past.

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

<comment><USER10> I still wonder what inspired Plato's Atlantis.

<comment><USER11> Do you also wonder what inspired J K Rowling's Harry Potter? Or Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged?

We are quite capable of pure fiction with symbolic inspirations, there is no need to suspect "a kernel of truth" behind any speculation.

<comment><USER10> Many classical mythologies had basis in reality: the Iliad is a great example. Why are we so sure Atlantis is a myth (or allegory) while the stories of the Bible are based on real events? It's just not that simple.

<comment><USER11> That's very simple: because Atlantis was presented as an allegory by its inventor, while most of the Bible was intended as history. Wondering where the real Atlantis was makes about as much sense as asking who was the historical prodigal son...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I don't know about lost civilizations, but ancient Rome was using concrete technology unknown to medieval builders[1]. Somewhere along the line, this super concrete recipe was lost. I find this really fascinating and some believe that ancient Egypt also created its pyramids using man-made stone instead of quarried stone:

> His most remarkable claim is that the pyramids were built using re- > agglomerated stone, a sort of geopolymer limestone concrete, rather than > blocks of natural stone.

[1] - [https://www.wired.com/2009/10/super-concrete-in-the-us- milit...](https://www.wired.com/2009/10/super-concrete-in-the-us-military- iran-and-the-pyramids/)

<comment><USER13> My understanding is that Roman concrete recipe/technique is considered uneconomical for most uses today because it uses very little water and must be mixed onsite and packed into place, which makes it much stronger even without rebar. But that doesn't work so well for mixing in a truck and driving to job- site, so modern industry prefers a much wetter mix even though it means our structures crumble in decades rather than millenia.

Where the similar recipe/technique has been applied is in the construction of some large dams, where they call it roller compacted concrete.

see romanconcrete.com

<comment><USER14> did anyone made tensile tests on a roman concrete specimen? Rebar is wildly used because reinforced concrete is not only used in compression but in beams, slabs ... and could be avoided in arched structures. Arches and domes can last a lost longuer but limit choices in what can be built. Roman concrete should be compared to modern concrete without rebar or this is comparing apples to oranges.

<comment><USER15> It's just a different tradeoff. We could absolutely make "Roman" concrete that lasts millennia, but it has a much lower strength than modern concrete so you can't make something like a harbor quay out of it. That said, "lasting a thousand years" is not as useful as it sounds, 99+++% of buildings will need to be demolished before that time anyway.

<comment><USER16> > you can't make something like a harbor quay out of it

Are you sure about that? The Romans built a lot of harbours. We don't really have any data on the compressive or tensile strength of Roman concrete so it's hard to say for sure.

<comment><USER15> You can't make a _modern_ harbor quay out of it, one that is strong enough for the super large container cranes. The main problem is of survivorship bias: all the flimsy Roman harbors have disappeared so yes, only the most sturdily constructed ones remain. They would still not last under the "modern" load of 40+ ton vehicles.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> >You see Mars is, a priori, just as likely a place for life to start as Earth.

Asserted without evidence, and considerable waving of hands detected.

<comment><USER18> "a priori" means "from theoretical deduction rather than evidence or experience", so yes, that's entirely the point of that sentence.

What the author is saying is "theoretically, life could have started on Mars just as easily as it did here".

<comment><USER17> The theories we have about how life started on Earth tend to disfavor Mars as a similar starting point, based on what we currently know about Mars.

I think the author was trying to say "I mean, look, Earth and Mars are not that different, and even though we don't have any current evidence for the appropriate chemical conditions on Mars, I don't see why it couldn't have been where life started instead of Earth, because ... well, just because they're sort of similar, kind of. Oh, and next to each other."

<comment><USER19> _based on what we currently know_

In two hundred years, conclusions drawn from what we currently know will be as out of date as conclusions from two hundred years ago are today. Or to put it another way, things known to the best of our knowledge are both as good as we can do and probably wrong because one of the things we know is that historically most of what people know at any given time turns out to be wrong at any given time.

<comment><USER17> Absolutely correct. But this article was written _now_ , and makes a claim that is totally unsupported by anything we know _now_.

I'm entirely down for our descendants in 200 years laughing at our scientific parochiality, just like we often get to do at our double-century antecedents. But that doesn't justify writing _right now_ that Mars and Earth have a priori likelihoods of being the origin of life in the solar system.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Prizes for finding specific things in specific years don't reflect the structure of how ancient archaeology actually works. Picking domesticated horses as a hopefully representative example:

* The earliest clear, irrefutable example of domesticated horses - horses and chariots put into a grave together - is from 2000 BCE.

* Most sources are confident horses were domesticated by 3000 BCE.

* There's archaeological evidence for domestication as early as 3500 or 4000 BCE.

* The closest known wild relative of the domestic horse diverged genetically tens of thousands of years ago. But it's believed that this was a natural event, and _Equus ferus caballus_ was wild for some time before humans domesticated it and drove the wild stock extinct.

If there's a prize for showing horses were domesticated west of the Caspian see before 3000 BCE, is it awarded or not? I don't know and I don't see any great way to decide.

<comment><USER21> Off topic, but on the topic of your specific example: there's a nice book called _The Horse, The Wheel, and Language_ [1] about this.

Great if you want to learn about analysing fossil horse teeth for bridle bit wear. Oh, and about Indo-European languages.

Edit: By 'you" I didn't mean parent specifically but "the reader".

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Horse,_the_Wheel,_and_Lang...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Horse,_the_Wheel,_and_Language)

<comment><USER5> Sigh...

another piece for my Tsundoku-stack.

;-)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> [https://arxiv.org/abs/1804.03748](https://arxiv.org/abs/1804.03748)

 _If an industrial civilization had existed on Earth many millions of years prior to our own era, what traces would it have left and would they be detectable today? We summarize the likely geological fingerprint of the Anthropocene, and demonstrate that while clear, it will not differ greatly in many respects from other known events in the geological record. We then propose tests that could plausibly distinguish an industrial cause from an otherwise naturally occurring climate event._

<comment><USER23> If such a civilization was confined to the shores of what is now the black sea, but which before the current interglacial was a fresh water lake whose level was much lower than today's, then no, we wouldn't be able to detect it casually -- we'd have to work real hard to find it. For civilizations confined to open sea shores the situation is much less dramatic because the sea level rise there was less than at the black sea, but still, there could be some that are 30 meters under water (accessible) but completely covered in sediment (so inaccessible).

Seems... unlikely to me. Plausible, yes, but unlikely. In particular any pre- interglacial civilization would have had to develop during the preceding glacial period, not before it because that would take it back 100Ky, which is too much to be believable given what we know so far about our species' evolution (though anything from more than 100Kya would be hard to find indeed). And evidence of it would have to have been destroyed by sea level rise during the interglacial, but why would the civilization itself be destroyed by the interglacial?

<comment><USER24> I think you're correct. The story on our species is known to degree that it's unreasonable that an advanced agricultural civilization existed. I think it's more likely that far further back, a dinosaur species achieved a more advanced state than we think possible today. Not quite agricultural due to a lack of tool use, but as far as you can go without the opposable thumb. Advanced social structures and nomadic. It's pointless speculation, but I do think it's more likely given the timespan available.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I fear the market Hanson proposes would incentivize skilled hoaxes as much or more than authentic discoveries.

<comment><USER26> This. (and you could probably reply to 90% of Hanson's 'you can solve problem X with a prediction market' posts with essentially the same argument)

It's not like people with understanding of archaeology aren't already highly incentivised - financially and otherwise - to discover evidence of ancient civilizations if it's actually there. Archaeological frauds exist even now, and even where there is no fraud there are enough disputes in dating and what actually constitutes advanced civilization to guarantee a prediction market in archaeological discovery is going to have a massive oracle problem...

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> If there had ever, in the last few million years, been mining on a scale comparable to what goes on today, we'd notice. Some natural resources would be used up. The oldest mountain range on earth is over 3 billion years old. It's in South Africa. It's being mined. It's not mined out.

If this planet ever had an industrial civilization, every once in a while we'd find something made of gold or stainless steel or ceramic. Not happening.

<comment><USER8> It sort of depends on what you mean by "advanced". A civilization that simply had pottery 50K years ago, would be considered "advanced" and a major major breakthrough.

If it did only happen on an island which is today submerged, then probably we will never discover it without major investments to look (which are poor investments since the probability is low).

...and hence, the author's main insight is that low-probability discoveries should be incentivized by prediction markets such that those who believe in the status quo can safely buy their positions - and that anyone who can upend the status quo is richly rewarded.

I think that, conceptually, has merit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Imagine they were so advanced that they had the ability to 3D-print really everything in high volumes from the quantum level up. From large scale building materials analog to our concrete and steel to metamaterials, isomers, Nano/Synbio, whatever.

What to do about the rat-race/treadmill?

Of course artificial scarcity by ubiquitous DRM embedded at quantum-level in absolutely everything!

Which after a while of missed payments self-destroys into ecologically safe mono-fractions.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, gone with the wind...

edit: or instead of missed payment a simple countdown/timeout, because why have old things at all?

<comment><USER28> Why even bother with quantum DRM? A sufficiently advanced organization of matter is indistinguishable from noise if you lack the capability to decode it. See an encrypted file or a butterfly chrysalis: it all looks like noise to us, but something emerges with the right key.

What if there was no hierarchy in this proposed civilization? Or what if they developed the means to encode civilization-wide access rights to every object they handled by saying "the nth crystalline molecule from the top (read right- to-left) has your signature flaw embedded in it?"

We have no way of detecting that with our current tech level, and even if we could trivially detect the crystalline flaws it doesn't mean we'd see or comprehend the scheme they employed. Working with a tech model that we understand (well, some of us, not including me), if you handed a hard drive to a Roman emperor and told them what it held, they wouldn't be able to do anything with it or even examine it non-destructively even if they put the whole of the empire to the task.

Ain't trying to say that it existed. I do like the remark in one of the Culture series that says technology is more like a rock face than a line: different sequences of discoveries lie along the path that a particular civilization travels. There's lots of room for surprise, whether discussing ancient, contemporary, or future civilizations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Here are some problems with prediction markets that Tyler Cowen enumerated in 2006: [https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2006/03/wh...](https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2006/03/why_dont_busine.html)

That was before machine learning became a thing. I wonder if ML can detect patterns in voting behavior to downrank/uprank certain predictions to get closer to the likely truth. Obviously the more liquid the market is the better.

Edit: Someone downvoted me but I'm not sure they're aware that Robin Hanson (the author) is a big advocate of prediction markets, which are also a central feature of the original post. I think highlighting the issues with prediction markets and speculating about a solution is germane to this discussion, especially since prediction markets can be very valuable for society.

<comment><USER30> Those look very specific to using employee-only prediction markets to guide decision-making within a single company. Which objections, if any, do you think apply to Hanson's proposal for tradable archaeology prize obligations?

<comment><USER29> Abstracting away from the corporation-specific concerns, there is an incentive problem. Vested interests can seek to lower the usefulness of the market's "price as a signal" by placing large diversionary bets. Granted, this is relatively less likely to be a problem in the archaeology space. What definitely may be an issue is lower liquidity.

Every time I see a post like this I think "where are all the prediction markets?" Regulations are one reason, but that's far from the only reason. If information/prediction markets are enhanced using new technology, regulators will begin to respect them more and allow for widespread use in non-academic contexts.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> If there are remains of a civilization from, say, 15000 years ago, very few are looking for it. In the Americas it is very hard to get permission even to continue digging below the Clovis layer.

Furthermore, it is just as likely to be under 60+ ft of water. We don't need to find the water for a worldwide flood -- it's all still there, since the ice melted, right there in the sea. Literally tens (or hundreds, going back a little farther) of thousands of square miles of what was very recently dry land is now underwater, more than enough room for some regional empires.

People who lived on those square miles had to pick up and move uphill, and leave their ancestral homes behind. (That, as anyway, is pure fact.) Australians have oral history of the conflicts that move caused, because other people already lived uphill.

It's not an extraordinary claim. Nothing makes it _prima facie_ unlikely. It just takes looking for evidence in places no one has chosen to look, yet.

We do know that a sophisticated civilization (tree-)farmed the whole Amazon basin, right up until they were wiped out by smallpox 500 years ago. LIDAR reveals many, many miles of huge earthworks. No one suspected, only a few years ago. We still know hardly anything about them. So, no, lost civilizations are not an extraordinary claim.

Lack of lost civilizations, where they ought to have arisen, needs explanation.

<comment><USER11> > So, no, lost civilizations are not an extraordinary claim.

> Lack of lost civilizations, where they ought to have arisen, needs > explanation.

Well, lost cultures as advanced as, say, the builders of the Egyptian pyramids, but significantly older, is still an extraordinary claim.

In fact, claims of any kind of civilization existing require some kind of proof - it makes no sense to say "the British isles can sustain a thriving civilization today, so we should assume that there was a civilization present there 100k years ago, unless we have some evidence to the contrary (or at least wonder why no civilization flourished there some at that time)".

<comment><USER31> No, it is an ordinary claim, requiring ordinary evidence.

The Egyptians had no magic powers. They had population, surplus food, and regular human ingenuity. Anywhere that happens, civilization arises, like desert wildflowers after a rain. If the wildflowers don't bloom, that requires explanation.

You do understand that we need evidence for everything, right?

But bending over backward to try to discount the evidence we have because it must be not just regular, workaday evidence, but _extraordinary_ evidence, is not science. It is, instead, hardscrabble turf defense, and nothing to brag about.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> So, assume this is all true. We came from Mars and advanced civilizations came and went, completely undetected. Who the fuck cares? Isn't not like we can dig up their ancient technology and use it now, can we? It's a fantasy for people who don't have the imagination to believe in dieties. Super-advanced-yet-dead civilizations are a cheap imitation of dead Gods.

</comment><comment><USER33> The scifi novel "The Hab Theory" by Eckert goes into some interesting debate about whether there were unknown previous advanced civilizations or not. It sounds _almost_ plausible, but not quite.

"Inherit the Stars" by Hogan is another interesting take on it.

<comment><USER5> There is a fringe theory similar to HAB (thx for mentioning it btw., didn't know that) wherein the earth tilts by about 90 degrees for a few days and then back, but the mechanism is different. Supposedly caused by changing magnetism and structure/viscosity of some larger parts of earths molten layers, changing the center of gravity for a while, and so on.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> Clearly the author has not eaten boxes of those newly legalized brownies and binge watched seasons 1 through 15 of "Ancient Aliens." If he had, he would know that "ancient astronaut theorists, would say yes."

It's entertaining, but what subtle improvement has he made on the work of eminent theorist Giorgio A. Tsoukalos?

<comment><USER5> No binge watching of bad hair required. 20 minutes suffice. (even less, because skippable/fast-forwardable)

 _The Unusual Earth Orbit Circling Above Our Ancient Past | Roger G. Gilbertson | TEDxColoradoSprings_

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HytJn6uaRk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HytJn6uaRk)

Maybe another (less than if fast forwarded) 30 minutes for

 _Proof a Mysterious Lost Ancient GLOBAL Civilization Spanned Virtually the Entire Planet…_ from:

[2] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTd1fRCAvR4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTd1fRCAvR4)

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> A reminder of the rather more ancient civilisations imagined in the Silurian Hypothesis thought experiment of a couple of years ago:

[https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silurian_hypothesis](https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silurian_hypothesis)

</comment><comment><USER36> Prediction markets are not legal in the U.S.

(There are some with low limits, like $1000 per position or $5k per person---I don't remember exactly---but I do not consider those to be "real" prediction markets.)

</comment><comment><USER37> RE not found evidence: I always imagine what would have happened if we were to start with biology based tech. A few centruries, and poof, nothing left. Now, put that into a million years perspective...

<comment><USER38> That depends on what you mean by biology-based tech, afterall, we're also a civilization deeply rooted in biology-based tech.

It's not necessarily the case that all organic materials are ephemeral over these timespans. Assuming that a tool-using civilization would have needs covering a wide range of material properties, including high corrosion resistance, there is no reason why even biologically-grown building materials would automatically be less durable than, say, concrete. Not to mention the tools and trinkets of everyday life. The assumption is that a large population always has a large footprint regarding the traces it leaves behind, even if that footprint is very different from ours. We found this to be true in fossils that have been left behind even by exceptionally fragile creatures.

Once we're talking advanced biology-based tech, this becomes even more pronounced. Outright genetic engineering in Earth's past would be bound to leave very curious traces in lifeforms that are around today. In fact, if I wanted to leave a message behind for a hypothetical civilization located on this planet a million years into the future, leaving it in DNA would be one of the very few viable choices.

I would posit that even DRMed biotech designed to turn every single piece of a civilization into mud once the license runs out would leave behind very detectable traces in the form of strange geological deposits and individual artifacts that survived against all odds.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> The last paragraph is an example.of innovation that can only be achieved with blockchain projects like Augur prediction markets and ettlements. Cool stuff

</comment><comment><USER40> Archaeologists have discovered a 7,000-year-old well built by Neolithic farmers in what is now the Czech Republic.

[https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ancient-well-oldest-wooden- stru...](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ancient-well-oldest-wooden-structure- ever-discovered-archaeologists-czech-republic/)

<comment><USER41> 7000 years is pretty modern, it's almost 3k years after agriculture started being adopted in multiple regions. There are older artifacts than that, intelligent humans have been on the planet for a long time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> I was perturbed by the offhand way he linked to a climate-change denialist website (as part of his assertion that "before 10k temperatures changed a lot more").

I don't think you get to call yourself a rationalist if you ignore the overwhelming scientific consensus in favor of a blog run by right-wingers.

</comment><comment><USER43> How does this kind of garbage reach the top of HN?

</comment><comment><USER44> It seems that dilettante intellectuals have rebranded themselves as "rationalists". Why is it that their blog posts are always high school book report level quality.</comment>


When the Internet Was Made of Sound (2019) - <AUTHOR> https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a29611456/internet-dialup-modem-sounds/ <comment><USER2> That's a beautiful visualization of something gone long ago.

<comment><USER3> Prints are available (at least they were). And her blog is definitely worth checking out.

[http://www.windytan.com/](http://www.windytan.com/)

(see tab 'infographics')</comment></comment>


Myths about /dev/urandom (2014) - <AUTHOR> https://www.2uo.de/myths-about-urandom/ <comment><USER3> 2018: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17779657](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17779657)

2017: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13332741](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13332741)

2015: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10149019](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10149019)

2014: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7359992](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7359992)

(Links for the curious. Reposts are ok after a year: [https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html))

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the advice! I will check the search first the next time. Also putting a the year if not recent.

<comment><USER3> Just to be clear, it's fine that you posted this! If checking search would have prevented you, that wouldn't be good. But you could always check search to find previous links to include for curiosity's sake (that's what I did), and to make sure that it hasn't had a significant discussion within the last year.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> > About 256 bits of entropy are enough to get computationally secure numbers > for a long, long time.

This isn't quite false, but it's deeply wrong; 256 bits is enough to produce 256-bit secure random numbers literally _forever_ \- the "long, long time" is precisely however long it takes a attacker to brute-force or otherwise recover a 256-bit RNG seed (aka private key).

> Look, I don't claim that injecting entropy is bad.

Note that injecting entropy less than 256 bits[0] at a time _is_ bad, in that it wastes the entropy. If a attacker knows your RNG state (either due to compromise or because you just booted), injecting 128 bits, generating (≥128 bits of) output, and injecting another 128 bits, only gets you 128-bit security. If you inject in smaller chunks, say 32 bits (generating ≥32 bits of output in between), you might as well not be adding entropy at all.

Note, apropos of the above, that /dev/urandom _must_ block during early boot (before X bits of entropy have been collected). If it doesn't, you have _no_ entropy, because a attacker can repeatedly brute force your (say) <32-bit RNG state based on /dev/urandom outputs.

0: or whatever security level you're aiming at

<comment><USER5> > If you inject in smaller chunks, say 32 bits, you might as well not be > adding entropy at all.

Depends on how quickly state bits leak. If the state only leaks 2 bits per minute, then adding 32 bits every minute is perfectly sufficient. That's why even though actual leakage rate is >0 bits for any real-world CSPRNG it can still be perfectly acceptable (and even desirable, depending on threat profile) to add entropy at a rate of 0 bits.

> /dev/urandom must block during early boot

Assuming CPU jitter is a source of entropy[1], you can harvest 256 bits in a fixed amount of time. So it depends on the definition of "block". Does waiting an extra 2 seconds to boot constitute blocking if boot time already takes 1-2 seconds? On Linux I regularly see heavily loaded systems hang random processes for _minutes_ just evicting VM pages (this is without swap, which is actually probably part of the problem), so I'm not sure what's so special about boot time in terms of how we define blocking operations. Faster is always better, of course.

[1] I'm dubious, but at least some kernel hackers think so. And Linus' personal opinions notwithstanding, he did add code that as a practical matter makes this assumption--because downstream users will never question it.

<comment><USER4> > Depends on how quickly state bits leak. If the state only leaks 2 bits per > minute

Fixed, but I'm assuming you're actually _using_ the RNG; if you only generate 2 bits of output per minute, you can get away with all kinds of dumb crap.

> So it depends on the definition of "block".

It's the same definition as any other (2)read syscall. Assuming a 32-byte read from /dev/random[0], it's equivalent to reading from a pipe with at least 32bytes buffered if the RNG is already initialized (read returns immediately); if the RNG is not initialized, its the same as reading from a empty pipe - <USER2> kernel switches to some other process after making a note to resume the calling process when some event happens ((2)write for a pipe, RNG initialization for /dev/random).

0: Or /dev/urandom, which should be literally the same character device, because there are never any legitimate reasons for them to differ.

<comment><USER5> > if you only generate 2 bits of output per minute, you can get away with all > kinds of dumb crap.

If outputting 2 bits leaks 2 bits of state, you're probably not using a cryptographically strong PRF.

<comment><USER6> You are misunderstanding the issue. If you only have two bits of entropy, than outputting two bits leaks the entire state, because two bits is brute forceable. This is true regardless of the quality of your RNG. The same is true of 32 bits, because 32 bits is also brute forceable. The reason to insert entropy in large chunks is so that an attacker cannot brute force the RNG state, between reseeds.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> (Author)

Keep in mind that Linux 5.6 is imminent, and I haven't found time to investigate it beyond some short reporting in LWN, let alone update the article.

But it's still my intention to do that, with some restructuring along the way.

The more changes Linux makes (for the better!) and the more time passes and later versions are in common use, the less the format "tell everyone how bad it is and then backpeddle with sections about every improvement made" works, and the less the title itself stays relevant.

I don't have a good answer for that structural problem, yet, so I'm kind of procrastinating.

<comment><USER8> It's really quite different. I got rid of all but the block-once-at-boot behavior of /dev/random.

If you know you are targeting a new kernel, using /dev/random is reasonable. Better yet: use getrandom()/getentropy().

<comment><USER9> On that note, would it kill the OpenBSD guys to get on the getrandom(2) train? I get it, they're dying on the "arc4random is better" hill (and, yes, I agree), but they're literally the last people in the way of making getrandom(2) the new default across not only the usual BSDs and illumos, but _also_ glibc/Linux.

<comment><USER10> Doesn't `getrandom(2)` use `RDRAND`? Should hardware RNGs on ME or PSP enabled CPUs be inherently be trusted - I mean don't the BSD folks recommend not enabling hyperthreading due to Spectre, etc.

<comment><USER11> > Doesn't `getrandom(2)` use `RDRAND`?

Not by itself, no.

> Should hardware RNGs on ME or PSP enabled CPUs be inherently be trusted?

Don't really have any choice. You can't defend against them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Title should be lowercase to match

</comment><comment><USER13> Shameless plug: I have a more modern explanation of all of that: [https://livebook.manning.com/book/real-world- cryptography/ch...](https://livebook.manning.com/book/real-world- cryptography/chapter-8/v-5/)

</comment><comment> awinter-py > And while appeal to authority is usually nothing to be proud of, in > cryptographic issues you're generally right to be careful and try to get the > opinion of a domain expert.

reminds me that cryptography is an area where subspecialty expertise has been in the professional consciousness forever

</comment><comment><USER14> Aside: did this get some new CSS? I recall reading it a while back and it looked quite different…

<comment><USER7> Yes, I'm playing around more than I should, but I'm changing things every now and then. At least I keep the URL stable. :-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> > _About 256 bits of entropy are enough to get computationally secure numbers > for a long, long time._

That's just word semantics that depends on how you define "computationally secure".

256 bits of entropy is good enough to get 1 random bit, 256 times. That's the hard fact.

For instance, 256 bits of entropy is not enough to generate more than one 256 bit key for a symmetric cipher. If you generate ten keys from it, you're allocating 25 bits of entropy to each one.</comment>


Can You Trust Cheap Chinese Phones with Your Privacy? - <AUTHOR> https://www.tomsguide.com/us/are-chinese-smartphones-safe,news-25624.html <comment><USER2> no</comment>


Gangnam Style Becomes World's Most Watched Video With 1 Billion Views in Sight - <AUTHOR> http://insidechannelmeter.wordpress.com/2012/11/23/gangnam-style-most-popular-youtube-video-in-history/

<comment><USER2> It's really refreshing to see something reach this kind of blockbuster status and not be from America, or Western Europe.

Not because I'm anti-American, but because this is the kind of experience non- Westerners must get everytime a Lady GaGa/Baywatch/Hollywood Movie dominates their cultural airwaves...whether or not they actually like it, they only still have a vague understanding of what the thing means, and its origins and backstory. It's nice being on the outside looking in...which is something you'd expect to happen more often given the demographic of the world.

<comment><USER3> It's refreshing. I'm not really sure if it's just a blip though. It seems like every few years there is this "Not US/West European" phenom that rises fast and disappears. Macarena anyone? 99 Red Balloons? There must be a couple more I'm missing?

EDIT: 99 Red Balloons is in fact Western Europe but was in German for more than a year (and widely successful) before being released in English. An oddity. Should have said "Non English" as more accurate than just Western Europe.

<comment><USER4> Macarena is a spanish song (<http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Del_Rio>) and 99 Red Ballons is german. How is this Not West European?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Do you guys have any favourite spin offs of Gagnam Style ?

The structure is always the same like taking some memorable moments of the video eg at the start the plane or the guy shaking his pelvis in the lift , then take some other stereotype or celebrities in it. So I actually wonder how many more views came from the parodies.

Last similar wave I remember was the "shit says " series maybe 6 months ago that had a similar formula.

here some examples:

Mitt Romney style

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTs_TKk5S2M> [http://www.collegehumor.com/video/6830834/mitt-romney- style-...](http://www.collegehumor.com/video/6830834/mitt-romney-style- gangnam-style-parody)

Eastern Europe Style [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zY1MVQeeStY&list=UUFjCy-D...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zY1MVQeeStY&list=UUFjCy- DI6cFNlNqMnihpDpg&index=1&feature=plcp)

Eton Style <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qaJl_qOVcf0>

<comment><USER6> Gangnam Style Orchestral + A Capella PSY <http://vimeo.com/48120211>

<comment><USER7> kind of makes you realize how bad the actual music with when it is played orchestrally.

<comment><USER8> It depends, it can also just be a crappy adaptation. I personally like this piano version: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jd-h0debytI&list=UUl3iv3e...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jd-h0debytI&list=UUl3iv3eEOtZ0l5nb_jHKYwg&index=1&feature=plcp)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> My 66yo father, who once asked incredulously, "who is this 'Lady Goo Goo'?" recently told me how he got the airline to bump him to 1st class for free. He then wryly remarked "Oppa Gangnam style".

That, right there, is what I call global penetration.

<comment><USER10> > recently told me how he got the airline to bump him to 1st class for free.

Not sure what you mean? Can you please elaborate? How is the Gangnam Style video related to your father getting to fly 1st class?

<comment><USER11> The point is that even his father who is not familiar with Lady Gaga, another famous pop icon, is familiar with Psy and comfortable using the meme created by his song.

His father interpreted his free upgrade as "Gangnam style".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Except here in Germany, where the local fuckwads at the GEMA [1] made Youtube block the video because "they hadn't granted the necessary rights". For a fucking copyright-waived video. Argh.

And people actually wonder why more and more (German) people have absolutely no qualms about piracy. I'm actually not sure whether or not I should thank the GEMA for that.

[1]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gesellschaft_f%C3%BCr_musikali...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gesellschaft_f%C3%BCr_musikalische_Auff%C3%BChrungs- _und_mechanische_Vervielf%C3%A4ltigungsrechte)

<comment><USER13> Ah, the old "viewable everywhere in the world except Germany" YouTube music video problem.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Funny how proportions are lost. They're assuming the billion views yet they're still 200 million views away. There was a time not so long ago, when Avril Lavigne and the Evolution of Dance battled themselves out fiercely to reach 200 million views. Clickbots, fanclubs and all.

<comment><USER15> Presumably youtube's userbase has grown since then. Also Psy's song likely has more international appeal than either of those.

<comment><USER14> Youtube's user base or the general internet's user base? It might also have to do with an increase in the general internet population of third world countries where this song got its initial traction.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> What does 1Bn views equate to in real money if you have the normal amount of youtube advertising? I know this may vary depending on the audience but I'd love a ballpark if someone has any idea. I was under the impression 1m views = ~$3300 but I could be mistaken.

<comment><USER17> $1 CPM is what pretty much everyone can get, $3CPM and beyond are possible but generally reserved for people that are members of well managed Youtube networks. Gangnam style is probably a unique case in that it's a single video that advertisers will want to associate with, so I wouldn't be surprised if it's making $5 CPM ($5k/1m views) -- $5CPM average, probably peaking at 10 - 15.

<comment><USER16> If I am not mistaken the 'M' in CPM stands for 1000 not 1m. the M is a roman numeral for 1000. That would also be more on par with what I am seeing other youtubers get (see AdamGibbins's link).

<comment><USER17> I meant $1 per 1,000 views. My calculation of $5,000 for 1,000,000 views was meant as an extension of the calculations for those that wanted to work out the total.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> The "World's Most Watched Video" may be an exaggeration -- am I to believe that Gangnam Style has been watched more times than the Zapruder film or the moon landing footage?

<comment><USER19> Is it really hard to believe? I personally have seen Gangnam Style more often than the zapruder shots or the moon landing. Heck, i've seen the clip "Aaliyah - are you that somebody" more often. This is not about the number of unique viewers but rather total views. Gangnam Style is easily the most viewed videoclip ever. Overall i think it can only be outclassed by long running commercials and tv show intro's.

<comment><USER20> It's absolutely impossible to believe. In the 1960s, the Apollo 11 moon landing had about 500 million views. The suggestion that in the four decades since it has not gained at least 300 million more is...well, impossible to believe. "An estimated 500 million people worldwide watched this event, the largest television audience for a live broadcast at that time."

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

<comment><USER21> Also: the recent olympics opening ceremonies are good candidates.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I still wonder why "Yatta, Yatta!" from Happatai did not become equally famous :)

[http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=happatai+-+yatta...](http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=happatai+-+yatta&gs_l=youtube)

<comment><USER23> Well, the song isn't as good.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> If you haven't seen it :) Gangnam Style:

with a bear <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1B1J73Ag3hU>

Nelly Furtado <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehs-vZ1uF-k>

Metal/rock cover <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czJAGGoaYtw>

</comment><comment><USER24> It reached 1 Billion views without any support from the 4th largest market for music[1].

Germany has a market share of 7–8% for albums and 9–12% for singles. In 2005 market value was 887.7 million USD. And yet no one in Germany has ever watched Gangnam Style on Youtube.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_industry>

<comment><USER25> > _In 2005 market value was USD 887.7._

Are you missing "million" or "billion"?

<comment><USER24> It's million. Fixed it, thanks a lot.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> All this and it's not counting places like China which has it's own youtube like service. And my understanding is that countries like Germany, with overly aggressive IP laws blocks the music from the video so it doesn't get nearly as many views. (it'd be great if somebody could confirm)

<comment><USER27> @slowpoke did that: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4826022>

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> There is a site collecting all the Gangnam Style parody videos

<http://GangnamStyleNews.com>

</comment><comment><USER29> really? more than Justin Bieber's baby?

</comment><comment><USER30> I'm proud to be in the NEVER WATCHED THIS CRAPOLA category, evidently not important enough to be counted.

<comment><USER31> Gangnam Style is a poignant example of a world-wide entertainment trend that wasn't started in America. Most of the world doesn't even know what the lyrics mean, but that didn't keep it from sweeping the globe. It did so without advertising or great expense, using Internet platforms like Youtube to get reach.

I've seen Gangnam Style covered in places like the New Yorker, the Economist, and the Wall Street Journal. These are places that don't generally spend time discussing pop music, but that also felt Gangnam was worth consideration.

Musical tastes vary, and nothing says you have to like it. But PSY's hit seems to be indicative of a global increase in cosmopolitanism, and that's a trend that affects many entrepreneurs and investors.

<comment><USER32> Note aside, the singer seems to be a wise, generous and simple person with a sense of distance. I was greatly surprised and pleased to see him in interviews. Doubly refreshing.

<comment><USER27> Very nice to hear that one. Most stories about people involved in media, music and entertainment seem to highlight that they don't have any those obviously redeeming qualities

<comment><USER32> Many of celebrities are product of the system (teen idols, etc), iirc PSY was an struggling odd pop singer with his own take on things I guess, which makes the whole phenomenon even funnier.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


A 14,000-year-old campsite in Argentina - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/09/14000-year-old-campsite-in-argentina-adds-to-an-archaeological-mystery/ <comment><USER2> _For more than a decade, evidence has been piling up that humans colonized the Americas thousands of years before the Clovis people._

It's actually been longer than that. The site at Monte Verde [1] in Chile seems to have been widely accepted as a pre-Clovis site nearly 20 years ago (1997 according to Wikipedia [2]). Awareness of the site, at least among the archaeological community predates that (1989 [3]). The first radiocarbon dates indicating a pre-Clovis origin for the site go back to 1982[4].

The idea that Clovis was not the earliest culture in the Americas, and the commensurate theory that the earliest colonists must have been traveling by boat [5] goes back decades. I know I've been reading about it (in the popular press no less) since the 1990s. It seems like every article I read about it makes it seem like some new and revolutionary idea. The only conclusion I can draw is that archaeological science operates on time scales only slightly shorter than those the archaeologists study.

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

[2] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Verde#Acceptance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Verde#Acceptance)

[3] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Verde#Diffusion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Verde#Diffusion)

[4] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Verde#Discovery](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Verde#Discovery) (third paragraph)

[5] I'd like to give you a citation for this, but this theory, as far as I can tell has no official name.

</comment><comment><USER3> Adds up very well with almost contemporary evidence from Monte Verde in Chile [http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal....](http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0141923) so "mystery" is a non sequitur. But that's the headline.

The original research paper is worth a read (open access FTW).

<comment><USER4> Yeah, I came here to say the same thing. I think the use of "mystery" in the headline was clickbait.

<comment><USER5> Ok, we took that out of the title above.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> When I was at university (UBC) "pre-Clovis" was an almost forbidden word in some classes. I saw a very heated debate in a geology class discussing land bridges. Many First Nations students took issue with any suggestion that their nations, their cultures, were not "first". Why that matters I don't know (politics) but they were adamant supporters of the Clovis First hypothesis. It has taken many years to etch away at the underlying land bridge assumptions and properly credit the resourcefulness of ancient peoples.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clovis_culture#Clovis_First_.2...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clovis_culture#Clovis_First_.2F_Single_origin_hypothesis)

<comment><USER7> >Why that matters I don't know (politics) but they were adamant supporters of the Clovis First hypothesis.

I imagine that it's less about "being first," and more about not wanting a history of hideous exploitation to be washed out under the excuse of _you weren 't first_.

I try to imagine what it must be like to only have had my family's history recognised in _any_ meaningful way in very modern times - and then to have people tell me "no no no, actually that's all changed, _this_ is your narrative now."

Rightly or wrongly, I think I'd be on the defensive as well.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> > The Clovis, who are _the_ early ancestors of today's Native Americans,

Emphasis added. One badly chosen word in an otherwise decent article. What we know of pre-Clovis people clearly supports the idea of them also being 'early ancestors to today's Native Americans.'</comment>


Ask HN: My hours have been cut to 15h/wk. What to do with spare time with Corona - <AUTHOR> The cut was offered by my company as a way to scale down during the pandemic without cutting jobs and I took it. No big deal, it's still enough money and that's not the topic I want to discuss in this thread.
I'm getting seriously bored, but I can't come up with anything interesting to do with the spare time.
It would normally not be an issue: I'd play the console, go for a bike ride, read a book... But for some reason none of that is appealing right now.
How to deal with the extra time without going nuts while the pandemic is going on? How do you cope if you've been laid off or just hold a regular full time job where there is only 2-4h worth of work per day? <comment><USER2> I was in a similar situation before 2008. The reason was not cut in hours. It was a new job and there was not enough work and I was paid in full. Over an entire week I had only 6-10 hours of work, and in the prior job I was doing 12-14 hours daily.

First thing is to allow yourself to be bored for a while. Decide not to do anything till a fixed date. Ideas will pop up and just write those down (on paper) as they do. Limit your time on internet for 1-2 hours a day. Sleep more and exercise a bit (do not strain). Within a week you should see your mood improved and will have fresh ideas.

For me the low-workload period was long (approx 1.5 years). I learnt music, stock-trading and some new recipes for cooking.

</comment><comment><USER3> besides my WFH full-time as technical manager, I'm planning to complete the certificate course for Google Cloud Architect</comment>


Challenges in Distributed Systems (Andy Gross, Basho) - <AUTHOR> http://www.infoq.com/presentations/distributed-systems-challenges

<comment><USER2> I agree with the speaker -- Andy Gross, Principal Architect at Basho, makers of Riak. As he explains in this talk, we're building ever more applications in and for distributed computing environments, but we lack _well-documented, standardized, reliable, OS-level tools_ for:

* managing consensus among many nodes (as he says, "where is my libPaxos?");

* testing distributed code (for example, to see how the system behaves under unusual/unexpected loads or scheduling scenarios); and

* devops (for example, monitoring and managing throughput across all nodes to avoid 'TCP incast'-type problems).

<comment><USER3> I agree with Andy that having a pluggable consensus service in the operating system would be an interesting avenue for reducing complexity for application developers.

However I am much more familiar with those algorithms than I am at kernel development. The benefits are clear but I'm not positive that this is a good idea. It might be best if they were implement as user-land services for now until there is a better idea of how these things should work.

The problem with Paxos for example is that it is actually a handful of protocols such as Synod. The reason for its complexity is that it tries to present a total-order for all messages to all replicas despite operating in an environment where the network cannot guarantee the order of messages to all nodes and processes can come and go. It works well but the implementation to make it happen is difficult to describe.

Conversely there are algorithms derived from a model of eventual-consistency where assumptions about the order of network delivery are not made and restrictions are instead placed on the programs (as far as I've seen). As long as you write your state transition functions with certain identities and use appropriate data structures to represent your state you can guarantee a partial ordering for messages and an eventually-consistent state (the only assumption is that all messages are delivered to the replica at some point).

(Interestingly I've seen a bit of research into tuning the bounds of _when_ things will be consistent in eventually-consistent systems).

The reason I think that building these services into the kernel could be a bad idea is that they are still not battle-hardened and they are not well understood yet. I am not a kernel developer but I imagine it would be rather difficult to design and support a "consistent" API that would allow users to plug in their desired algorithm. Thoughts?

<comment><USER4> > As long as you write your state transition functions with certain identities > and use appropriate data structures to represent your state you can > guarantee a partial ordering for messages and an eventually-consistent state > (the only assumption is that all messages are delivered to the replica at > some point).

CRDTs are one such approach. Commutativity solves the problem of ordering in a very different way, and turns the consensus problem into a "set membership" rather than a "membership and order" problem. CRDTs have some really nice properties, and are a very active area of research.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> _It 's what I call "Hacker News Driven Development": When faced with a distributed systems problem, the temptation is to pile more immature code on top of it._

</comment><comment><USER6> Text version? Or at least the slides?

Infoq wants me to login to access the slides. :(

<comment><USER7> You can download Infoq presentations with youtube-dl [1] and rtmpdump [2].

1\. [http://rg3.github.io/youtube-dl/](http://rg3.github.io/youtube-dl/)

2\. [http://rtmpdump.mplayerhq.hu/](http://rtmpdump.mplayerhq.hu/)</comment></comment>


How to Lose 23 Lbs in 28 days (hint: it requires radical system-hacking) - <AUTHOR> http://hackthesystem.com/blog/how-to-lose-23-lbs-in-28-days-hint-it-requires-radical-system-hacking/

<comment><USER2> I agree with the premise behind his methods, specifically the 'recreate your identity' part, although I do tend to implement them somewhat differently.

I rely less on external pressure and more on my internal disdain for half- assedness and failure.

</comment><comment><USER3> Those pictures do no look like he lost _23 lbs_.

Also how is this advice useful? Lose weight by starving yourself? This sounds a lot more like some of the free self - help advice that goes around...

</comment><comment><USER4> I prefer the way to do a lot of sports (ie: cycling running) and eating well and losing fat by the long time. If i was doing the same as him it would take me less than 28 days to get back those 23 lbs..

</comment><comment><USER5> Why is this on HN? The "after" picture looks as if the guy had just pulled in his belly, to be honest, and calling a diet "radical system-hacking" is quite a stretch, isn't it?

<comment><USER6> Did you not read the entire article? Its about engraining new habits through radical system change.</comment></comment>


How to build and deploy a simple Facebook Messenger bot with Python and Flask - <AUTHOR> http://tsaprailis.com/2016/06/02/How-to-build-and-deploy-a-Facebook-Messenger-bot-with-Python-and-Flask-a-tutorial/ <comment><USER2> If you have something built in Flask that you want to run on your own VPS rather than Heroku or another IaaS, it's incredibly easy using gunicorn or uwsgi with nginx. gunicorn is a bit faster and easier to get started with out of the two.

Here's super rough instructions in a gist, and you can find plenty of great guides on Google of course: [https://gist.github.com/mcescalante/5db616b9a826605f1df35f79...](https://gist.github.com/mcescalante/5db616b9a826605f1df35f79b09cf6f6)

<comment><USER3> I've been using nginx for reverse proxying mostly, but what's the purpose of using something like gunicorn or uwsgi over using just bare Flask? I'm not very familiar with best practices in the area. Is the goal to filter requests for performance or something else?

<comment><USER2> The server config in the gist is definitely just a proxy, forwarding all of the requests through to gunicorn. Many people add more to the configuration block, to do something like serve static assets with nginx rather than their Flask application.

From the top paragraph of [http://flask.pocoo.org/docs/0.11/deploying/](http://flask.pocoo.org/docs/0.11/deploying/):

"While lightweight and easy to use, Flask's built-in server is not suitable for production as it doesn't scale well and by default serves only one request at a time. Some of the options available for properly running Flask in production are documented here."

In short, the Flask server is not really written or tuned for production, so we use gunicorn or wsgi which are WSGI containers that are production ready :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> So I can deploy a Facebook Messenger bot on commodity hardware and services; yet I cannot run Facebook Messenger on my mobile browser or write a compatible Messenger app for iOS or Android?

<comment><USER5> I was just thinking about this. I have to wonder if it's possible to create/run a personal matrix integration server.

Edit: which if course wouldnlet you use any compatible chat app, including Vector.

<comment><USER6> Surely someone's done this, but I can't find any examples

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I started using AWS API Gateway + Lambda for these type of problems where I don't actually need a 24/7 running server.

Bots / webhook listeners do really fit for API Gateway + Lambda use cases.

<comment><USER8> Are you using Javascript for that? I thought the API needed to have a server that's always running so the chats can be instant, but is it possible to do that with Lambda?

I'm currently using Modulus and I think it will get pretty expensive if I keep making more bots, so a cheaper way to do it would be nice!

Edit: Found a tutorial: [https://medium.com/@igorkhomenko/run-facebook- messenger-chat...](https://medium.com/@igorkhomenko/run-facebook-messenger- chat-bot-on-aws-lambda-2fa800a67d76#.4v5va9iaz)

<comment><USER9> Lambda functions initialize in <10ms when warm, <100ms otherwise, in my experience. They seem to stay warm for 15 minutes or so after a cold start.

The excellent Serverless framework is pure JS, but you can also deploy jars to Lambda, which lets you use any JVM language. Clojure Lambdas have a more extreme profile: ~500ms for a cold start, <1ms once warm. You could keep it warm with a timer event source, which could do double duty as a watchdog / heartbeat thing.</comment></comment></comment>


Trailer for Ashton Kutcher's Steve Jobs Film Hits the Web - <AUTHOR> http://mashable.com/2013/06/21/steve-jobs-film-trailer/ <comment><USER2> Given how prominently Woz features as well in the trailer the tagline "one man..." comes off just inaccurate.

</comment><comment><USER3> Looks bad.</comment>


Ask HN: What is your favorite thought experiment? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Not so much a thought experiment - but trying to grasp the Library of Babel.

Somewhere on the pages is your entire life story, already written. Waiting to be discovered. The story of your birth, every variation of death. Every success. Every failure.

Just a meaningless collection of words waiting to be discovered, only given meaning once found.

[https://libraryofbabel.info/](https://libraryofbabel.info/)

Even my post already existed: [https://libraryofbabel.info/bookmark.cgi?vdayie_ifpawv163](https://libraryofbabel.info/bookmark.cgi?vdayie_ifpawv163)

<comment><USER3> What is that?

<comment><USER4> [http://flavorwire.com/515783/brooklyn-author-recreates- borge...](http://flavorwire.com/515783/brooklyn-author-recreates-borges- library-of-babel-as-infinite-website)

[http://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2015/07/23/the-library- of...](http://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2015/07/23/the-library-of-babel-as- seen-from-within/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Personally, I think Newcomb's Paradox is really interesting: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newcomb%27s_paradox](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newcomb%27s_paradox)

<comment><USER3> That's only called a paradox becasue some people refuse to accept the obvious solution.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Einstein's thought experiment on simultaneity illustrated with a train (simultaneous, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Traincar_Relativity1.svg](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Traincar_Relativity1.svg)), (not simultaneous, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Traincar_Relativity2.svg](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Traincar_Relativity2.svg))

</comment><comment><USER6> This is meditative and not scientific, but still a thought experiment: To consider, who am I between two thoughts?

</comment><comment><USER7> What is the one thing that could reverse an entrenched system, and how could you build a prototype in the least amount of time. Preferably, something people think is too much work, while it actually takes two days.

</comment><comment><USER8> Imagine Pinocchio at rest.

Suddenly, Pinocchio says "My nose is growing!"

What happens next?

<comment><USER9> > Imagine Pinocchio at rest. Not sure why, but pictured a spherical Pinocchio > in a vacuum :P

<comment><USER10> Like the inside of a whale?</comment></comment></comment>