Sam Altman and Y Combinator Bullying Accusations - <AUTHOR> https://pando.com/2017/07/03/sam-alt-man/ <comment><USER2> So some 3rd rate blog got banned from attending YC demo days and now they want to try and weave this into the currently-hot narrative regarding harassment against women? This strikes me as just a lame attempt at news-jacking.

<comment><USER3> This happens all the time. Twitter-dramatic people rachet up their Karpman Drama Triangle histrionics against celebrities to try to get something juicy to up their social media currency. Sama deals with this every day.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > _Unfortunately, whilst all this was playing out, at least one Valley bro > apparently decided that a little bit too much progress was being made. That > at least one woman too many was speaking out._

So the article opens with the implication that Altman is just another 'bro' complicit in sexually harassing women.

It then hammers on the Bilderberg part like it was somehow relevant.

Furthermore it proceeds to make a tortured comparison between Altman and Trump, even going so far as to call him "some kind of Alt Right Roger Rabbit". Presumably this is because their readership is so sophisticated as to otherwise not understand such alleged impropriety unless framed in context of Trump.

Never mind the fact that Altman is openly gay and harbors a fervent dislike of Trump. But hey—when your job involves passing off third-rate trash as journalism, then I suppose lying by omission to suit an agenda is simply par for the course.

> _Which brings me to the moral of the story, where my outrage at seeing Sarah > and Pando smeared by a unremitting scumbag like Sam Altman butts against my > own guilt at being part of the social group – well-off white dudes in > Silicon Valley – who are almost exclusively responsible for all of the shit > we've witnessed /read about these past few days._

Ah yes, the moral of the story. This roughly translates as: _" My boss is in a spat with this guy, and I like my paycheck, so I'm going to call him nasty names and state that I feel guilty about being born with the same skin color as him. Then, I'm going to blame other people with the same skin color as me for the world's ills so I can feel better about myself."_

<comment><USER5> "Never mind the fact that Altman is openly gay and harbors a fervent dislike of Trump. But hey—when your job involves passing off third-rate trash as journalism, then I suppose lying by omission to suit an agenda is simply par for the course."

Sure, but he did the same thing Trump has been doing for the past year. That's what the comparison is.

<comment><USER4> More like Pando is saying he did. For all we know there's more nuance somewhere that they're omitting. It's easy to cherry-pick the most flattering aspects of a Twitter feud and present it as a complete accounting of events.

Regardless, I still fail to see why they felt the need to make the comparison. It just struck me as a cheap way to vilify him with their readers.

If Altman did what they said he did, then of course that's bad. However, I can't help but notice he isn't the one penning hate-filled screeds here.

<comment><USER5> All the tweets are out there to read. And that whole, "I've got an investigation going, but I'm not going to actually say what it revealed" thing is DIRECTLY out of Trump's playbook. Like, that's exactly what he did with Comey.

And yeah, if he's being a douche, and worse yet a Trumpian douche, I see no reason not to call him out on it.

Also, he penned hate-filled screeds during that Twitter exchange.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It's hardly worth even commenting on this, except to say that it's dishonest to conflate how the tech industry treats women with how YC treats journalists who write bad stuff about them. Every organization does its best to control how people perceive it, for better or for worse. There are real problems for women in tech; Pando getting on YC's bad side is hardly one of them.

<comment><USER7> The article makes the point that the founder of the site was a woman and tries to show the parallel between systemic harassment of women in VC-backed companies, and the isolated harassment of Sarah's site by Sam.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> everyone in tech knows what pando is. but this needs to be unflagged so that stories of conspiracies and hiding the truth won't pop up. put it back and let it die on its own.

<comment><USER9> If only half of the story is true, it's still mind blowing what's going on. Very unfortunately that PG isn't involved anymore.

That Sam has doubts about Adam Penenberg integrity speaks volumes for itself - Stephen Glass fraud investigator fame - there is even a movie about the case. No wonder the HN got flagged, uneasy story, it's the user.

<comment><USER10> > _No wonder the HN got flagged, uneasy story, it 's the user._

I don't understand this sentence, but no one at YC or HN has touched the submission. "[flagged]" means lots of users flagged it.

<comment><USER11> Suggestion:

/s/flagged/flagged by users/g

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Whats up with the name calling and body shaming?

</comment><comment><USER13> Honestly, this reads doesn't read like a piece of "journalism"... It's closer to a Facebook rant.

Clearly, Pando staff don't like Sam Altman, and I think this whole article is pretty unprofessional.

> How is this the culture that we built? How did we end up creating an > industry in which lying pipsqueaks like Sam Altman are heralded as "thought > leaders" and "visionaries"?

I don't know if Sam Altman is a visionary, or thought leader. I do know that in this case, he kept it way more professional, and the evidence Pando (or Sam for that matter) bring to the table adds nothing to the conversation.

> What the Sam Altmans care about is that three years ago a website run by a > woman wrote a mean thing about one of their portfolio companies. In the > Sams' world, there must be consequences for that kind of insubordination. > She must be brought to heel.

To be blunt, none of this on Sam's part seems sexist (at least I don't see it). Perhaps I missed something, but this seems to be using the "women in tech have wronged" craze to rationalize some way the Pando staff feel wronged. I grant you, many women (and probably a whole lot of others, minorities, non- citizens, etc.) have been wronged, but this... this just detracts from the discussion. Pando, the New York Times, or anyone can't just attack people for being in the positions they are in. I can't blame Altman for being in his position, he's there, all we can do at this point is try to work together to improve the situation. To do that, petty stuff like this needs to stop.

Occasionally, I'm sure we will need to remove people causing problems, like a CEO who enables sexual harassment, or a board member who says inappropriate things. Hopefully, this wont happen too often, as I refuse to believe the vast majority aren't decent human beings.

That being said, in this case, it seems like Pando is the problem -_-

<comment><USER14> Not to take this on a tangent but wait till female interns at VC firms decide to speak up. They put up with abnormal requests for attending parties at abnormal hours.

<comment><USER13> To be fair, I too am invited to parties at abnormal hours, or out to bars (and I don't drink), or to the water parks, etc.

I think it's important we keep things in perspective and review every case as a unique occurrence (or every person at least). There's a danger in generalizing.

There is obvious sexism (perhaps a ton of it), but I also think it's not really helpful to just assume certain requests are sexist. Especially, in the example you just gave, where female interns "abnormal requests for attending parties at abnormal hours". I'm sure it happens all the time, there may even be a small sexual component (just like every other industry), however it may be just as sexist not to invite them...

Unless it impacts their career, or in some disenfranchises them, I really don't see it as an issue. I can tell you that I turn down literally every event outside of work that isn't 9am - 5pm. It may impact my career (although I don' think so), I think people just feel pressured about it.

I can't tell you how pressured I felt turning down our teams offsite to a ski resort. I turned it down because it wasn't in my job description, but also because of the following:

(a) I like to spend time with my family

(b) I don't like skiing

(c) All the women had their own rooms, while the guys had to share

(d) I have a fulfilling life outside of work

The reason I bring that up, is a lot of people may look at that situation as sexist. It actually did disenfranchise me to not go. Literally, I was told "it's required, you have to go", I still said no.

Personally, I view it as a difference in lifestyles and expectations. I'm not offended that they made me feel uncomfortable with the offer (idk if I should, maybe...), I however am upset that I lost something out of it.

I think that's what we need to fix, fix the expectation that work leaves the office. It's fairly easy to not make people feel uncomfortable if the expectation that 9am - 5pm it's a "safe space", anything that happens there you put your work hat on and work appropriately. Then when the shift ends, your free to put your fun hat on. Don't mix the two, and you'll have a hell of a lot less problems.

Even with your example, that wouldn't occur.

<comment><USER15> I feel for you, I do. I feel the same way about extracurricular events.

But, I think what you're missing is that gender discrimination isn't black and white. It's a matter of percentages. Let's say bagging out on weekend ski trips impacts 30% of men, and 42% of women, because women bear more responsibility for child care tasks, or because they are wary of spending a beer-fueled weekend snowed in with their male co-workers. Now multiply that by a dozen other independent circumstances where women are disadvantaged, even by a percent or two, and you quickly end up with an immense headwind.

Again, that's not to say that you aren't impacted too. But in all likelihood, you come out ahead or even on some of the other dozen issues.

<comment><USER16> If you suffer because of life choices like spending time with your children or not liking binge beer drinking, that may be unfortunate but is not "sexism". Even if it happens that women tend to make different choices.

It's like if you have a policy of only hiring people with CS degrees. That's not sexist, just because most CS graduates are men.

You can't hold the company responsible for the fact that women on average choose to spend more time with their family and are less inclined to stuy certain subjects. Unless you discriminate against them BECAUSE they are women, it's not sexism.

<comment><USER15> Yes and no. Requiring a computer science degree is a fairly reasonable restriction to place on hiring, since it (at least on its face) correlates strongly with qualification for the job. However, requiring all your employees to go on a bro's ski weekend trip, or serving your free dinner at 8 PM every day when none of the women with families can stay for dinner, may have a disparate impact on employees without any correlation to their work performance.

To turn up the contrast and make a semi-absurd argument, one could say, "We don't discriminate on the basis of religion, but we ask all applicants to recite the Lord's Prayer from memory in their interview. Strangely, we never seem to hire any Hindu or Muslim applicants." OK, that's absurd, but what if you only recruit at universities that have extremely low female:male graduation ratios in their CS programs, when there are other programs with better balance? That's certainly not discriminatory on its face, but it has the same result as if you had discriminated overtly.

Sexism may not be the right word (and I didn't use that word), but I do think it's important to look at the results of your policies and environment in totality to determine if you are treating women equitably. This is certainly the standard that the courts use for evaluating things like voting regulations -- look at the recent rulings on North Carolina's voting laws: actions like curtailing the number of weekend voting days that do not mention race at all are clearly crafted to reduce participation by black voters.

<comment><USER16> It might not make business sense but surely that should be up to the owners of the company. If they really like ski trips why not?

Is your suggestion to ban decisions that have disparate impact in terms of race or gender?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> This article is literally nothing except pando whining about being banned from ycombinator events.

<comment><USER18> There is certainly hyperbole in the article but there is also a good point.

Why is Sam dropping smears? If he really thought there might be something worth "investigating" he would keep quiet and investigate. It's a total dick power move (and transparent bullshit) designed to undercut someone you don't like by spreading innuendo and veiled accusations without actually making the accusation.

The adult thing to do is say "oops, sorry. donation to charity made" and move on with your life. That's a good deed no matter how you slice it plus good PR in general. There is no win to be had here because Sam is punching down.

I'm honestly disappointed. The faux-apology just makes it worse. Much respect to you Sam, but this is childish behavior. We know it, you know it.

(I say this knowing I've doubled-down and done stuff like this in the past and regretted it every time)

<comment><USER19> Sama could have ended the drama nice and quiet but he decides to play along.

Pando editors are definitely unprofessional here. If they care about their integrity, I think they should apologize for raging a bit too much.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> >>> "We didn't tolerate it from the most valuable private company in Silicon Valley history and we sure as aren't going to take it from the substitute teacher of Paul Graham's bro creche."

Touche. I disagree, but touche nonetheless!

</comment><comment><USER19> I follow Pando and this feels like an awfully written piece looking to just pin a blame.

I hope by just throwing sexual harassment claims Without serious facts they don't ruin trust and credibility.

</comment><comment><USER16> There is no indication, even if you believe this post, that Altman did anything because of "sexism". At most he's generally vengeful. In fact the only sexism (and racism) in this story comes from Pando.

</comment><comment><USER21> Not sure this has anything to do with gender or race. Sounds like a disagreement on facts of a story. Seems like stirring controversy to takeover an important conversation and get clicks. Kind of like Fox News or CNN.

</comment><comment><USER22> I don't think it was sexist. It's just standard power based behavior. Isn't specific to tech. Have seen that sort of behavior from people in power of all genders and ethnicities in the Valley for as long as I've been in the industry.

Examples: \- It doesn't matter what's in the contract. I have a lot more money than you and can sue you to oblivion. \- Tell me what to say to his boss when the boss asks me a question. \- If you have two people and one has more seniority and the other is better, who do you give the better assignment to? The one with seniority. That's why I'm leaving.

<comment><USER23> I completely agree, but (sort of incidentally) I do wish that there was some recognition that the "tech industry" is not one specific group of people. Even at the most basic level, there are the hackers, and then there are the MBAs that flocked in when the money started flowing. Two completely disparate subcultures that are lumped in together under one banner, and not only lumped together that way by outsiders, but by "the tech industry" itself.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Not much spice in this gravy. Could not understand the story despite reading it twice. Pando is just trying to make hay while the sun shines, or as we say in India, "Behti ganga mein hath dhona".

</comment><comment><USER25> > ..."white dudes"... ..."white bros"...

Why the fck could we not leave the race out of it? Nobody would dare to speak about race unless they are white - in which case it is used as a slur?

<comment><USER19> I thought the same. What it sama was an African female. Would you use the same words?

That's fucked up.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> They're conflating two different things. Criticism is fine and should be encouraged. Hysterical ranty responses with false claims is an enormous problem.

This phenomenon that we can't criticize actions without being falsely accused of being an "x hater" is dangerous. What Pando has done is dishonest.

</comment><comment><USER27> Funny how perception works. I perceive Sam Altman to be a borderline far leftist. I guess it makes sense that those to the far left of him would see things differently.

<comment> vertex-four Sam Altman is as liberal as liberals get. Not a leftist by any means.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> While I agree this article is pretty bad, why is it disappearing from the front page so fast? It's being upvoted pretty quickly. @dang is adamant that they don't punish articles that are negative towards Y Combinator, and I don't see it as flagged yet, so I'm curious.

<comment><USER29> I see it as flagged, at least currently.

<comment><USER28> It is now. The difference a minute makes :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Can someone explain to me why this was flagged?

<comment><USER8> because its a boring political story that has no technical relevance.

<comment><USER18> There's also optics. Flagging the story just feeds the narrative that YC is "hiding" something regardless of the truth.

When you see a PR train coming down the tracks... get out of the way. You can stand there and yell at it all you like but it won't matter. When you get to a certain point in life (high office, large influence, and/or lots of money) there is nowhere to punch but down. That means you have to stop throwing punches or you have to accept the hate. Those are your two options. On the plus side you're still really rich and/or powerful so it isn't exactly a bad deal.

<comment><USER10> Agreed in general, and we make a careful point of moderating HN less, not more, when an article is critical of YC or YC startups, although 'less' doesn't mean 'zero' (one learns about loopholes the hard way when running a web forum). But it's a moot point in this case; HN users have flagged the story overwhelmingly and the comments make it clear why. Since the community response is so clear, I think it's probably sufficient for us to simply explain that moderators haven't intervened in any way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> [https://youtu.be/E5ONTXHS2mM?t=38s](https://youtu.be/E5ONTXHS2mM?t=38s) pando pando pando pando pando</comment>


Why I moved my Quora answers to the (open) Web - <AUTHOR> http://www.quora.com/Keith-Winstein/Posts/Why-I-moved-my-good-answers-to-the-open-Web

<comment><USER2> One of the things I rather like about StackOverflow is that any content submitted to the site is under CC-BY-SA, the same license as Wikipedia etc. Quora building a platform for knowledge-sharing and then locking down the content is questionably good for Quora, and not good for anyone else.</comment>


Stanford University Free Class: Design and Analysis of Algorithms I - <AUTHOR> http://www.algo-class.org/

<comment><USER2> I'm stunned... I've already signed up for ML, was thinking crypto, and now this? Some people dream of winning the lottery, I would be happy for a 6 month sabbatical from my full time job to immerse myself in these classes. I've currently taking the AI class and a enjoy it immensely. I feel the my 'bag of programming tools' has grown exponentially with all the stuff I'm learning.

<comment><USER3> I'm taking ML now and it's pretty darned good.

<comment><USER4> ML class is good, but I'm bit disappointed regarding programming assignments - it is just a translation of the given math formulas to the Octave/MATLAB syntax.

<comment> brown9-2 I agree with your description but I'm not sure if I'd call it disappointing. However I think it'd be really exciting if the class offered some sort of final project where you had to use the algorithms on some new domain of your own choosing (although of course you don't need a class to do this on your own).

<comment><USER4> Exactly, regarding final project or similar, where students could demonstrate some creativity and come up with original solutions. Actually, I put more emphasis in "bit" word, before "disappointed".

But otherwise, it is really a great course - such an amount of practical information in such a short time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The ideal situation is that other Universities get into the game, so we can pick and choose courses from specific professors - one course from MIT and another from Stanford and so on.

Another thing I'd like to see is this idea expanding beyond CS to, say, Math and Physics. Within CS it would be great to see courses on Compilers, Operating Systems and so on. Yes I am greedy :p (and the courses are addictive!)

<comment><USER6> Why stop there? I hope we'll get an online version of every university course out there!

<comment><USER7> I think this might actually favor consolidation. With physical classrooms, you need hundreds of universities, but once a few universities are teaching an online Algorithms course in which thousands of people can enroll, it may be hard for additional universities, especially those with less exalted brand names than Stanford, to attract interest/students.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm a Stanford student, and I can tell you that Roughgarden is one of the best lecturers at Stanford. If you're thinking about taking a class, I would highly recommend this one. Plus, the material is awesome.

<comment><USER9> Which Stanford course does this correspond to?

<comment><USER5> looks like CS 161 [https://courseware.stanford.edu/pg/courses/214383/cs-161-fal...](https://courseware.stanford.edu/pg/courses/214383/cs-161-fall-2011)

Can anyone (at Stanford or otherwise) tell me if there is a follow up course? The (online) course title says "Design and Analysis of Algorithms I". Is there a Design and Analysis of Algorithms II (or III or IV)?

<comment><USER10> There's the following algorithms class CS 261 (upper-level undergraduate/masters) and CS 361b (mostly aimed at phd students, though undergraduates take it). 161 covers all the material you would expect to see in an undergrad algorithms class. I'd be surprised if 261 or 361b are put online, since they're not usually recorded and (at least when I took them) have between 10 and 20 students.

<comment><USER5> "I'd be surprised if 261 or 361b are put online, since they're not usually recorded and (at least when I took them) have between 10 and 20 students."

Isn't that the exact reason they should be put online though? If there are say 5,000 students worldwide (vs 150,000 for the AI course) that is still a massive multiple. I sincerely hope Stanford doesn't stop at the "Introduction to X" courses. The upcoming "Probablistic Graphics Models" class seems reasonably advanced, and is hopefully a harbinger of things to come.

<comment><USER7> I think smaller classes are trickier to online-ify in a way. With large lectures, they're already somewhat public, so recording them doesn't change things a lot. With a 10-person class, you often have more of a seminar-style discussion, with a lot of back-and-forth between students and professor and less of a pre-planned, one-way lecture. That might be harder to record well, and I think the seminar-style discussion might also suffer if students were "on the record", knowing that they were being broadcast rather than just chatting with the 10 people in the room.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I'm seriously considering taking half a year off to work on several of these classes, supported by a part time job. There's just so much in there that we never properly treated at uni (bachelor level).

<comment><USER12> Yeah, I did 2 ai based classes, a probability class and tackled nlp for my honors thesis and still find I'm learning a fair bit from the ai class.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Wow, the amazing classes just keep on coming! Stanford is really doing a phenomenal thing by making all of these classes free to the public!

<comment><USER14> .. it's raining free classes this weekend! Must be a deadline Monday :)

<comment><USER15> Is this a CVPR reference, or just an amazingly accurate comment?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> They´re like pokemon. Gotta have them all!

</comment><comment><USER17> Honestly, I'm more excited about these classes from Stanford than Christmas. This is the one I've been waiting for, thanks Santa!

</comment><comment><USER18> I am amazed that Stanford is taking this idea and running with it. Khan Academy established the need and feasibility of the parallel education system. It is much better than the other types of open course ware. I am beginning to think there are going to be a lot more. And I am desperately wishing for some electrical engineering classes.

<comment><USER19> EE classes of the signal processing variety?

<comment><USER18> Yeah, would mark out if that happened.

<comment><USER20> I don't think I've ever heard of anyone marking out for signal processing, but I'm liking it. I think we need to combine all of the terminology- 'Fourier was such a spotmonkey' or something.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> This guy is a great lecturer, I'm working through his CS161 videos right now.

You can get a sample of what his lectures will probably be like here [http://openclassroom.stanford.edu/MainFolder/CoursePage.php?...](http://openclassroom.stanford.edu/MainFolder/CoursePage.php?course=IntroToAlgorithms)

<comment><USER22> Know anywhere I can download those vids from? Streaming is a bit slow from where I am..

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Great! Now I'm waiting for the Compilers class.

</comment><comment><USER23> What are the expectations for someone who signs up for a course? Are there ramifications if one does not complete the material? I want to sign up for this, but I have three other college classes to take at the same time (with extracurriculars), and I'm not positive I could keep up for the entire semester.

<comment><USER24> It's completely free to take, and no one will hassle you if you don't do anything at all.

In addition, at least for the ones that happened this fall, if you are taking the advanced stream, you can drop down to the beginner one at any time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Is there a central place to get a list of all the classes? (Aside from the bottom of these individual pages)

</comment><comment><USER26> I'm currently loving Jennifer Widom's DB class, and I'm excited about this and ML next quarter.

I really hope this phenomenon spreads outside of their CS department; I'd love it if there were some pure math classes(like real analysis and abstract algebra) in this format.

<comment><USER27> I've been doing ML class this quarter, and it has been very good. Andrew Ng is a great teacher, and the programming exercises are a great addition.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> This may have been answered in one of the many other threads on these, but are they going to run these regularly? There's so many I want to do but I don't have time to do them all at once. Have they said that they will run them later next year?

<comment><USER29> I don't believe the ai class profs have mentioned it yet. The db professor sounds like she is going to do it again next year same time, but hasn't said so definitively. ML class is happening next semester again.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> I'm pretty amped about this, to be honest. Gives me a way to take an Algorithms class a semester early, and it serves as a good kick in the rear too! (Well, hopefully not so much the latter - just excited to be able to take the class!)

</comment><comment><USER31> Like he said: "the key class to ace the technical interviews." So true.

</comment><comment><USER32> I am guessing there are three more classes to come. That way the rows showing the classes, at the bottom of each class page, will be nice and symmetrical.

<comment><USER33> To make everything nice and symmetrical, think of a "square" of classes.</comment></comment>


Any Early Adopters Willing to Check Us Out? - <AUTHOR> http://www.lgcy.io <comment><AUTHOR> [https://lgcy.io/Dallas%20.Cowboys](https://lgcy.io/Dallas%20.Cowboys) \--> That's an example

<comment><USER2> 1\. What is this? Why do I need it? It seems like Wikipedia or Twitter, but without the benefits of either.

2\. Why does it load so slowly? It took 30 seconds for a simple info page.

3\. Why doesn't it render properly? I'm on Brave on Android, so admittedly I have an adblocker, but that shouldn't turn a page into a pile of rubble.

<comment><AUTHOR> 1\. A platform where it turns your individual posts you upload into a story of your life. All other platforms focus on individual posts that aren't connected and don't keep in mind what you want your legacy to be. This connects your posts and turns it into a story of your life. 2/3 I'm assuming you are using mobile to view the platform, mobile hasn't been completed which is the cause of the slow rendering and the ugly look of the platform while on mobile

<comment><USER2> What makes you think most people want such a thing?

And for those that do, why is Facebook or Instagram or a custom blog inadequate?

Facebook changed "wall" to "timeline" many years ago and has had a similar time-based structure since then. They even encouraged people to add major life events that happened before Facebook existed at all.

<comment><AUTHOR> Simple - I had this built for myself. When I reached out to random people discussing the platform before I had it built, they loved the concept behind leaving a legacy. Pay attention to how many times professional athletes, movie stars, business people and the average person mention the word "legacy", wanting their life to have meaning and to leave a legacy after they're gone.

None of the other major platforms inspire to leave a legacy. Your point is valid, it's a platform where users can upload videos, photos, text etc like the rest of them. But each platform has a different circumstance, vibe or idea - linkedin is for business, employment ; snapchat is quick and easy highlight of what you're doing; facebook is the Swiss army knife based around your friends; instagram is simply photos and videos; but none effectively tell a story of one's life and inspire what you want your legacy to be, what you are about etc. They are all quick, one off posts that don't effectively tell a story of your life, which is what I think people are really doing when they are uploading content --> uploading a piece of their life's story bit by bit

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> We're looking for early adopters to check out our new platform. It'd be cool if you provided any feedback - positive or negative.

Cheers

<comment><USER3> I looked at your provided link.

I have no clue what you do.

Surely that information should be clear and umissable?

<comment><AUTHOR> Are you on mobile or web? If on mobile, it is not completed. On web, expand the post in the link, and you'll see the timeline

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I mean, do you have a landing page explaining what it is that people would be joining?</comment>


Making Java fully dynamic via invokedynamic and dynamic class creation - nerds-central http://nerds-central.blogspot.com/2011/05/performing-dynamicinvoke-from-java-step.html The op-code thing is a means to an end. The key of the article is how to use this technique to get at the new invokedynamic op-code and use the dynamic language features that provides from Java. Java does not support invokedynamic in syntax, so there are a few hoops to jump through to get to it. One can create a class which has an invokedynamic call site in it. Then link to that class. However, that is not very flexible. So using dynamic class loading from op-codes to create a new class site and then using that from Java (by casting to a know interface) makes a very clean pattern for Java its self to make use of invokedynamic. <comment> nerds-central I am personally convinced that invokedynamic (the new BA op-code for Java 7) is not just for dynamic language support. Patterns like the one in this post _will_ let people develop dynamic approaches to Java. This will effect aspect oriented programming, all reflection based system and so on. I can see applications in server environments where objects/beans etc can use invokedynamic to tight bind initially loosely associated business logic.

In short - I believe invokedynamic is a game changer for Java and everything that interoprates with or competes with Java.</comment>


Minority Report for $70 - <AUTHOR> http://leapmotion.com/index.html

<comment><USER2> Someone already posted this yesterday: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4002418></comment>


How Much Power Does the Volkswagen TDI Lose in "Cheater" Mode? - <AUTHOR> http://www.tflcar.com/2015/10/how-much-power-does-the-vw-tdi-lose-in-cheater-mode-video-report/ <comment><USER3> This test seems very poor. They didn't measure the NOx emissions so we don't know if it really entered "cheater mode". According to a comment there, it was probably trying to compensate for what it detected as the rear wheels spinning and they need to turn off DSP. It doesn't sound like they really knew what they were doing so I'm not sure I trust it.

<comment><USER4> All of this testing can be seen as very poor, however, I would argue that we are running the wrong tests. Let me explain...

Imagine you were developing a car. As part of the project you would need to test, test, test and test the drivetrain and the engine. For your test data to be relevant you would want a controlled environment, e.g. car on perfectly flat road with no pot holes, turns or aerodynamic consideration. You could then adjust the variables and check the results - power, torque, emissions, noise level, oil use, fuel use, temperatures and so on.

In this development mode the test rig works pretty good. Figures can be produced that are important for the engine/drivetrain development. Variables can be changed and results measured. The figures - defeat device aside - <USER2> actually true with the normal margins for statistical measurement (not every engine will be 100% exactly the same even if it came off the same production batch).

The problem - defeat device aside - is when regulatory bodies use this data for what they need to know, i.e. real world performance. They accept data that they know is not real world and accept it as 'fact'.

If we look at our own testing for building apps, websites and such like we take a modular approach, testing our dev boxes with some type of 'seige' that does not factor in real world internet connectivity and bandwidth, not to mention how customers might use our products in the wild. We can even prove to our clients that their site isn't slow, sharing our metrics with them. Yet, in the real world things don't quite attain those metrics. Luckily nobody gets harmed if our 'squirrel picture app for cats' app falls short.

So, it is the procedures that are wrong and our standards bodies that are doing it wrong (by blindly accepting manufacturers' test data). We are lucky that VW have been cheating as we now are having the conversation about the testing methodology.

<comment><USER5> _For your test data to be relevant you would want a controlled environment, e.g. car on perfectly flat road with no pot holes, turns or aerodynamic consideration. You could then adjust the variables and check the results - power, torque, emissions, noise level, oil use, fuel use, temperatures and so on._

That's not how cars are developed. There is some of this for sure, but even "static" dyno tests involve varied workloads to simulate an urban environment. The European Driving Cycle[1] is a fairly basic example of this.

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

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I have an idea for a different test method.

You take your cheating Volkswagen TDI without software fix to the local dragstrip on a day with little wind and do a series of test runs, you document your 1/4 mile time.

Then you send in your car for a fix to Volkswagen most likely a ECU software update as that is cheapest fix.

You retest your car at the drag racing strip, record the same number of runs.

If the numbers between the test run differ much you can sue Volkswagen as the car may have worse performance with the legal Nox emission software.

Here is a device that will let you test your car perfomance on normal roads. [http://www.vboxmotorsport.co.uk/index.php/en/products/perfor...](http://www.vboxmotorsport.co.uk/index.php/en/products/performance- meters/performancebox)

Disclaimer I own a car with the affected engine.

<comment><USER7> That's a better test method, but since the VW fix is not available, it's worth trying something else. Although in this case, it seems the methodology is suspect: traction control applied brakes may be the source of the lost horsepower, and emissions weren't measured so there's no confirmation that the enhanced emission control mode was enabled either.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> The methodology here is highly suspect. First of all they are using an AWD dyno which can be unlinked to test a FWD or RWD car. It is expected that the car will dyno lower when driving the rear wheels as well as the front. Not only does it have to turn the drums of the dyno but also the rear wheels, tires, and brakes of the vehicle. Second, a key component of the cheat as reported by the media is keying off of the presence of the OBDII instrumentation. As far as I can tell they did not have any way of simulating this condition.

<comment><USER9> Not all emissions tests are conducted with OBD2 link. In some relaxed regimes, OBD2 interrogation is the only component of the emissions test, and the car passes if the car determined there is no faults. I lived in a county with emissions testing and the OBD2 link was used as a pre-test before the dyno run, and to feed the VIN number into the state's computer to provide some assurance about the identity of the car being tested.

Some vehicles, like my Toyota, indeed behave slightly differently if there is a diagnosis computer connected. I don't know if this applies to the OBD2 link as well as the toyota-specific connector under the hood, but it's pointed out in the factory shop manual. At any rate this knowledge has prevented me from trying the "scangauge" type of data collection device.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> > The acceptable particulate level in Colorado emissions testing is 35% > opacity. That means the smoke and particulates that are coming out of the > exhaust pipe can block up to 35% of light and pass the test. This is a lot > of smoke.

This is the most shocking part of this... can you really pass with that much smoke coming out the tailpipe? That's absurd and I find it hard to believe. What's even the point of testing based on those regulations?

<comment><USER11> The 35% is a meaningless number without more details. It's not shocking at all if a 1km column of smoke blocks more than 35% of the light passing along it. So we need to know more about the test to decide if it's shocking or not - specifically the distance the light travels through the sample.

Integration time is also important. Short bursts of dense smoke can be equally polluting as a continuous stream of light smoke.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> While not conclusive, I give these guys credit for replicating a behavior fitting the "cheater" profile. But I am surprised that not spinning up the rear tires triggered that behavior.

The loss in power measured here will be very noticeable to diesel owners. Diesels have narrow power bands. You don't spend much driving time anywhere near the top hp zone. The torque curves are what matters. A 10% loss means you will probably have to rev up another 10%, say 3300 rather than 3000, to get at the same power. While a professional reviewer stepping into a car for the first time might not notice, the guy taking his personal vehicle in sure will. VW owners will not be happy if the coming fix reduces torque by this much.

I suspect this "cheat" is done by enriching the mixture a little to lower the temp and reduce NOx. Conversely, VW might have been running things too lean under normal operation. A lean (oxygen-rich) mixture burns hotter, resulting in more power and efficiency but much of that unburnt O2 ends up combining with N2 to form the nasty N0x junk. So if the fix means effectively pinning the cheat on all the time, fixed cars will probably end up burning more fuel with less top-end power.

<comment><USER9> I know that a lean burning petrol engine will emit more NOx, but as an American who is not a truck mechanic I don't really know much about diesel. Does it work the same way in the diesel cycle? On the other hand, I am reasonably sure that more fuel = more CO2 emissions (or whatever emissions are catalyzed into CO2.)

<comment><USER12> It's the same basic chemistry. You've got O2+N2 (air) plus hydrocarbon (H-C=C-H sort of things) all mixed together and heated. Ideally all the 02 bonds with the H and C to form C02 and H20. If the mixture is lean and hot enough then there isn't enough H and C for all the O2 and it instead bonds with the N2 to form NOx.

The only real difference with the diesel is that the hydrocarbons are longer, which is why diesel is thicker and less volatile. Diesel needs to be hotter to break down these longer hydrocarbons and this is achieved via a higher compression ratio (14:1 instead of 10:1). That extra heat is an issue for N0x production if the mixture gets too lean. But if the mix is too rich, with not enough 02 for all the H and C, then you get incomplete combustion. That black soot is essentially just carbon that couldn't find any oxygen to bond with.

To avoid soot, so-called clean diesels run slightly lean and then rely on a catalytic converter to turn any N0x back into N2 and O2, but a dry cat can only go so far. BMW and others inject urea into the cat where it become ammonia (NH3). The O in the NOx grabs the H from the NH3 and the two Ns form N2. NOx + NH3 = N2 + H20.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Not very convincing.

On most cars, you can't _completely_ turn off traction control. The "ESP off" button is there driving with tire chains, it just increases the threshold of the safety systems but doesn't disable them. That could explain the warnings in the dashboard, and also the reduced torque. High torque on low-traction surfaces leads to wheel spin.

<comment><USER14> Off topic but I hate cars that don't allow traction control (TC) to be turned off it can be dangerous.

We had Ford Transit vehicles at work and in the winter if there is a lot of snow the TC will kill 90% of engine power trapping you in the snow.

I've almost been killed by TC on a Ford Transit activating at the worst moment. When I first drove the vehicle I had the vehicle stop abruptly when the TC kicked in and a car almost ran into the back of me.

You can disable it by taking out a fuse but it also disables the ABS and airbag. Plus it was a leased company vehicle so I couldn't do that anyway.

It's like a practical joke here kill 90% of the engine power at the worst moment.

For you warm climate people drifts of snow at the end of driveways or on the road are common in winter regions. Usually you power through them if possible, wheels straight, foot down on the pedal all the way.

In the end I found out I could go fast and then put the vehicle in neutral and coast through as best I could.

I should say for ice TC is fantastic but it's not common for pure ice to be on a road, some parts but most times it would be melted by applied road salt.

<comment><USER15> ISTM the Transit's TC might just not be tuned very well? That might be related to the model year or might be something a Ford dealer could fix with a firmware update. Friends I've had in snowy places have sworn by their AWD vehicles. Personally I've scared myself half to death driving a big RWD truck in the snow.

<comment><USER14> Living in a snowy climate yes AWD and 4X4 are great yes (even FWD) it's the traction control that's the problem.

You can tell it wasn't designed by people who have ever seen snow. The Ford Transit is manufactured in Turkey but I don't know if that's a reason for the terrible traction control (and poor heat, and failing wheel bearings, and always cracking windshields).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> The most telling aspect of this is not the 10% power drop but the massive torque drop at lower RPMs. That indicates that VW is limiting turbo boost at low RPMs while in this mode. That makes sense, as increasing turbo boost increases pressure, which increases combustion temps, which increases NOx production.

</comment><comment><USER17> VW owners may be looking at the kind of retrofits California requires for older heavy trucks.[1] The muffler is replaced with a filter which has to be cleaned periodically. This seems to be working; it's rare to see a truck belching smoke in California. So there's a path to a fix available.

[1] [http://www.arb.ca.gov/msprog/truckstop/truckstop.htm](http://www.arb.ca.gov/msprog/truckstop/truckstop.htm)

<comment><USER18> I always see large trucks on I-5 regularly spewing huge amounts of smoke when they hit the gas. It gets so bad that people speed around them to avoid the smog getting into their cars. This is mostly large commercial semis and dump trucks. Are you talking about passenger cars?

<comment><USER12> The black stuff from diesels is soot, not smog. Soot is just unburnt carbon. The term 'smog' covers a whole manner of nasty chemicals, mostly oxides of nitrogen and sulfur.

Soot is relatively harmless compared to smog. A diesel producing soot is running rich and therefore is arguably cleaner than a "clean-diesel" running lean and pumping out oxides. Those carbon-belching trucks are far better for your lungs than the smoke-free VWs pumping out N0x. Beware the pollution you cannot see.

<comment><USER19> Good post! Years ago I had a slight head gasket leak, and needed to drive the vechicle just one more day before I took the head off and did the nasty job.

I had a little bit of extra smoke comming out of the tail pipe, and I got pulled over by a Police Officer. I told the officer, the extra smoke was mainly water vapor, but was still expecting a ticket.

Well, the officer said he used to be a mechanic, and knew I was likely telling the truth. He let me off with a warning.

I think those days are over though. I have seen people freak out over the wiff of cigarette smoke. Yesterday, I heard this lady yelling at a janitor over bleach smell. She squelched , "You're giving me cancer!". I don't think he understood English, and was probally better off?

I'm all for cleaning up the air, but people need to educate themselves on what exactly is going to give them, or the environment problems.

<comment><USER12> A leaky head gasket will usually produce a white smoke that smells a bit like pot smoke. That's the ethylene glycol in the antifreez/coolant being burnt.

The new anti-bleach craze is laughable. I had one woman at the local dog beach tell me "You know bleach is the same chlorine they use in swimming pools and we know that stuff causes cancer." I spend at least an hour a day swimming laps. Have done so since I was eight. And I at one point lived in a country where we regularly added small amounts of bleach to drinking water to disinfect it. If chlorine causes cancer I am doomed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Wow, only a 10% loss? That hardly seems worth cheating... then again, I don't run a car company, so I guess it's the kind of thing they think they need to do. bummer.

<comment><USER21> The real question is how it converts to mpg. A whole bunch of manufacturers have gotten in trouble for exaggerating fuel economy, and I for one certainly consider it when comparing cars (to an irrational degree, in fact). If it's the difference between 38mpg and 34mpg then that might be worth lying about.

<comment><USER22> Especially if you're trying to meet US CAFE standards. Curious if VW is going to need to buy a bunch of ZEV credits now in CA (with Tesla being the primary beneficiary).

<comment><USER23> Both CAFE and Smog Check-style programs are gamed terribly, across multiple manufacturers... but VW gets the blame, which it rightly deserves.

Testing of emissions needs to happen at the tailpipe while driving with mobile equipment in the real-world with certain types of traffic / road conditions.

Mileage needs to be calculated by metered fuel measurement on a test track with both highway- and (stop-and-go traffic) city-driving.

In addition to either two, Tesla vehicles and other full electric vehicles cannot come quickly enough to supplant gasoline/diesel/CNG/LNG/flex fuel/etc.

PS: I just California Smog Check'ed my '85 Vanagon, which has direct-port fuel injection, mass-airflow sensor and rudimentary "computer" (Digijet) after replacing the catalytic converter, O2 sensor and having a VW specialist shop tune it up. NOx (nitrous oxides) went from barely failing 15 and 25 mph limits to near zero. HC (hydrocarbons) and CO were also barely detectible. Emissions on it (a 90 hp motor) are currently at the levels of a PZEV or a new vehicle, and it gets 24 (real-world) MPG (9.8 L/100km).

Already, CA Smog Check station owners are foreseeing additional mandated equipment investments to perform tests on modern vehicles not just via the OBDII port under the steering wheel. This is a good thing but it's hard to sell small-business owners on capital and labor expenses up against the status quo/sunk costs fallacy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> So are they claiming that the software drops the engine into "cheat" mode by detecting when the front wheels were not spinning (which implies dyno- testing)?

Is it confirmed that is how cheat mode worked?

If I were writing this I'd be more inclined to look for known test cycle behaviour (ie, accelerate for a known time, then constant speed then stop, start etc etc) and drop into cheat mode when it is detected. I guess this could be a problem for unknown cycles though?

<comment><USER24> Other groups have stated the same thing [1]. The car already has to detect dyno testing to turn off traction control and other things that are dangerous under these conditions, adding a flag to tweak the mixture the car works with under speed isn't so difficult after that. Trying to detect a pattern would lead to much more complicated logic, especially if you get a tester who decides to do things in a different order.

[1] [http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/cars/volkswagen- emissions...](http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/cars/volkswagen-emissions- cheat-exploited-test-mode)

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> >if you look lower on the RPM curve the difference is significant. The car lost 15 horsepower around 2,800 RPM, and 32 lb-ft of torque near 2,700 rpm

so, looking at the picture, the power/torque at 2800rpm is about 120/260 while in "cheater" mode it is 105/228\. And that ratio is preserved through whole 2000-3000rpm range, the range that really matters as most of the driving happens here.

</comment><comment><USER26> So now, given that "fixing" the problem will cause power loss, and consequently adversely affect fuel economy, wouldn't a number of VW owners opt not to bring in their vehicles for the recall? What's the incentive for VW owners to voluntarily bring in their cars for a regressive (in terms of power and mpg) fix?

<comment><USER27> I believe VW have promised to _replace everyones entire engines_. I'm stupefied over how much this will cost, i've seen numbers around to 100B mark. Their market cap is somewhere near half of that. Presumably they think it's better than the brand damage otherwise. I think it's fair to assume they'll go bankrupt over this.

<comment><USER28> Do you have a link for this? Replacing even 500k engines in the US is indeed stupefying.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> The BBC did a real-world driving test and directly examined the exhaust for NOx emmisions and they were exponentially worse than the lab results.

If the exhaust was going into your car, you'd be fatally poisoined in short order.

So thanks for the cancer you've given to all the pedestrians and cyclists VW (and all the other lying corporate a-holes).

<comment><USER30> Not all toxins are carcinogenic. In particular, VW seems to have been leaning out the mixture, resulting in lower levels of soot and carcinogenic polyaromatics. I'm not aware of any studies showing oxides of nitrogen to be carcinogenic.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Why would a company take such a huge risk for a paltry 10% gain in engine power, and a probably even smaller gain in mpg? This seems like a very dumb thing to do.

<comment><USER32> In order to sell cars. The competition is/was doing it also and it was widely known practice. [1] For some reason VW is getting all the blame.

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjUr3RQRERM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjUr3RQRERM)

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> Offtopic but I couldn't help it... It looks like they're still running win xp! I suppose the pc is air gapped yeah..</comment>


Google Bowls a Googly - Possible invalidation of Oracle's patents - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2010/11/google-bowls-a-googly/index.htm <comment><USER2> Without getting into detail (or touching on the related copyright issues), I would sum this up as follows concerning the software patents at issue in this case:

Google is taking its cue, of all things, from the Supreme Court's _Bilski_ decision, which upheld business method and software patents in general but which also gave lower courts a powerful tool with which to smash them if it liked - and that is to invalidate them as unpatentable "abstract ideas" if they did not satisfy the so-called machine-or-transformation test and if there were no other basis by which to remove them from the abstract-idea category.

Many here were deeply disappointed in the _Bilski_ outcome but, take heart, that battle is not over yet. Even while rejecting the machine-or- transformation test as an _exclusive_ test for saying that a particular business method meets the test for patentable subject matter, the Supreme Court nonetheless upheld that test as a _useful indicator_ of whether something was patentable or not. If, for example, a software patent failed to meet that test, then a court could potentially conclude that it did not constitute patentable subject matter. What then? In all likelihood, a court would say, as did the Supreme Court in _Bilski_ , that the challenged patent fails as constituting only an abstract idea, which is not patentable.

Courts have more and more been using the _Bilski_ precedent as authority to strike down software and business method patents on abstract-idea grounds. _Bilski_ pointed the way and many courts are following. (See, e.g., [http://ipspotlight.com/2010/08/19/district-court-rules- inter...](http://ipspotlight.com/2010/08/19/district-court-rules-internet- advertising-patent-invalid-under-bilski/))

The Groklaw piece referred to in this article discusses this in more detail (see <http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20101111114933605>). Moreover, in an August 13, 2010 piece (<http://groklaw.net/article.php?story=20100813112425821>), Groklaw reported that "Groklaw member Celtic_hackr went through [the Oracle software patents] and sees none that are tied to any specific machine."

With its latest filing, Google is revealing its strategy as one of taking on Oracle's software patents head on and asking the court to declare them invalid on the abstract-idea ground (among others). This is very aggressive and has potentially huge consequences.

Bottom line: Oracle can go fishing for opportunistic dollars but it will do so against Google only at a potentially devastating cost to its newly-acquired Sun assets. In the precatory words of Groklaw (in the item last cited above): "And may software patents crash into the ocean as an unintended consequence of this patent attack."

</comment><comment><USER3> Before people celebrate, remember that Google's arguments are _negotiations via the legal system_ , not a battle-to-the-death over principle.

If Oracle offers Google and its ecosystem a reasonable deal, in which Google publicly acknowledges that Oracle's patents are valid, the matter will be resolved -- and Oracle's patents will be stronger than ever, presumptively, because they were legally tested by a dispute with a deep-pocketed adversary who eventually agreed to license them.

Compare also: when first sued by the Author's Guild in a class action over book-scanning, Google originally argued they had a fair-use right to scan/index the books without prior permission. When a settlement deal favorable to Google's continued operations was proffered, Google stopped fighting for the general fair use principle, and instead has been defending the benefits of their settlement agreement. [1] What should others who want to scan/index books do? Now, Google suggests they should get explicit permission beforehand, using the precedents Google set. [2]

I don't blame Google for making necessary practical legal compromises for their mission, but I also don't put them up on a pedestal, as if they were a disinterested champion who will establish equal rights for everyone. They'll pursue their organizational interests, as with any other ambitious organization.

[1] <http://www.publicknowledge.org/node/1828>

[2] [http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/09/opinion/09brin.html?pagewa...](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/09/opinion/09brin.html?pagewanted=all)

"If Google Books is successful, others will follow. And they will have an easier path: this agreement creates a books rights registry that will encourage rights holders to come forward and will provide a convenient way for other projects to obtain permissions. While new projects will not immediately have the same rights to orphan works, the agreement will be a beacon of compromise in case of a similar lawsuit, and it will serve as a precedent for orphan works legislation, which Google has always supported and will continue to support."

<comment><USER4> In general, I'm inclined to agree with you, certainly with any other company, and probably with Google..

But Page and Brin probably have the muscle to make a bad business decision and fight out the patent if they think they can win, and it's far reaching enough that they might go for it.

<comment><USER5> Count on Google to fight the good fight! Like they did when they gave up Net Neutrality to make a deal with Verizon.

<comment><USER6> Playing devil's advocate here, but their deal _would_ secure net neutrality - for broadband. It's only mobile that gets fucked over. Now, anyone can see that mobile is the future, so this isn't much to hang your hat on, but it is something.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> For those in the US, a googly is a way of delivering (pitching) a ball in Cricket. The American equivalent terminology would be 'throwing a curveball'

<comment><USER8> So you're saying that anyone outside US knows about this Cricket thing.

<comment><USER9> Cricket is probably the #2 sport in the world.. <http://www.mostpopularsports.net/>

Of course, I assumed that American football would be right up there : Turns out, it's a minority thing, by a long way.

<comment><USER10> Take that list with a grain of salt considering they left out rugby completely.

<comment><USER11> They seem to have called it "Football", i.e. lumped in with American Football.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> By offering 20 defenses, Google is showing it intends to fight the case just as aggressively as Oracle. In another sense, they're not revealing much at all, but rather raising every conceivable objection now to keep their options open (as a case progresses, introducing a new argument if an existing one turns out to be flawed becomes problematic).

The most interesting thing - though I don't know enough to guess how far they will get with this one, is paragraph 3 under 'Defenses': '3. Each of the Patents-in-Suit is invalid under 35 U.S.C. § 101 because one or more claims are directed to abstract ideas or other non-statutory subject matter.' This particular argument would, I believe, invalidate most software patents if sustained at trial. I am not a lawyer, and especially not a patent lawyer, just a pre-law student with a hunch.

It will be interesting to watch this case unfold. Judge Alsup wants to retire from the bench and return to private practice, but he has a very good reputation for handling complex litigation cases (and explaining the legal issues clearly in his opinions); this one looks to be time-consuming, but would also boost his reputation significantly.

Edit: snap ;-)

</comment><comment><USER13> Exhibit J is interesting. So much of this code looks like boilerplate to me that I don't think it says much about whether it was copied. Given standard naming conventions, the public interface, and the simplicity of the code, a lot of developers would create almost identical implementations. I mean, the code doesn't actually DO hardly anything.

<comment><USER14> Some aspects of it look copied to me - the class's 10 fields are in identical order. Some parameters to the function look lifted straight from code generated by disassembling bytecode (flag flag1 set set1). However, these may be explainable by some other means.

[http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=permutations+of+10+item...](http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=permutations+of+10+items)

<comment><USER15> They were probably listed in that order in the documentation, and the javadocs are generated from the source.

It'd be more suspect if they were in a different order, especially if they were ordered as if they were in a hashtable that was iterated over.

<comment><USER14> Interesting but unconvincing theory. I have never seen public API documentation that lists private fields before. This certainly makes no mention of private fields: [http://www.docjar.com/docs/api/sun/security/provider/certpat...](http://www.docjar.com/docs/api/sun/security/provider/certpath/PolicyNodeImpl.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> "better search" is Evolution. If Google is able to create precedent invalidating the software patents system, that would be a Revolution (not that a Revolution with all its mess is always, or even sometimes, a best thing though :)

</comment><comment><USER17> I think we all know how this will end: a joint-licensing agreement that allows Oracle to go after or threaten the next VM vendor.

</comment><comment><USER6> I know this is entirely tangential, but did anyone else notice how _ugly_ Google's code is? Sun's is neat and clean; Google's is a mess.

<http://groklaw.net/pdf2/OraGoogle-36-10.pdf>

</comment><comment><USER18> While it is Oracle vs. Google, Oracle is buddying up to Apple at the same time, this is one of the best viral marketing campaigns ever. Attach/Attack current big names and be very visible.</comment>


Ask HN: Give me some Python/JavaScript project or web app ideas - <AUTHOR>

<comment><USER2> Build HN User profile analytics. Basically, a dashboard page that shows users by location, professions etc. Obviously, it depends heavily on what the user has in their profile. For example,the dashboard could show "Well known entrepreneurs" which would display info of lot of founders/co-founders of companies that are on HN. If a user profile does not have any info, then scrape through their comment history and find out keywords like location, profession etc. I see many users commenting like "I am the co-founder of...", "I am a lawyer...", "I am a CPA...", "I live in San Francisco..." etc. This could be great way to find those people.

</comment><comment><USER3> Python Project and Web App Idea Generator, written in Python. Scrape HN for "Show HN:" submissions and append "written in Python" for project ideas.

<comment><USER4> Use this: [http://itsthisforthat.com/](http://itsthisforthat.com/) and use Python and Javascript to develop the product

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> What are some of your interests? What issues would you like to see addressed in the world?

</comment><comment><USER6> Code a Python interpreter in JS (without using Emscripten.)

</comment><comment><USER7> I'd like to see some D3 + Flask action.

</comment><comment><USER8> Build a business card interpretation service</comment>


71% of Americans between 17 and 24 can't meet the minimum criteria for service - <AUTHOR> http://taskandpurpose.com/vast-majority-americans-20s-unfit-military-service/ <comment><USER2> I was hoping that the article would touch on what the physical requirements are, and was disappointed. Here's some interesting resources

[http://work.chron.com/armys-minimum-physical-requirements- jo...](http://work.chron.com/armys-minimum-physical-requirements- join-13518.html)

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

The criteria are:

\- BMI

\- Eyesight

\- Physical fitness on push ups, sit ups and length of time to run 2 miles.

Notably, the differing physical requirement minimums for men vs women are quite significant.

<comment><USER3> Ironically, the _maximums_ for women pose a serious problem for women who want to go for the toughest roles. You need to seriously bulk up to get in.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> If you take a look, the problems they're describing are direct counterparts of problems society has: The prison/industrial complex and the war on drugs is disqualifying people on the character test, the basic fitness requirement is undoubtedly affected by the food deserts in major cities and so on.

This is pretty serious: an armed force that doesn't resemble the general population is a recipe for conflict and tyrrany.

<comment><USER4> The fairness of prison sentences for drug abuse or dealing is a different debate, but I am not convinced drug users and drug dealers should make it to the army. It's not the war on drugs that creates drug users.

<comment><USER5> > _I am not convinced drug users and drug dealers should make it to the army_

Throughout history, the strongest soldiers of the strongest armies have always been on a kind of permanent high. It's uncertain anyone can withstand the hardships of military life, and of wartime, for any serious length of time, without drugs.

<comment><USER4> That was at a time when the army was expected to walk up to the enemy and shoot them at short distance. The approach demonstrated its limits at WW1. I am no military expert but I do not believe this is compatible with modern warfare. Not to say that there wasn't drug abuse in later conflicts, but that these were probably not helping.

<comment><USER6> Methamphetamine was used for pilots on long missions at least from WW2 to Desert Storm.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Someone on reddit pointed out something the other day that made a lot of sense.

The GOP is afraid of subsidized health care and subsidized/free college, because it would remove the two biggest recruiting tools the army has -- free lifetime healthcare and money for college.

Without those carrots, few would sign up for the military.

<comment><USER8> While this makes a lot of sense, I really hope it's not true.

<comment><USER9> I don't know any Republicans who felt this way or even brought up the topic.

<comment><USER7> Congressional Republicans. Particularly the ones on the Armed Forces committee, who are acutely aware of the recruiting problem.

<comment><USER9> > Someone on reddit pointed out something the other day that made a lot of > sense.

I'm afraid I'll need a better citation than that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Stop fighting bullshit wars halfway around the world and you'll have plenty of capable volunteers. No one wants to get their extremities blown off just because some military industrial complex CEO needs another beach house.

<comment><USER11> Are you implying little Johnny isn't a real hero? He lived in a military camp in Baghdad for 4 months! He even had a gun pointed at him at one stage!

I really don't get America's glorification of combat "veterans." In the old times, sure, but these are just people doing their jobs at the end of the day, and jobs that frequently involve killing people. I'm sure most people who sign up don't do it out of the goodness of their hearts, or for the sake of "peacekeeping."

<comment><USER10> To get the glorification you need to consider that those men and women are willingly exposing themselves to mortal danger. This kind of thing is hard to understand for someone who has spent all their life in an all white upper middle class neighborhood with not a worry in the world.

The US foreign policy might be haphazard and misguided, but don't you dare shit on the very real sacrifice these kids are making.

<comment><USER12> and yet if the policy is so haphazard and misguided wouldn't it be better to steer them away from a completely a wasted sacrifice?

Doubly so because their cost is measured in lives.

<comment><USER13> > wouldn't it be better to steer them away from a completely a wasted > sacrifice

Pretty sure your OP is not opposed to that, but the "Little Johnny" language bullshit that his parent wrote.

<comment><USER14> I took it as a reference to this:

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

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Perhaps the US should explore the concept of a foreign legion. A 5 years service would become a fast path for foreigners to gain US citizenship.

<comment><USER15> The US had program a bit like that for while (MAVNI), but it was very limited in who it would accept and was recently shut down.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Luckily, the services only enlist less than 2%.

</comment><comment><USER17> Isn't this largely because standards are relatively high right now because the military has more people enlisting than it needs? If they needed more people they would just lower the standards a bit like they were a few years ago and they would have plenty of people. They would have to do a bit more work during training to get them in shape and they would have to overlook some minor issues that they aren't willing to now, but they wouldn't actually have trouble getting enough people.

</comment><comment><USER18> Oh don't worry, if army ever gets a shortage of people they will just lower standards. They can do it pretty much indefinitely.

<comment><USER4> You can read the article as "it is a problem for the army to recruit", but also as "we in the US have a health & crime problem".

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Just send more robots into warfare. I keep reading about robots displacing civillian workers, but why not anything like this about the military? Why so little concern for these kids getting blown up by IEDs or otherwise killed while fighting for peace in some remote country who's culture they don't understand?

<comment><USER5> If you're fighting against robots the only answer you have left is terrorism, as a way to make people who drive the robots, care about the fight.

More drones, more robots, more terrorism.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> This seems like the only upside to obesity, the drug war, and lack of education that plague our country.

</comment><comment><USER21> With a lop sided supply-demand situation, Trump ended a program (MAVNI) that allowed immigrants to obtain citizenship if they served the armed forces for six years. Many previous such enlistees have given their lives (for the US) in war. Ironic

<comment><USER22> That program was ended in December 2016 while Obama was president: [https://www.ice.gov/doclib/sevis/pdf/bcm-1612-02.pdf](https://www.ice.gov/doclib/sevis/pdf/bcm-1612-02.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Maybe better publicity for the college assistance available to veterans.

Some of those-- drug use and fitness problems-- seem like they can be fixed if people understand the incentives.</comment>


Quantifying Creativity in Art Networks [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://arxiv.org/pdf/1506.00711v1.pdf

<comment><USER2> Waiting on the game-theoretical sequel which allows me to plot my optimal art career based on networking the gallery world.</comment>


Google Sets Rules to Curtail Employee Debate - <AUTHOR> https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-sets-rules-to-curtail-employee-debates-1530115201 <comment><USER2> In my personal estimation as someone who actually has actually read these new rules and is currently working under them, these policy changes represent little substantive change from the previous policy. I won't be quoting the text directly because I don't think it's public, but most of what was changed represents a codification of practices that were already floating around as best-practices. They also added concrete examples of what constitutes harassment, all of which strike me as things that any reasonable person would actually consider harassment. Nowhere do I see anything that might be construed as "curtailing employee debate."

All of which is to say how surprised and thrown off I am by this article: it and previous ones [1] try to portray Google as a place that's roiled by political fighting where the leaders are struggling to keep control over a irresponsible and politically radical workforce. Under this narrative these new policies are just the newest, desperate attempt to restore order to the snowflake cagematch that is Google.

The reality, at least as far as I and practically everyone I've spoken to is concerned, is the exact opposite: people share their views openly, a wide range of opinions are respectfully shared, most people have the right to get into and stay out of political discussions, and the institution does the best it can to set the boundaries of what is appropriate at work while permitting a otherwise anything-goes approach. If this reality is anywhere close to being accurate, the picture this article paints is simply nonsensical.

[1]: [https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-vs-google-how-nonstop- po...](https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-vs-google-how-nonstop-political- arguments-rule-its-workplace-1525190574)

<comment><USER3> because that doesn't sell.

I'm not at google but I'm at a bay area tech startup. I'm in slack channels around things ranging from learning to speak japanese and korean, keto diets, coffee discussions, lgbt issues, politics (aside from my groups on work specific things).

I guess I don't see why I wouldn't talk to my coworkers about things I like and care about? Some coworkers don't like to talk about these things so they aren't in those discussions - that's also great. We also have a code of conduct but it doesn't curtail debate it's just pretty much what you would expect - I imagine very much like google's

<comment><USER4> > I guess I don't see why I wouldn't talk to my coworkers about things I like > and care about? Some coworkers don't like to talk about these things so they > aren't in those discussions - that's also great. We also have a code of > conduct but it doesn't curtail debate it's just pretty much what you would > expect - I imagine very much like google's

I think part of the problem with the forced socialization at a lot of these companies is that it creates cliques that in turn introduce a lot of bias into the workplace. If I'm not interested in whatever you want to discuss but a majority of others are, this can potentially have a negative effect on how I'm perceived and also compensated/promoted while having zero to do with my actual work product. After work socialization involving drinking is another example. If my lifestyle for whatever reason does not accommodate that, I might be seen as not a team player, no fun, etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> They could have solved the problem months ago by firing the people engaged in that sort of behaviour. The leaked screenshots that came out around the time they canned Damore were full of bad behaviour, but it appears none of those people were fired. Instead they were allowed to continue calling their coworkers nazis and fascists.

Almost without question this policy will be used to silence people objecting to their "diversity" programmes, not the people actually attacking their coworkers.

<comment><USER6> I don't think the solution is to fire these people (or Damore), it's just to say, "you can have whatever views you want outside of work, but unless it's relevant to your job, leave you opinions at home." That's how most of the corporate world operates.

<comment><USER5> That would also have worked, except in Damore's case they did actually solicit feedback (his memo was written after some training event where they said employees could/should comment).

That said there's a difference between "I am talking about opinions and views that are irrelevant or inappropriate for the workplace", which is a mistake that is perhaps easy to make and can be trained out of people, vs "I am literally calling my coworkers nazis and demanding they be fired for expressing their views", which is not exactly a mistake and I see no real reason to tolerate such behaviour in any company.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Employees at most companies (including other large multinationals) deal with this by only discussing political opinions among close colleagues or not at all, but it seems this way or working is not common at SV tech firms.

<comment><USER7> Google isn't really that much different. It's not a hotbed of political discussions and arguments.

There are focused discussions on politically relevant topics: such as immigration. It's a given at google that immigration is a net benefit to the country. If you disagree then well, your option isn't going to be well received. There is another option that diversity is good (based on both research and the fact that google is trying to build for everyone so we need representation to do so).

I find that all companies have some basic facts and truths, axioms if you will. Arguing against them means you need to leave the company. You won't be successful. For example, would you try to advance the argument that the web isn't important and web search is pointless? Of course not.

This goes for every company on the planet. Smaller ones have less axioms, the simplest being "boss is always right".

<comment><USER6> Opinions on immigration and diversity aren't really relevant to Google's corporate mission as a whole. They are relevant to some degree to some of its hiring and HR policies.

I have not worked anywhere where immigration policies were brought up at a company wide level. Diversity does come up elsewhere, but mainly so management can pay lip-service to the idea that they care about diversity.

By the way, I'm not placing all (or even the majority) of the blame on the people bringing up immigration or diversity, though I would argue they aren't appropriate topics in most workplaces. If you hold a controversial opinion on those issues (and others) and it's not relevant to your job, maybe you should keep your opinions private at work.

<comment><USER7> Well your first statement is just your opinion!

A core mission of google is to foster innovation, at the big and small levels. The company considers itself driven by innovation. So how do you grow the next billion users, which is a business goal, has implications in who you hire etc.

Also, a lot of googlers are immigrants, very smart people who have moved to the us. Basic human consideration about their fate is a dilemma. To blithely say it's "just" a hr problem, well that sort of seems to me like it's actually a non problem at all.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The fact that they even have to contend with this kind of toxic environment makes me pretty glad to be at a smaller company where there's really not much room for that behavior.

<comment><USER9> It's a pretty recent phenomenon. Having worked in a couple of fortune 100 companies, there was rarely any discussion of controversial topics. We talked about our families, sports, movies, the weather, etc when we talked. We rarely discussed politics. Maybe a remark here or there, but never a full out discussion, argument, etc. I don't know what political party my co-workers belonged to, if any. Never asked, nor was asked, about voting. But I've noticed we've been getting more emails/notices from HR about supporting causes, tax deductible charities ( many of which could be seen as controversial depending on one's views on a lot of matters ), etc. And there is a very small minority of highly vocal and politically active group. But most of us just want to work and go home as quickly as possible.

Maybe it's because we have too many people employed who have nothing to do. They sit in front of their computer all day reading the toxic news all day and get radicalized. Idle hands mixed with overconsumption of news can make for a toxic mindset.

Not sure why companies have gotten so politicized. I think a bit of it is the types of people working in HR. The ubiquitous toxic news, especially on social media. You would think shareholders, the board and the CEO would want people to be as apolitical as possible since that makes the most sense to run a profitable company composed of a diverse group of people.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Years too late. Employees have grown to feel entitled to abuse each other. It's disgraceful.

</comment><comment><USER11> It seems volunteer moderation may not scale well at a company this size.

When I consider that the logs of these intranet conversations are a legal liability, and moderation actions may cause legal challenges as well, it strikes me that perhaps google should hire professional moderators that report up through their legal division.

I imagine a lot of employees might balk at this, but having developers losing sleep over how to respond to intranet drama may be considered undesirable as well.

<comment><USER12> Doesn't moot still work at Google? If someone can setup a scale volunteer basis moderation system, that's probably the guy you want.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I know that my view is far from the mainstream, but does anyone else get the feeling that Google's effectiveness per-employee is lower?

I know that by the numbers, their per person revenue is off the charts, but what if they just have a few awesomely automated money spigots and like half of the employees are not really as wonderful as we've been told?

I mean, the Google images AI that classified black people as gorillas hasn't actually been fixed yet, for example: they just removed the ability of the AI to classify any images as "gorilla"... As one example.

If people are complaining about the busy message boards and there are a lot of different boards that are used, how much work is really getting done?

</comment><comment><USER14> ".....oversee discussion groups about anything from animal rights to sexual expression."

Why are there even discussions about this on a work forum? Why in the world would anyone want to talk about this stuff with the people they work with? Is it a side effect of the company being so large it's impossible to know everyone?

I go out of my way to not discuss anything that comes within a whiff of a controversial topic with the people I work with. I go to work to pull a paycheck and because I enjoy the work that I do, I do not go to work to make friends or to hang out with people. If I end up making friends with some of the people I work with, great, however, we hang out as friends outside of work and we don't discuss things as friends via any work channels. Is making your co-workers your friend group a new thing? Is it a side effect of working so many hours you don't have time to hang out with anyone else?

<comment><USER15> There is this trend in HR to try to get people to "bring their whole selves to work".

Of course, most people are political, social, etc animals.

<comment><USER16> This is also the consequence of corporations encouraging cultures that blur the lines of work-life balance. People will bring life into work. Reap what you sow.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> To use the facebook trick if you're getting paywalled: [https://www.fullwsj.com/articles/google-sets-rules-to- curtai...](https://www.fullwsj.com/articles/google-sets-rules-to-curtail- employee-debates-1530115201)

<comment><USER18> I didn't know about this trick. Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Does anyone have a non-paywalled article on this topic?

Opening in a private window does not allow me to read.

<comment><USER20> Install the Read Across the Aisle browser plugin. I'm the creator, it's free and doesn't track you, and allows you a renewable 7-day pass to the WSJ, thanks to a partnership we have with them.

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

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> This is a cultural shift. First gen corporate workplaces 60-80's were much more top down, arbitrary and controlled.

Second gen was already loosening up on individual freedom but there was a strict border between the private and the work persona.

Now it seems this border is breaking down and there is one persona. Delicious to find most commenters here on the wrong side of a generational divide. Soon you will be dismissed as grey beards with out of date ideas.

<comment><USER22> pretty ageist comment there....

<comment><USER21> Given the routine use of 'grey beards' on most tech threads here to dismiss others while pushing their favoured technologies so much so the term may as well have been invented here it is rank hypocrisy to protest.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This is a reaction to the rise of the trolls. Trolling your coworkers and engaging in bad faith argumenting has no place at work. It represents a profound disrespect of your colleagues, it is counterproductive, and is distracting.

It's not unreasonable to put these restrictions on - which btw are content neutral - workplace tools/discussions. It's not an attempt to quell dissent but to focus it in a useful manner.

I believe, that damore was arguing in bad faith, attempting to trigger and troll, and do so in "polite" language, which doesn't excuse him at all. You can't write a meandering argument that isn't well founded, filled with incorrect suppositions, and bury that all your female coworkers are not as qualified and expect that to end well.

<comment><USER23> No he wasn't arguing in bad faith. He's just a nerdy guy who took the claims about wanting honest feedback at face value and told people what he thought instead of reading between the lines and realizing he was in a high school clique environment. If you can't even see that, the one with bad faith is you.</comment></comment>


How Can a Stock Market Strategy Everyone Knows About Still Work? - <AUTHOR> https://www.aqr.com/Insights/Perspectives/How-Can-a-Strategy-Still-Work-If-Everyone-Knows-About-It <comment><USER2> Are you referring to Bitcoin pump and dump?</comment>


Protect your users from accidently loosing form input with Garlic.js - <AUTHOR> http://garlicjs.org/#demonstration

<comment><AUTHOR> Can anyone recommend a Chrome Extension that does the same?

<comment><USER2> I think Lazarus does the same.

<comment><AUTHOR> If you're speaking of [http://getlazarus.com/](http://getlazarus.com/), do you know why it isn't in the Chrome Web Store?</comment></comment></comment>


Danger – Stop Saying "You Forgot to " in Code Review - <AUTHOR> https://danger.systems/ruby/ <comment><USER2> IMO, checks that can be automated, like linting or formatting, should happen before code review and have been fixed before the code is submitted for review.

That way the code review is not 'polluted' by potentially plenty of automated comments, and reviews can focus on actually review the code as it is proposed to be submitted to the code repository.

</comment><comment><USER3> I find the use of "she" throughout your site when referring to an automated code process to be fairly strange. I suspect you're trying to add levity and personality, but it's an odd thing to assign gender to. Perhaps consider replacing those with "it"?

<comment><USER4> Apparently someone asked the same question - from the FAQ:

> Danger keeps getting referred to as "her/she", what gives?

> When we were in the naming process of Danger, we went through a lot of > names. In the end, it got named after Gem "Danger" McShane, who was involved > in both the copy and the concept. While not a programmer herself, she's > helped out with trying to understand the personality behind the project. > Danger, the project, is a female, northern UK, command-line app into 80's > punk/indie. Inspired by community efforts like the Haçienda / Factory > Records.

> Understandably, applying a gender to a genderless concept comes with it's > own complications. To make it worse, female genders tend to be applied > towards "digital assistants" which should raise questions on outdated-but- > still-persisting gender stereotypes and patriarchical power structures. > There is no answer that can completely absolve the disconnect I'm afraid.

[https://danger.systems/guides/faq.html#danger-keeps- getting-...](https://danger.systems/guides/faq.html#danger-keeps-getting- referred-to-as-quot-her-she-quot-what-gives)</comment></comment>