Possibly the worst CAPTCHA ever. - <AUTHOR> http://www.epcounty.com/publicrecords/officialpublicrecords/OfficialPublicRecordSearch.aspx

<comment><USER2> Not nearly the worst.

The worst I've seen was one where the captcha was injected into the HTML, then scrambled with CSS and scome scripting so that it would be difficult for a human to type it.

I think it was for a bank.

<comment><USER3> I believe Sony did that as well. I remember it surfacing after that major personal info breach a while ago.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Nope. Here are the worst captchas: [http://www.johnmwillis.com/other/top-10-worst- captchas/](http://www.johnmwillis.com/other/top-10-worst-captchas/)

</comment><comment><USER5> This is actually one of the more useable captchas I've seen recently...

<comment><USER6> Trivial to solve with OCR though, which sort of defeats the purpose entirely. I'm fairly certain the letters would just be in plaintext in the SWF anyway, so it's probably breakable for a malicious person at no cost. Hard for the user, easy for criminals, smells like DRM to me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> CAPTCHA is bad. It serves a purpose, but it serves it so completely and resolutely that it does a disservice to user-friendliness. I feel like this example is the logical evolution of the concept. That is to say, it is abhorrent, but almost un-remarkably so. I'm also on the website for a local government, so that probably adds to why this doesn't faze me.

And to be honest, it was still easier to process than some of the recaptcha I've come across.

(I'll just conveniently ignore the fact that it's made in Flash.)

</comment><comment><USER8> Worst I have seen is for U-play "forgot my password". For months it has said to do 2 side by side capchas, but only one image appears, but with two entry boxes. Their official response is to do it through their forums, which only requires 1.

</comment><comment><USER9> Why are we still doing this?

OpenID is the answer to this problem. Let the likes of Google/Facebook/Yahoo/Symantec worry about this problem.

<comment><USER10> Many people don't want the Google and Facebook overlords holding the keys to our kingdoms. If logging in via FB/Google is my only option, I simply find another site/app. It's that simple.

<comment><USER9> Don't do that, you are spreading FUD about OpenID. OpenID isn't a Google or Facebook choice. Its many more and under your control, your choice. It's statements like that that make people think an open identity platform isn't worth implementing.

We need to stop giving emails and passwords out to 200+ sites and wondering why we get spam and regular password resets.

<comment><USER11> > Don't do that, you are spreading FUD about OpenID. OpenID isn't a Google or > Facebook choice. Its many more and under your control, your choice. It's > statements like that that make people think an open identity platform isn't > worth implementing.

In September 2013, Janrain announced that MyOpenID.com would be shut down on February 1, 2014; a pie chart showed Facebook and google dominate the social login space as of Q2 2013.[67] Facebook has since left OpenID; it is no longer a sponsor, represented on the board, or permitting OpenID logins.[15][68]

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

Generally everyone moved away from OpenID in favour of OAuth and even when they were implementing it most big companies were just OpenID providers, thereby totally defeating the openness part.

Based on the above, I could safely say, it's not worth implementing OpenID.

I would suggest doing research on the topic before making bold statements like this.

> We need to stop giving emails and passwords out to 200+ sites and wondering > why we get spam and regular password resets.

Sure, let's just use Facebook and Google logins everywhere I'm sure nothing bad could come of it aside from the NSA getting full access to EVERYTHING that we use then.

If you are bothered by spam and the likes, just register yourself a throwaway email account.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Is it Flash? Because I can't see anything on mobile.

<comment><USER13> Yes it is. It's a flash animation with a whole bunch of letters falling downwards, 3-5 of them green and one of them purple or blue, with some flashy stars in the background, and it asks you to type only the green letters.

And if you hit the button to get a new CAPTCHA, the old letters vanish with a sparkly effect before the new ones fall down.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I don't think that that is so bad. At least they don't show "GREEN" in blue.

</comment><comment><USER15> The worse would be those that make you watch an ad video then type in the ad words.

<comment><USER16> Does this really exists ?

<comment><USER17> yes. during the campaign, a few sites had those video ads and I had to watch the Meg Whitman video and then type in "GoMegWhitman2010". I did not.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Hashcash.

/me keeps up the good fight.

<comment><USER19> Hashcash just hurts people with older computers. If spammers wanted to get around Hashcash, a decent sized rig will blow through them. Hell, it would be easier than OCR.

<comment><USER18> This doesn't hold up for a number of reasons.

First, the client should be actively and asynchronously working on the puzzle when the page loads, so when the submit button is pressed, the puzzle is solved, and ready to be submitted to the server. Asynchronous JavaScript has already been solved. Even for a Raspberry Pi, a 16-byte Hashcash puzzle can likely be solved before the user has finished typing in the form.

Second, the point of Hashcash is to stop spammers from mass POST attempts. Form spammers rely on bots, without JavaScript, to mass POST to forms, millions of times per day. As soon as JavaScript is required, this immediately stops 90% of the bots in use, right now. Of course, they'll adapt, with JavaScript VM bots if Hashcash is the norm, which then ties up the client solving the puzzle. The longer the client is tied up, the less it can spam in a given amount of time. It _drastically_ slows down the amount of comments a spammer or zombie network can perform. As computing gets more powerful, the Hashcash minting size can be increased, to continue tying up the bots. "Blowing through them" couldn't be a bigger exaggeration and further from the truth.

Third, properly implemented Hashcash is designed to prevent double spending. So, once the token is spent, it cannot be spent again. Even better implementations will not allow tokens that have not been minted within a certain timeframe, such as 24 hours. The Hashcash specification has the timestamp as part of the token. This discourages mining the tokens early, for spending later.

Lastly, captchas have shown to be entirely ineffective against bots. Do a search for beating captchas, and you'll see the sad state of affairs. Captchas are getting harder for humans to interpret, because bots are getting better at OCR, and defeating them, with increasing reliability. In every instance I've deployed Hashcash into a web form, I have yet to see spam come through. In one site, as of the time of this writing, Hashcash is solely responsible for blocking 670,624 spam POST attempts in a 10 year run.

The big drawback, is forcing JavaScript to be enabled, in able to POST to a form. From what I've seen on the virtual web hosts I administer, it seems to be about 10% of the web traffic has JavaScript disabled, on average. This might be acceptable, and it might not.</comment></comment></comment>


GitLab 9.2 Released with Multiple Assignees for Issues and Pipeline Schedules - <AUTHOR> https://about.gitlab.com/2017/05/22/gitlab-9-2-released/ <comment><USER2> If you're starting a company _today_ , would you use Gitlab over it's competitors (Atlassian, GitHub)?

And keep in mind, I'm not talking about specifically using GitLab for "git". I mean, what technology stack would you use for:

\- Issue tracking

\- VCS

\- Developer Chat

\- CI/CD

\- Project Boards / Project Management

I actually just asked this question today [1] but didn't get much of a response.

I know Atlassian is not properly but for a fully stack software development experience, it seems like my only true options are either GitLab or Atlassian (not GitHub).

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14394123](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14394123)

<comment><USER3> I used both. While Atlassian didn't included everything by default and misses lots of features (due to their plugin system which means that they don't necessary think they need to implement stuff) and Atlassian uses more resource and does not support git:// urls only the ugly ssh:// once. If I think back I should've never switched from Jira+Stash+Jenkins, however we did the Switch to GitLab and somehow I'm not 100% happy. It's way way slower a lot of things in CE are just missing and the costs for our < 10 user company would be way higher with gitlab ee. gitlab is easy to upgrade and the maintance feels a little bit more easy since jira/stash backup is way more complicated. however the jira is way better at managing issues (even the lightweight version of the boards is more simple and easier to use) and stash is extremly fast compared to anything on gitlab. at the end everything has their tradeoffs, but I would prefer the Atlassian Stack since it never broke anything, while on GitLab we often run into issues (especially CI related)

<comment><USER4> Thanks for the feedback.

What do you need in GitLab to manage issues better?

Sorry to hear you ran into problems with your self hosted GitLab. What CI problem was the most disruptive?

<comment><USER3> Well to not write a wall of text, this were the most "disruptive" things: \- compared to JIRA Agile the issue board is a joke (it's hard to actually describe the differences, but basically we can't use the gitlab issue board since it either doesn't work correctly when closing issues via push or it just isn't as understandable as the jira versions) \- docker and the ci is a horrible experience (we had a jenkins build before, which always worked, however even the ssh way of gitlab ci sometimes fails randomly or can't be canceled or whatever)

Positive thinks about gitlab: \- your at least listening (while atlassian is not, they mostly care for their big customers) however stability and performance should be your number one priority and not adding more stuff that might make that stuff worse. sometimes it's good to not add more stuff in some versions.

<comment><USER5> Hiya,

Thanks for sharing this feedback.

* Closing issues via push

Automatic issue closing (e.g. via push or MR) should work (I just tried it out on a test repo) - see the docs[1]. Did you use the correct keyword? Maybe something went awry, but it's definitely supported. Or did I misunderstand you and closing them via push works, but the issue is something related to the issue board instead? Could you share a bit more info? We'd love to get that sorted out if it's a bug or problem.

* Issue Board usability

We'd like to make the issue board as best as it can be. Which part of it was confusing to you? Maybe we can open an issue about it and ping the UX team?

* CI

Could you detail the experiences you had with our CI? Were you using GitLab.com or a self-hosted instance? And if you were using GitLab.com, were you using your own or our shared runners?

You can definitely cancel jobs, strange that you had problems with it.

What failed in your job?

* Stability & Performance

With each release we're adding stability and performance improvements, see [2]. And as always, our infra team works hard to improve the same on GitLab.com, see [3]

[1] - [https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/user/project/issues/automatic_iss...](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/user/project/issues/automatic_issue_closing.html)

[2] - [https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab- ce/issues/?scope=all&ut...](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab- ce/issues/?scope=all&utf8=&state=opened&label_name\[\]=performance)

[3] - [https://gitlab.com/gitlab- com/infrastructure/issues?scope=al...](https://gitlab.com/gitlab- com/infrastructure/issues?scope=all&utf8=&state=opened&label_name\[\]=performance)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Thanks for all your amazing hard work guys and gals, really truly appreciate all the effort that's been going into making GitLab releases faster, reliable and all the new features that have been coming out, especially around Issues and CI.

I upgraded our dev and then prod environments not after the announcement without a hitch.

Keep up the good work!

<comment><USER4> Thanks Mr Mondo!

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> One of the things I like most about Gitlab, is the steady releases and improvements by small doses, making it easy to auto-upgrade and adapt as we go (with the occasional internal announcement: "hey, you can now do X in Gitlab, have fun"). I've used JIRA/Atlassian, Github and Redmine a lot, and by far, I like Gitlab the most.

My only point of friction, which is being worked on, but will presumably take some time: no internationalization of the user interface (UI translation). I manage two instances of Gitlab: one for our shop (where we communicate with clients), another for a large-ish free software project (with hundreds of people from all skills and all languages). We (obviously) try to take any step we can do to remove friction with tools, but language is an important factor that we often under-estimate.

<comment><USER4> Thanks for the kind words. As mentioned in the release post we Internationalized Cycle Analytics. More translations are forthcoming.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm seriously considering switching to Gitlab. Multiple assignees makes sense for large projects.

<comment><USER9> GitHub's had multiple assignees since last year: [https://github.com/blog/2178-multiple-assignees-on-issues- an...](https://github.com/blog/2178-multiple-assignees-on-issues-and-pull- requests)

I mean, switch if you want to switch. But I hope that that is not your main reason.

<comment><USER8> I've had other reasons to want to switch. It's still not enough to pull the trigger though.

<comment><USER4> What would make you switch?

<comment><USER10> For me getting something done for => [https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab- ee/issues/1020](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ee/issues/1020)

Patiently waiting for this since I reported this request to you in [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11092066](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11092066) :)

Unfortunately somewhere along the way this was turned into an enterprise edition ticket. Would be nice to have this available for my personal install as well.

<comment><USER11> We are looking at the performance metrics over time now, based on the monitoring work we are doing.

What tools are you using to do your testing now?

<comment><USER10> Append to a sqlite database and have some adhoc queries on top of it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Very excited about official gitlab Helm charts! Awesome work.

Just tried it out and was hit by the `gitlab` service not starting due to: "PersistentVolumeClaim is not bound, which was unexpected."

Shame, I'll try it in a few releases and see if it's improved.

<comment><USER11> Hi orf,

Thanks for giving our Helm charts a try! That is actually a temporary error, because the pod is waiting on the underlying storage to provision.

If you wait a few minutes, the underlying PVC will finish provisioning and the pod will automatically retry starting. At that point it should succeed.

We will update our documentation to include this, sorry for the confusion.

<comment><USER12> Hey Josh, I'm running it on Minikube though and the storage had provisioned without error. Perhaps I needed to allocate more disk space to my minikube instance (the default is only 20g), it would be good to include that in the documentation as well!

Minikube will be the gateway to most people trying this I assume. As such, you'd need to increase the default CPU/RAM/Disk for Minikube:

minikube start --disk-size 80g --cpus 4 --memory 4080

<comment><USER11> Thanks orf, you are exactly right. The requirements exceed the minikube defaults, we will add this to the documentation as well.

<comment><USER4> This was done in [https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab- ce/merge_requests/11624](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab- ce/merge_requests/11624)

<comment><USER12> Thanks for the quick turnaround! I'm not sure this is the issue though:

[https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab- ce/issues/32773](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/32773)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Curated list of resources to learn ethical hacking - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/codedbrain/getting-started-with-eh/blob/master/readme.md <comment><USER2> nice</comment>


DIY gnome applets - <AUTHOR> http://nicolasb.com.ar/2011/09/diy-gnome-applets/ <comment><USER2> I think this is not relevant in GNOME 3, which no longer has applets. Instead, you write extensions. There are multiple simple examples at [http://blog.fpmurphy.com/2011/04/gnome-3-shell- extensions.ht...](http://blog.fpmurphy.com/2011/04/gnome-3-shell- extensions.html)

<comment><USER3> I took the submitted post to be intentionally funny.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Not specific to the GNOME environment, but some people might want to check out dzen if they are interested in piping CLI commands to their desktop.

<http://sites.google.com/site/gotmor/dzen></comment>


Ask HN: How do you capture/keep your ideas? - <AUTHOR> I'm thinking of tackling these two problems:<p>(1) Ideas happen anywhere, anytime (running, in the shower, driving, etc). How to capture these ideas before they vanish?<p>(2) I use notebooks, but once I write down an idea chances are that I will never see it again. I have a box full of notebooks collecting dust.<p>I want to know how do you capture/keep your ideas (notebook, an app, eidetic memory, napkins, mails to yourself), what do you like/dislike about your current way, and what have you tried and didn't work/stick. <comment><USER2> Been trying a variation of Noguchi's system described here : [http://www.literatureandlatte.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1592...](http://www.literatureandlatte.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=15926#p15926)

<comment><AUTHOR> Nice. Do you use the variation described in the linked post, or did you do a variation of your own? (If so, please can you explain it?)</comment></comment>


Rebuilding a simplified Firefox logo - <AUTHOR> http://blog.seanmartell.com/2013/06/27/rebuilding-a-simplified-firefox-logo/ <comment><USER2> Downvote me to hell but I can't stand the new logo. It's the little things, the designer is on the right track, simplification is the right direction but...

The new 2013 logo is unbalanced & dull.

1) First it's extremely unbalanced, all the eye popping color, depth, & detail is in the tail with nearly no highlights on the left side of the logo.

2) The fur on the end of the tail is 3D, slightly wrapping itself around the globe. Why? Why simplify the whole logo and leave the tail with the same awful complexities as the previous 09-13 logo? The tails in the 04-05 and 05-09 are near perfection and more simple. The newer tails add unnecessary detail yet they were kept.

3) It's inconsistently flat. Usually flat coincides with simple, but the logo's complex outlines have actually been exaggerated while the coloring has been flattened and simplified. The fox's head and torso on the other hand were nicely simplified (aside from the little hairs added all over).

4) It's dull. What was once planet earth is now a dull blue ball with coffee stains.

5) The gradient of orange to yellow is too hard. The entire fox is orange then sharply turns to yellow after the tail starts. The gradient change in the 04-05 version is perfect. The new logo's gradient is harsh and too distracting.

6) Micro-details were added. Why? I thought this was about simplifying? Look at the fox's fur on it's back. There's little tiny hairs that have been added that weren't there in the 04-05 and 05-09 version. There's no reason for those to be there. When the logo is shrunk and viewed at it's normal size they won't even be visible, why not just remove them altogether. In fact the ears have added hairs as well.

It's easily salvageable and the designer was on the right track:

Just bright up planet earth, contrast the continents from the ocean more, remove the 3D-ness of the fox's tail, further simplify or remove the tail's inner fur spikes, and soften the gradient of orange to yellow that runs across the fox's body and get rid of those annoying hairs that one can only see when zoomed in 400%.

<comment><USER3> Perspective: This is how the normal person will see what you are hating [http://rkuykendall.com/uploads/fx-logos- small.png](http://rkuykendall.com/uploads/fx-logos-small.png)

<comment><USER4> Interesting - at that scale, the gloss on the globe in the 2009-2013 version looks unnecessarily distracting to me. The latest one "reads" best to me at that scale.

<comment><USER5> I was thinking the same thing. But by and large, 2004-2005 was remarkably a case of "if it ain't broke...". The fox was just the right shade, the globe was there, but not overwhelming.

Considering this was right before the rise of Web 2.0, we can see the gloss was appropriate at the time, but it suddenly follows the flashy trend downhill.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I started reading this article with a burning prejudice against overly nitpicky designers, but I have to say, each change here makes perfect sense and contributes to a more cohesive whole. Never thought Firefox of all places would be a good place to read about design. Great work!

In regards to the flatness and lack of detail that some people are complaining about: when I look at the Firefox icon in my taskbar, I don't parse it as a fox and a globe but rather as an abstract red/blue circle. The simplified design will make this easier to read -- much more in line with, for example, the Chrome logo.

<comment><USER7> > " _Never thought Firefox of all places would be a good place to read about > design._ "

Why's that? Firefox has always had incredible design aspects to their products?

<comment><USER8> I don't know if _always_ is quite true, but they've been pretty solid for the last three years or so, definitely :)

<comment><USER9> Many of us long-time Firefox users have actually found the past three years to be the worst so far, in terms of design.

The rush to copy Chrome in appearance and behavior has essentially ruined what was a decent experience before. What's worse is that the design changes haven't actually brought any benefits, either. And to make it even worse, there has been nothing to suggest that things will actually improve any time soon.

Firefox's declining market share over this period is very good evidence that people are not happy with it. It initially became popular because it provided a better experience than other browsers; now it's declining because it's providing a worse experience, and the recent changes clearly haven't been helping the situation.

<comment><USER10> > Firefox's declining market share over this period is very good evidence

The only evidence we have is that Google's marketing team has been _very_ effective at advertising Chrome. :-P

> Many of us long-time Firefox users have actually found the past three years > to be the worst so far, in terms of design.

I'm not sure why you think you can speak for many Firefox users.

> rush to copy Chrome in appearance and behavior

I'll quote myself from a different discussion [1]:

Outside of manilla folder-like tabs and a panel menu, Chrome is given far too much credit in innovating the direction of browser UI. Tabs on top is an objectively better UI choice [2]. The download manager is an original Firefox design [3] and almost anything else that other browsers have adopted (tabs on top, start page tiles, etc) is all from Opera.

> now it's declining because it's providing a worse experience, and the recent > changes clearly haven't been helping the situation.

FWIW, Firefox has held steady over the past year hovering around 20% according to Net Applications [4], and they even had a small uptick in the past month. In any case, I am confident Firefox lost users because of Chrome's superior performance and snappy behavior, not because of UI changes. I think projects like MemShrink [5], Project Snappy [6], and the revived Electrolysis [7] will go a long way towards improving Firefox's performance. Will those changes be too little too late? Who knows. Will the upcoming Australis design be the last straw if your theory holds true? That's up for debate.

I've recognized your handle on other Mozilla/Firefox related posts on HN and your comments seem to be universally negative [8]. Have you had a bad experience with the community? I understand strong dislike for a company or product, but it just seems...difficult to hate on such an underdog like Mozilla. :-P

/says self-declared Mozilla fanboy

[1]:[http://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/1fhgak/mozilla_plea...](http://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/1fhgak/mozilla_please_stop_copying_chrome/caahuua)

[2]: [https://blog.mozilla.org/faaborg/2010/06/24/why-tabs-are- on-...](https://blog.mozilla.org/faaborg/2010/06/24/why-tabs-are-on-top-in- firefox-4/)

[3]: [http://limi.net/articles/safari- downloads/](http://limi.net/articles/safari-downloads/)

[4]: [http://www.netmarketshare.com/](http://www.netmarketshare.com/)

[5]: [https://wiki.mozilla.org/Performance/MemShrink](https://wiki.mozilla.org/Performance/MemShrink)

[6]: [https://wiki.mozilla.org/Performance/Snappy](https://wiki.mozilla.org/Performance/Snappy)

[7]: [https://wiki.mozilla.org/Electrolysis](https://wiki.mozilla.org/Electrolysis)

[8]: [https://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/comments&q=firefox+P...](https://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/comments&q=firefox+PommeDeTerre&start=0)

<comment><USER9> There is some historical browser usage share data from a variety of sources at: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers#Hi...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers#Historical_usage_share)

StatCounter's desktop and mobile stats show a consistent decline from 26.49% in June 2011 to 16.86% in May 2003.

StatCounter's desktop stats show a peak of 32.21% in November 2009 down to 19.76% last month.

The Clicky stats are similar, showing a peak of 33.43% in December 2009, down to 21.19% in May 2013.

And then there's W3Counter's data, which shows peaks of 32.3% between December 2009 and March 2010, down to 19.2% in May 2013.

Wikimedia's data, although not as recently updated, shows a peak of 30.96% in February 2010, down to 19.11% in October 2012.

The numbers you cite are quite different from these other sources, which are all relatively consistent, which in turn makes me suspicious of yours.

I think we have indeed seen Firefox go from approximately 30% share at the end of 2009 and beginning of 2010 down to less than 20% today. That's a pretty significant drop in just 3.5 years.

As for my negatively, like I said, the Mozilla crew has earned it. I know many others share this opinion, as well. The numbers above support that very strongly.

We were quite happy with Firefox up until Firefox 4. Before then, the focus was on usability, and providing a good browser. Since then, however, the priorities have clearly shifted, and the resulting product has declined in quality and usability quite severely. It's a bad situation, and I'm not going to pretend otherwise. Some people speak out, others just move to a different browser.

<comment><USER10> > I think we have indeed seen Firefox go from approximately 30% share at the > end of 2009 and beginning of 2010 down to less than 20% today.

I don't disagree that Firefox lost marketshare over the past 3 years. Interestingly enough, the peaks you list are nowhere near Firefox 4's release date (March 2011), while Google's advertising for Chrome began near those points [1]. Both StatCounter and Net Applications show this trend (decline after Q4 2009).

Whether or not StatCounter or Net Applications is more accurate is an argument I don't want to pursue (page views vs unique visitors, country weighting to remove bias vs no weighting to preserve data integrity, etc.).

> I know many others share this opinion, as well. The numbers above support > that very strongly.

I'm willing to bet if Firefox continued to look like version 3.6 yet took the same performance/behavior from every version along the way it would be in the same position. Chrome has simply been the superior browser to get things done, but that can actually be questioned now with a more competitive browser landscape.

> Before then, the focus was on usability, and providing a good browser. Since > then, however, the priorities have clearly shifted,

How so?

> It's a bad situation, and I'm not going to pretend otherwise.

Who's pretending? I'm quite aware of Firefox/Mozilla's position as an underdog (in fact, I'm concerned). I'm just wondering why you feel the need to reiterate your dislike given that if someone has not been convinced to move from Firefox to another browser by now, then either they don't know other options (unlikely) or they clearly still appreciate something about the Firefox or Mozilla community and ecosystem that goes beyond the growing pains that pushed you away.

Mozilla did wonders breaking the IE monoculture and they are doing solid work now keeping the other major players honest, if not competitive by offering a solid contender now. In the end, I want Mozilla to be successful because I believe Mozilla matters: [https://brendaneich.com/2013/02/why-mozilla- matters/](https://brendaneich.com/2013/02/why-mozilla-matters/)

[1]: [http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-10422101-71.html](http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-10422101-71.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I don't care about the new logo, or the old one... I just clicked the comments link to confirm what's at this point become pretty well documented on HN: _all articles introducing new graphic designs of any kind will be hated_.

Not that it's not justified, but I'd challenge anyone to pull up an example to the contrary. I'm sure someone can find one, and it'll probably somehow involve Stripe :)

<comment><USER12> It's funny... I think there might actually be a good reason for this.

In so much of my experience, it often seems like version 1.0 (or sometimes 2.0 or 3.0) is the best version of something. All the original creators are still on board, the interface is straightforward, the functionality is clear, the product is good.

But then, by the time you get to 4.0+, the original creators have moved on, a new team comes in looking to make their mark, and suddenly a graphic overhaul is introduced, they start focusing on "content" or "exposing features" or whatnot, the interface loses organization and coherence, and bad decisions start being made.

I don't know of a name for this phenomenon, but it almost seems to be the rule rather than the exception. But it may explain why people seem to be so anti- change -- because, so many times, the change actually is just pointless or bad.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Interesting that they aim to have a single resolution-independent logo ("This tied into another goal of having the image hold up with greater clarity at smaller sizes" _and_ "with high resolution displays in mind"), while traditionally, advice was to tweak icons to their display size and resolution. For example, [https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/ipad/#documentation/...](https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/ipad/#documentation/userexperience/conceptual/applehiguidelines/IconsImages/IconsImages.html) says "redraw art as you scale down" and "do not use the standard-resolution 32x32 icon as the 16x16@2 icon". Similarly, [http://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/windows/desktop/aa51...](http://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/windows/desktop/aa511280.aspx) says "Simply scaling down from the 256x256 size does not work" and "As an icon gets smaller, transparency and some special details found in larger sizes should be sacrificed in order to simplify and get the point across."

This isn't purely by technological choice ("we want a svg logo"), as one can somewhat build a svg where the level of detail varies depending on display size ([http://timkadlec.com/2013/04/media-queries-within- svg/](http://timkadlec.com/2013/04/media-queries-within-svg/)).

So it's either a deliberate "it's better that way" choice, or a "better one really good logo than a couple of less good ones", or they weren't aware of media queries, or they don't think them supported well enough.

<comment><USER14> Clarity at smaller sizes depends on color & contrast, not small details. Of course they will do manually-optimized 16, 32 and 64px versions.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> And in 2-3 years there'll be another post 'explaining' how the 2013 logo was too dull or the gradients lacked dynamics or something, and there'll be another logo that's basically the same with marginal changes, because people basically can't resist the urge to tweak.

I appreciate that people get bored and design sensibilities change. But spare us the long-winded itemization of why this is 'objectively' better, when it's obviously a simple matter of taste.

<comment><USER14> Fair point, but it _is_ objectively better at small sizes (see comments above), a bit similar to the original one.

<comment><USER15> I don't really agree. I liked the second one best, but I presume there was some good reasons for the last version they adopted as well.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Somehow I still prefer Jon Hicks original re-brand of the phoenix logo the best. That is the 2004-2005 version displayed in the article. See [1] for an earlier evolution write-up of the brand logo.

[http://thinsmek.com/a-history-of-the-firefox-icon-and- detail...](http://thinsmek.com/a-history-of-the-firefox-icon-and-details-on- the-3-5-logo/)

</comment><comment><USER17> Am I alone in thinking that the 2005–09 logo is clearly the strongest image? I'd like to see the results of a poll. Designers can talk their way into all sorts of things; a bit of objective measurement of opinion would be interesting.

<comment><USER18> That was my initial thought too, but ultimately I have no problem with them simplifying the logo to make it SVG-friendly, even if the first pass results in an oversimplification. In a few years, the next pass will probably be done in SVG first and might get a little more detail back.

 _> The first step in the rebuild was to go in and strip out all the detail that was using blend mode layering such as multiply, screen and overlay – mostly found in the tail area 1. As stated, a key goal of the redesign was to make it work flawlessly in SVG as well as open up the possibility to rebuild all the internal structure using SVG and CSS gradients._

 _> Having reduced the logo down to its shape-tweaked forms 2 and softer gradients, we continued to remove any detail we thought wasn't critical to the overall image. This tied into another goal of having the image hold up with greater clarity at smaller sizes._

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I wish there was some more contrast on the continents, but otherwise I think it looks nice (and they finally fixed the arm!!).

However, given that one of the stated reasons for the change is "SVG compatibility", I'm surprised that there's no link to an SVG version. And the official Mozilla branding page doesn't seem to be updated yet:

[https://www.mozilla.org/en- US/styleguide/identity/firefox/br...](https://www.mozilla.org/en- US/styleguide/identity/firefox/branding/)

</comment><comment><USER20> This is mostly about the transition to SVG, not really a "brand evolution". The new logo is fine, not that much better or worse than any of the other variations shown. I don't get the hoopla.

I like what Wolff Olins did for Firefox OS and would love to see Mozilla take major new steps in that direction, with more radical changes to the logo (which frankly has always looked like a shrimp at favicon size): [http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/mozilla_...](http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/mozilla_to_mobile_oses_fox_you.php)

</comment><comment><USER21> I have never really liked the Firefox logo much. I guess this is a decent compromise given what they've got, and looking at an example of what a completely flat Firefox logo would look like it just doesn't quite work, think this is a at least a step forward.

[http://www.iconfinder.com/icondetails/85101/513/browser_fire...](http://www.iconfinder.com/icondetails/85101/513/browser_firefox_flat_mozilla_icon)

<comment><USER22> Mmm, the logo you linked seems to have lost all meaning concerning the globe. When I look at it, the blue sphere doesn't seem to fit well. The fox also seems just a bit too rounded.

</comment></comment><comment> rkuykendall-com My browser didn't want to resize the page smaller than 25%, so I made this to visualize the logos at very small sizes:

[http://rkuykendall.com/uploads/fx-logos- small.png](http://rkuykendall.com/uploads/fx-logos-small.png)

</comment><comment><USER23> This looks unbalanced. Right side has much more colours than left.

<comment><USER24> Region 2 in the article is the back of the fox -- they removed all the fur, which I think is an important detail. There's some color variation up by the shoulder/neck area that sort-of looks like it, but it's too subtle.

Thumbs-up on removing the high gloss, though.

(yeah yeah, everyone's a critic)

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> I hate this current "make it flat" movement. Ok, it's good so smoothen the logo a bit, the oval light on top wasn't super pretty, but the grade of details (in the fox!) were just about perfect.

</comment><comment><USER26> Man, I always thought the FF logo was a good example of a complex logo that worked really well. The new one is a little too simple.

</comment><comment><USER27> It lost a lot of depth on the left hand side. Instead of looking like the back of a fox, it just looks like an amorphous shape with a tail. 2009-2013 was the best on the left hand side.

</comment><comment><USER28> The word simple must be the word for today. From the payment processor to arguments for and against simple coding..arrrgh. Do you want a simple logo? Do what USA Today did to their logo. Have a third grader spill blue paint.

<comment><USER29> But spilled paint doesn't have simple enough geometry!

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> It wasn't a good logo to begin with. Lets start there. It's trying too hard to be literal and fit into the blue round boundaries of most other browser logos. And I honestly don't know whether the tail is supposed to be stylized fire or not. The asymmetry and distracting hi lights bother me too. In order to evolve and mature a logo it has to be solid to begin with. Otherwise updating it just makes it fall apart.

</comment><comment><USER31> I am experiencing extreme design rage that they kept the way the blue globe shows through in ragged edges of the tail. It's pointless, distracting, and violent.

"Violent," you wonder? "Surely you are insane and hyperbolic." I am neither. Look at those spots and tell me they don't look like a cheese grater. I wouldn't touch this icon if it existed in 3D space. Would you?

</comment><comment><USER32> I guess they had it right the first time.

</comment><comment><USER33> I gather this is driven by SVG: an efficient use of a minimal number of bezier curves (quite literally, _reticulating splines_ ).

It would be a nice project to automatically recreate existing image files as efficient SVGs.

However, this procedure seems to make things look flat and textureless.

</comment><comment><USER34> I think it would be psychologically better if that Fox were to show his eyes.

<comment><USER35> Here's the fox all on his lonesome, though not exactly in logo form: [http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/mozilla_...](http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/mozilla_to_mobile_oses_fox_you.php)

<comment><USER22> There was also a special fox made by Mozilla Japan a few years back [http://www.foxkeh.com/downloads/](http://www.foxkeh.com/downloads/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> Oddly, until reading this article I was always under the impression the Shepard Fairey created the Firefox logo...something seemed off redesigning the Firefox logo and not mentioning Shepard, so I looked into it and...

It turns out Shepard Fairey created the red "Mozilla.org logo and mascot" (see: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_%28mascot%29](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_%28mascot%29)).

</comment><comment><USER37> Never really been a fan of the Firefox logo. Why not go for a revolution? Just use the Red Panda as inspiration for something very cutsey and recognisable. Bin the current logo.

I like the idea of the ship's wheel in the navigator logo, and the compass in Safari. As for the other logos they don't do anything for me (oh alright, IceWeasel is quite a funny knock off, and Nightly's is boringly okay.)

<comment><USER38> might as well rename FireFox to RedPanda too ;)

<comment><USER37> The Firefox name is kind of catchy (and known) so I wouldn't go that far. ;)

I think the name started it started out as Phoenix, then Firebird - which they couldn't use as it was a database, and then was named Firefox. I quite like the transition. Not sure if it was Clint Eastwood inspired or not. I like the way that Firefox is the Red Panda - so it's nice that it kind of has that evolution. It so happens that the Firefox is rare and is totally cute. There was an icon floating around on Linux which was based on the panda that I liked - and the panda has loads of potential for a lovely icon.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> "Simplifying a style doesn't always mean bringing it down to basic geometric shapes and solid colors."

Cough... cough... iOS7

<comment><USER40> And Google, Microsoft, ...

Though really iOS7 is the least flat looking.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> That blog layout is gorgeous, anyone know what it is? I'm guessing it a custom made skin by him.

<comment><USER38> from the source, looks like WordPress

<comment> mh- indeed, the WP theme is [https://github.com/viewportindustries/starkers](https://github.com/viewportindustries/starkers)

can see here: [http://blog.seanmartell.com/wp- content/themes/simplified/sty...](http://blog.seanmartell.com/wp- content/themes/simplified/style.css)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Oh I thought it was a lazy designer that left out all the details in the Firefox logo. Never imagined it was actually a new logo. Didn't really notice it a lot though anyway, not sure you can even call this a new logo.

</comment><comment><USER43> For an article about how it is now SVG-compatible for improved display on retina-class screens, it sure does look crappy on my Chromebook Pixel.

Would have been nice if they used retina-quality assets in the announcement...

</comment><comment><USER44> I remember the hullabaloo when the 'flat' Chrome logo was introduced, but people have gotten used to it as well. Seems to me like the FF logo will undergo a similar transition :)

</comment><comment><USER45> I can't believe so much time has gone into iterating a logo which was pretty acceptable to begin with, when so many other areas need work.

<comment><USER46> I see your point but this is obviously a graphics guy (or girl) and probably not a programmer to the level that is require for a lot of the work on Firefox. Now if this new logo were designed by a developer on OdinMonkey I would say it was time wasted as they could be doing a lot more important thing but I don't think this is the case :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER47> I wonder if Debian will make a similarly flattened new logo for their Iceweasel version of Firefox.

</comment><comment><USER48> First logo was more punchy/constrasted ! New one is inexpressive.

</comment><comment><USER49> wtf is up with the whole "flat" trend? first microsoft, then apple and now firefox. lack of depth does not look "good".

</comment><comment><USER50> Jerking it, Firefox edition. Nobody cares about the details as 99% of the users will look at this logo in a 16x16 or 32x32 px version.

Is it a fox hugging a globe? Is the fox red/orange? Yes? Is it somewhat detailed? Okay. _Good enough_.

</comment><comment><USER51> Oh look, it's even more flat!

Just put the gun to its head and pull the trigger. Flat's all the rage man, why not kill another great logo with it!

<comment><USER52> That is nowhere near flat.

<comment><USER53> It may not be as flat as currently trendy (Microsoft, iOS 7) but it still has way less contrast than all the previous revisions.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54>
        Dear Firefox,

        Please don't.

        Sincerely,
        the Internet</comment>


Web History Chapter 4: Search - <AUTHOR> https://css-tricks.com/chapter-4-search/ <comment><AUTHOR> Some people at Stanford put me on to Google in 1998. I knew in ten minutes with just a few searches that it was lightspeed better than everyone else.

Plus the portals took forever to load, even on a broadband connection. Google was super fast on my 4 mb connection. I went out in the next month and told everyone I knew to try it. I became an unpaid evangelist for Google I liked it so much.</comment>


Making Git and Jupyter Notebooks play nice - <AUTHOR> http://timstaley.co.uk/posts/making-git-and-jupyter-notebooks-play-nice/ <comment><USER2> Hi, HN!

Author here. A friend mentioned this was on the front page so I wanted to stop by and make explicit that this advice is OUT OF DATE as far as I'm concerned. It's way too much hassle (I work in a much larger team now than I did then!) and doesn't play well with rebase etc.

These days I either recommend the jupytext approach (not tried it but seems sensible) or personally I just use Sphinx-gallery.

Advantages:

* Plain python files play well with IDE refactoring, Black formatter, etc etc.

* You now have a readymade 'tutorial' page for your docs.

* Files are run with every docs build, so you can configure things to alert you when they're broken.

Disadvantages:

* You end up editing a throwaway notebook file. If you forget to copy-paste your edits back to the source, and rebuild, you have lost your edits. However, this forces me to keep the 'temporary, exploratory' nature at the front of my mind and not allow the notebook code to grow too large before performing some clean-up.

<comment><USER3> Can you not use [https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/python/jupyter-support- py...](https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/python/jupyter-support-py#_export-a- jupyter-notebook) to export/import?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Things I've found in checked-in notebooks:

* database credentials.

* sensitive data

* a whole DataBricks webpage because the person didn't understand how to export just the notebook.

* collections of notebooks named only what step in the process they are, and literally nothing about what they actually do.

* Whole base64 encoded images and zip files

* packages imported by manually manipulating system environment paths

* multi-processing/multithreading by shelling out and calling new python instances

* good old "don't run these cells"

<comment><USER5> Untitled9.ipynb

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Or just use jupytext and only commit the .py files. Works for us. Commits just look like normal python code, with a few comment markers for cells

<comment><USER7> I love jupytext, but i feel like it's a patch on a problem that should have just been solved. Just change jupyter to work directly in the genereres file format and skip the "pair files" hassle.

<comment><USER8> Or it could be solved at the git tooling side by introducing Jupyter specific merge and diff tools.

<comment><USER9> adding git tooling for a specific file type seems like a slippery slope, no? (assuming you are saying that git itself should have this tooling built in - if you mean some sort of addon, fair enough but then everyone who uses jupyter & git needs to install that addon)

<comment><USER8> I am not suggesting that git itself should ship with a bunch of custom merge utilities for specific file types. git ships with a mechanism that allows custom merge drivers. Setting up custom merge drivers might not be ergonomic right now, but it could have some benefits compared to the transformation approach. For example merge conflicts could result in a valid notebook and it could be manually resolved inside the notebook interface, no need to dive into the text file.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I found a good compromise by using VSCode Python extension. You can import Jupyter notebooks as Python scripts and the other way around [0]. If I need to work on a notebook, I prefer working with a Python script and the interactive window [1]. Then I commit both script and ipynb version.

[0] [https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/python/jupyter-support- py...](https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/python/jupyter-support-py#_export-a- jupyter-notebook)

[1] [https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/python/jupyter-support- py...](https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/python/jupyter-support-py#_python- interactive-window)

<comment><USER11> Agree 100%. Only thing I'd add is that the killer feature of the extension is that it allows one to treat ordinary python files as notebooks (without converting!) by 1. Connecting to a persistent kernel instance 2. Allowing the user to use magic comments to delineate code cells within the python file. With these two things, and the ability to export as a real notebook, you get the great experience of a notebook — submitting easily editable cells to a kernel one at a time, as many times as you want — without of all the usual baggage that that would entail. Plus you get to edit in a decent editor (and edit things other than just python files in it) instead of the crap Jupyter forces you to use.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Can Jupyter stop using JSON and look for a new structure (not only about the file format but also the data fields representation)? The current format is unordered and contains huge binary blobs which makes it very inefficient and version control is simply a pain.

I believe a new design worth sacrificing backward compability.

</comment><comment><USER13> A lot of people mentioning what is essentially R markdown files as a better approach.

In .rmd the notebook is just markdown where code segments inside triple backticks can be executed.

That sounds nice and git compatible (and it is), but you lose a lot of the convenience of Jupiter notebook, namely that output isn't stored together with input.

The nice thing about Jupyter notebooks is you get story, code and results in a single package.

<comment><USER14> At the beginning of your Rmd file, add a chunk that spins your Rmd file to an R script.

[https://www.garrickadenbuie.com/blog/convert-r-markdown- rmd-...](https://www.garrickadenbuie.com/blog/convert-r-markdown-rmd-files-to- r-scripts/)

Now you have:

\- single file (Rmd, plain text) where you can do any edits, which, when compiled, produces:

\- (1) you get story, code and results in a single package: one output file (usually, html), where all inputs and outputs are stored together (or, just the outputs, if you turn off echo'ing, e.g. for producing a report),

\- (2) you get the code: another output file, which is a simple R script version of your Rmd file.

Code updates to the Rmd are viewable much easier on the output R script (#2), which is also much more convenient for debugging. For static text updates, I look at the Rmd file. For content updates (e.g. did my data change between the runs?), I look at the html (or Word or PDF etc) file (#1).

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> A year ago, I was frustrated (and surprised) to see one can't do code reviews with Jupyter Notebooks. GitHub diffs for notebooks JSON are super messy.

I set out to build ReviewNB[1], code review tool for Jupyter Notebooks. Turns out a lot of other people had this exact problem. One can see visual diffs & write review comments on notebook cell. Currently only works with GitHub though.

If you want to diff locally (before committing changes), you might like nbdime[2].

[1] [https://www.reviewnb.com/](https://www.reviewnb.com/)

[2] [https://github.com/jupyter/nbdime](https://github.com/jupyter/nbdime)

</comment><comment><USER16> Note: This article is from February 2017.

</comment><comment><USER17> Google AI team did a very good presentation and blog post about this and other common problems [https://cloudblog.withgoogle.com/products/ai-machine- learnin...](https://cloudblog.withgoogle.com/products/ai-machine- learning/best-practices-that-can-improve-the-life-of-any-developer-using- jupyter-notebooks/amp/)

</comment><comment><USER18> I have some projects based on Jupyter Notebook (e.g. [https://github.com/stared/thinking-in-tensors-writing-in- pyt...](https://github.com/stared/thinking-in-tensors-writing-in-pytorch)), and collaboration sucks. Even with git, I need to resort to "don't touch these files, I am working on them right now".

I was thinking about using RMarkdown files (vide [https://towardsdatascience.com/version-control-with- jupyter-...](https://towardsdatascience.com/version-control-with-jupyter- notebooks-f096f4d7035a)) as for them diffs make sense.

Does any of you use this approach, or have insights on how to make it good for collaboration AND visible on GitHub?

</comment><comment><USER19> Interesting. Is it possible to integrate this as a git difftool instead? Sometimes you want to include the cell output in the repository.

</comment><comment><USER20> I just clear all outputs before committing code. Works well enough for me, but it's cool to see a more advanced solution!

<comment><USER21> The problem with that is when there are very long running cells and you want to see the output and keep developing, and committing code as you go along.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Neat project ! Dearly needed. But may i ask, why not use pandoc to convert notebooks to orgmode and git that ?

</comment><comment><USER23> Anybody aware of a corresponding solution for Mercurial yet?</comment>


AWS announces virtual private servers starting at $5 a month - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2016/11/30/aws-announces-virtual-private-servers-starting-at-5-a-month/ <comment><USER2> From the article:

 _"...removing a huge barrier to entry for less technical users"

"Certainly folks who have a technical background, and have more specific requirements will want more control over their choices"_

This isn't necessarily true. I might be generalizing, but I don't think that most people who can fire up and administer a Linux VM will have much trouble creating an EC2 instance.

The thing is...unless I _have_ to do that, I don't want to. Spinning up EC2, Azure, and GCE VMs isn't difficult, but I still much prefer the workflow of creating a VM using Linode or Digital Ocean.

There was a point in my career where I relished more complexity. I'm at the point now where I almost always prefer a simpler solution provided it is sufficient to accomplish the task at hand.

</comment><comment><USER3> TechCrunch report of: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13072155](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13072155)</comment>


Big Pharma shells out $20B each year to schmooze docs, $6B on drug ads - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/01/healthcare-industry-spends-30b-on-marketing-most-of-it-goes-to-doctors/ <comment><USER2> The entire reason for Outcome Health to exist as a company...

</comment><comment><USER3> This is a BIG problem that needs to be fixed imho.</comment>


An Introduction to SMB for Network Security Analysts - <AUTHOR> https://401trg.pw/an-introduction-to-smb-for-network-security-analysts/ <comment></comment>


Coronavirus may mean automation is coming sooner than we thought - <AUTHOR> https://liwaiwai.com/2020/04/21/coronavirus-may-mean-automation-is-coming-sooner-than-we-thought/ <comment><USER2> I think most of the predictions about permanent changes caused by the virus will turn out to be wildly wrong. Companies will view this as a rare event that's not worth spending significant resources to prepare for. The march toward more automation will press on just as it did before the virus, governed largely by the price of labor vs. the price of automation.

<comment><USER3> From what I've seen the thinking about permanent change is more that, massive changes are being made now, and inertia will mean those changes will stay in place, because they'll actually turn out to be better anyway. It's just that the cost of implementing or even considering those changes was too high before, but it's necessary now.

<comment><USER4> I think a lot of that is going to depend on the types of investors left in the stock market and the types of Highly Paid Consultants that Sell Their Vision after all of this.

At the moment it seems equally likely that some companies come out of all of this with the "lesson" that remote work caused their downturn in productivity and stock value (who can remember that every other company experienced the same when your investors only care "what have you done lately?" and "what have you done 'proactively'?") and we'll quickly see a return to "everybody needs to be in the office together" culture back backed by the same consultants that learned the wrong lessons after Marissa Mayer's Yahoo! house cleaning and were still badly ratcheting companies towards as miserable as possible colocation strategies.

It seems about 50/50 to me right now which group will prevail. At least with US public traded companies the only inertia seems to whatever shiny fad stock traders are enamored with versus whatever misery HPCs manage to sell on golf courses in C-Suite handshakes. (ETA: Some of whom, the worst stock investors and HPCs are the same people, of course.)

<comment><USER5> Well predicting _some companies_ will do something can't be wrong.

But working from home will expose a lot of stuff that _can_ be done from home, a lot of employees who turn out to _prefer_ working from home, and a lot of CEOs and accountants and so on will realize a lot of money can be saved on real estate. People are being quoted in the news along these lines, you don't have to anticipate it.

<comment><USER6> Agreed but it will also expose many who simply can't work at home also.

I am a advocate for working from home. But I know plenty of people and roles who are suffering a great deal from working from home.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> My take on this whole offshoring / automation conundrum is that although the current crisis won't immediately constitute a boon for automation, it will certainly pose the question in countless boardroom meetings. It's a question that's been asked before, but it's never been as top-of-mind as it is now, and that's first step to get the human and capital resources behind it to actually see this come to fruition.

From what I've heard in the manufacturing industry, automation is great conceptually but there are still many finer motor tasks for which the technology just isn't there yet, so cheap labor is the solution. Perhaps in hindsight these managers will find that concentrating all of that cheap labor in pretty much just one geography (China) isn't exactly the definition of redundancy, so supply chains in the long term will need to be redefined.

Slowly, geographies like Vietnam, Mexico, India and even the U.S. should benefit from this desire to diversify away from China. This "next generation" of factories will be smarter and pave the way for more advanced automation involving finer motor tasks.

> "The demand for smart factories is likely to grow with increased > diversification of production locations – from China to Vietnam, India, and > even the US." _(Morgan Stanley Research. Investing in the Second Machine Age > – Picking the Winners. July 19, 2019)_

<comment><USER7> Most likely supply chain managers will establish "second source" policies, just like the US Defense Department has always done for many products. They won't necessarily move away from China entirely, but will build factories in other countries as well.

<comment><USER8> Yeah, this crisis has illustrated beyond the shadow of a doubt that you need second-, third-, fourth- sources if you can. Especially for critical goods. Moving to Vietnam doesn't do anything to solve the fundamental problem. It may not even make sense to build a second- source in vietnam. You want geographic and, to the extent that it's possible, population isolation.

So finding someplace along one of South America's coasts would be attractive. Australia would be extremely attractive if we could get automation right because labor costs there are just too high. Africa would also be attractive in the extreme. You wouldn't even have to take the resources off of the continent. Lowest labor costs around. Plus, two enormous coasts full of warm water ports.

Anyway, the idea would be to set things up so that if one region goes to the dogs, you just switch to the other.

EDIT: Now I think about it, there are some pretty large political issues in africa right now, so maybe africa wouldn't be the best place. Populism could easily end up landing you in the same situation as white farmers in Zimbabwe. Anyway, the fundamental idea still stands. Balance manufacturing from Asia and N America more towards S America, and Australia.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> As soon as this thing hit this was one of my first thoughts, once things recover there are going to be a lot of companies looking for ways to automate things because robots don't get sick, they don't have to worry about social distancing they keep going until you tell them to stop or the power gets cut.

I do wonder however if this effect will be hampered by the number of unemployed. More unemployed people means a greater supply of laborers and that translates to lower costs.

Of course on the flip side it may be that many companies are starting to see what is actually necessary for their company to operate and will run with a leaner staff moving forward.

The future will be wild that's for sure.

EDIT: When I say "translates to lower costs" I mean lower costs for labor, realized what I said could be ambiguous.

<comment><USER10> The flip side is really the question: Where does the money come from to buy the things produced by the robots if people are no longer being paid to produce things?

If you answer something like UBI, then you're just passing the buck and the obvious question is, "where does that money come from?"

This problem is secretly baked into the structure of the current crisis. More automation is inevitable, I'm not arguing about that, but it will only exacerbate the problem.

<comment><USER11> The money is minted, which is to say printed, by the central bank. That is where the money comes from. That is where all money comes from.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's not where the _value_ of money comes from, though

<comment><USER12> But there isn't much value in people spending their lives driving delivery cars or bagging groceries either.

The point of UBI proposals is that there _is_ enough total value in our national economies to meet everyone's basic needs— the question of where the money/value "comes from" is simple, it comes from taking it back from where it's been concentrated over decades of inadequate taxation.

<comment><USER13> You're conflating financial value with moral value. There's a lot of financial value in delivery or bagging even if there's no moral value.

Printing money doesn't increase financial value it only increases liquidity.

> it comes from taking it back from where it's been concentrated over decades > of inadequate taxation.

Again you're not increasing the financial value, you're changing how it's disbursed. Whether your fuel is in the form of gasoline or electricity you still have a finite amount of it and once you burn through it, it's gone unless you're adding more to the system.

<comment><USER14> Could you expand on what you mean by "moral value" here? Something like job satisfaction, self-actualization etc?

"Moral" as a descriptor seems likely to derail the argument here. There's nothing immoral about delivering groceries; it's providing a genuinely useful service, and _can_ be intrinsically rewarding as evidenced by the hundreds of thousands of people volunteering to do it for free in the UK at the moment.

<comment><USER13> I am responding to the parent's line:

> But there isn't much value in people spending their lives driving delivery > cars or bagging groceries either.

The parent is conflating different meanings for the word "value". The grandparent is talking economic value, eg receiving money for labor. Clearly there is economic value for delivery services since I'm happy to pay them and their drivers do infact get paid.

Therefore the parent must intend a different meaning of value. The most likely meaning (that makes sense in this context) is moral value. There may be great moral value in being a doctor for instance - saving the lives of others.

I am not saying that it is the case that there exists no moral value in delivery jobs or grocery. I am saying that even if it were the case that those jobs have no moral value they still have economic value.

(I would argue all work well done has moral value, but that's irrelevant)

<comment><USER12> I do mean economic value— the jobs _literally don 't pay very much_, mostly because there's a sizable pool of people willing to do them because they lack alternatives.

In a UBI world where those people weren't working to avoid starvation and homelessness, it's likely that much of this bottom-tier work would start to look more like the kind of job a middle class teenager does while living with their parents— they're not there to survive, they're there to earn supplementary cash for a video game or prom dress. I'd expect then that:

\- Employers would experience some frustration with the flakiness of non- desperate personnel, and would be willing to pay at least something of a premium for labour that sticks around.

\- That premium and the promise of even greater reliability gains would lead to increased automation pressure at the bottom end.

\- Poor people who used to work themselves to the bone just surviving (eg, Stephanie Land) actually have the time to take training programs and ready themselves for higher-value work.

<comment><USER15> <\- Employers would experience some frustration with the flakiness of non- desperate personnel, and would be willing to pay at least something of a premium for labour that sticks around.>

That labor cost premium would have to be reflected in higher prices. I'm not paying a premium for marginal items. That's the whole definition of premium...

<\- Poor people who used to work themselves to the bone just surviving (eg, Stephanie Land) actually have the time to take training programs and ready themselves for higher-value work.>

Not everyone is cut out for higher-value work, and the amount of higher-value work is also limited. Rembember Carlin's Axiom [1]

The reason these jobs don't pay very much isn't just because there's a large pool of people willing to take them. In fact, many menial job positions have a hard time being staffed because the labor pool is not big. The reason they pay poorly is because they have low economic value. They add little marginal value to a product or service.

For example, if I want a hamburger, I can cook one at home for approximately $1.50. A nice bun, 1/4lb of fresh meat, some condiments. If I get a Quarter Pounder from McDonalds, it's around $4. So I normally only buy one for convenience; when I'm too far from home, or too tired to cook. Now if that ends up $8, then I'll cook one at home every time I want one.

[1]George Carlin — 'Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.'

<comment><USER12> > I'm not paying a premium for marginal items.

Conflict diamonds and non fair trade coffee are also cheaper than what replaced them. Obviously these kinds of ethical externalities exist on a scale, but the point is that it's more complicated than just arbitrarily declaring an item or class of labour as "marginal" and moving on.

> Not everyone is cut out for higher-value work...

The snide value judgment aside, lots of artists/writers/musicians/etc begrudgingly participate in the "low value labour" market as a means of staying afloat while they pursue their real passion on the side. Isn't all of this just a further argument for taking on as a society the obligation to meet people's basic needs? Do we really need to hold people's livelihoods hostage just so that upper middle class software professionals can still get a $4 hamburger whenever they want it?

<comment><USER13> It's not the middle class that needs the $4 hamburger. They're going to get overpriced cocktails and three course meal deals at a sit down experience.

And yes quite a few people want to be artists or musicians and can't. They should be able to try but also at some point we need a mechanism for them to realize they may need to try a different career path if it's not working out and they aren't creating value.

With UBI, you're just making a subset of the population pay for everyone else. Sometimes that tradeoff makes sense - food stamps - but when you end up just increasing inflation and hurting those who it's meant to benefit then it seems like tail chasing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Worth noting that a lot of niche industries only work today because we have better automation to support oddball things that aren't truly "mass produced." More and better automation will enable even more of these segments to exist.

Mechanical keyboards are a good example. There's a wide variety of plates, cases, and circuit boards available today that would be infeasible to make by hand, and were not cost effective to make just a few years ago. But here we are today with an appreciable hobby and market that wouldn't exist if not for improvements in manufacturing efficiency.

</comment><comment><USER17> The automation is here and is used everywhere right now if it makes economically sense. Good overview of the pricing here: [https://blog.robotiq.com/what-is-the-price-of- collaborative-...](https://blog.robotiq.com/what-is-the-price-of- collaborative-robots) Basic robot $50k, advanced application - $100k. One can hire lots of workers for the money. Especially during recession.

<comment><USER18> People are working on cheaper arms and we should soon have ones for under $10K. Ex: Pieter Abbeel from UC Berkeley [https://news.berkeley.edu/2019/04/09/meet-blue-the-low- cost-...](https://news.berkeley.edu/2019/04/09/meet-blue-the-low-cost-human- friendly-robot-designed-for-ai/)

[https://github.com/berkeleyopenarms](https://github.com/berkeleyopenarms)

<comment><USER19> I don't believe the github has the STL files or instructions on how to actually make the robot, just the API and simulations are open source.

<comment><USER18> Abbeel's new robotics company might be working on commercializing that prototype ([https://covariant.ai/](https://covariant.ai/)).

I remember him mentioning the project in his robotics class, found it: [https://youtu.be/xWPViQ6LI-Q?t=4075](https://youtu.be/xWPViQ6LI-Q?t=4075) he claims it will be around $5,000

<comment><USER19> That's disappointing, it would be nice to see a true open source robot arm. I believe Covariant is separate from the Blue robot arm though.

<comment><USER20> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfJn7T4D-6k](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfJn7T4D-6k)

Maybe of interest

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> > Automation coming sooner

I'd predict the opposite. The world will shortly have an international depression, and to the extent that businesses are allowed to be open, there will be 1000 applicants for every position. Wages will collapse. Demand for products generally will be low, dampened by the fact that a huge number of possible buyers are flat broke.

Those are conditions to retard the growth of automation, not increase it. You're going to spend a zillion dollars automating to produce a product people can't afford to buy while there are thousands of people outside your factory saying "we want to make your shit by hand for nearly free"?

Next couple of years will be a LOW time for automation, not a high time. (Which doesn't mean zero, obviously certain products are still going to be produced by increasingly cheap automated processes.) But some big surge in the rate of automation? No way.

</comment><comment><USER22> We've already had massive automation events, the computer, the internet, mobile, self-checkout, etc. Everytime these steps made life better mostly, and more automated or at least allowed most people to be more independent.

The last mile of automation is costly, where the first ones were money savers.

Building physical robots and tuning them, maintenance, cleaning, updates, security, new versions etc etc.

This last phase of robots, drones and self-driving vehicles will take a long time to get right and it is much more costly to enter it. The speed of innovation also makes it quickly out of date when you do commit to it.

The automation remaining involves mostly hardware which is more costly, the initial ones were software that saved lots of money and wasted time.

</comment><comment><USER23> I've thought about this too. A lot of businesses will come back to the US from China. They'll likely be building new state of the art plants. Automation tech has become quite abundant in the recent years. I mean, hobbyists are making industrial-ish robot arms with arduino/rpi's for under $2k. The programming is becoming much simpler as well using encoders and physically moving the robot and having it record the moves instead of coding it all from scratch. Here's one I've been looking at building: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfJn7T4D-6k](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfJn7T4D-6k)

<comment><USER24> Production is not going to come back to the United States when we have draconian labor laws. That is the reason it left in the first place. We are going to be more dependent on foreign cheap labor as time goes on. We cannot weaken our currency and tighten our labor laws and expect investment in manufacturing at the same time.

<comment><USER25> "Draconian labor laws" make no difference if you don't have any labor. That's key to grasping how different heavy automation makes things. Additional overhead of (let's pick a nice round guess) $5000 per worker adds up fast in a factory with 500 workers ($2.5M). But when you're only paying a maintenance technician and a security guard it's ten grand, and there are a lot of things a business might reasonably choose to do that cost ten grand without flinching.

<comment><USER24> My point is that the US industry has no compelling reason to invest in automation when foreign labor is so cheap. It is cheap because labor here is expensive. It is expensive because of regulatory and statutory intervention. You are correct that we do not have any labor(somewhat hyperbolic of course). I understand why in some cases automation makes total sense on the micro and macro level. Are you trying to say that because it is expensive to employ labor here automation will fill in the gap? If so, why? Labor is cheap in other regions and money is getting tighter as we speak. Automation requires heavy upfront costs.

<comment><USER25> You're 100% right so long as disease pandemics and other disruptive events are discounted.

And I think in a board room in 2019 you could do that, you could say it makes no sense to hedge against a disease pandemic, those never happen. It makes no sense to optimise for locality when we can get cheap labour on the far side of the globe and disruption won't happen.

But the trouble is that when you make that presentation in 2021 every single person in the room knows it isn't true, they all lived through this, they saw it themselves.

Usually the next argument is the one you already brought up - but labour costs in the US are too high. But a robot factory doesn't incur labour costs as I explained.

<comment><USER24> With the global lockdowns in place, you would have to consider the hedge. That is the point of the article and your point. There will certainly be companies that move toward automation. I wonder whether the moves toward automation at the micro level are offset by the lack of growth in the macro. Is it a wash? For how long? These are questions that we will find out.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I have taken almost the opposite insight away from this whole ordeal. Automation is inelastic. Retooling is expensive and slow. It depends on lots of upstream suppliers having elastic production. Humans are on the opposite end of the spectrum. They're great for on-demand additional capacity at a cost.

</comment><comment><USER27> Certainly seems like an automated stream of Coronavirus riding agenda's.

Anything that has "Coming soon" or "Than we thought" always triggers a level of credibility erosion in me, this just went full on.

Thing is with automation, what do you do with all those excess humans who are no longer needed to work as I do recall the 70's champion the future would see us all spend most of our time on leasure and 3 day working weeks. Seems a case of some people end up working 6-7 day weeks and others none.

But automation has been on it's way for so long, it's not an overnight shift, but a gradual one. Then the net result is never what is expected. Heck other day people read abour Rumba and how ealy models failed sooner as people was using them daily instead of weekly as previously. So the time saved in one area of interacting with cleaning shifted to another of almost gamified interaction, marking out area's, playing with it and stats. So whilst some automation can do wonders, it can often shift the problem into something else and still not save overall.

</comment><comment><USER28> I don't fully understand the arguments in these kinds of pieces. Haven't businesses always been economically incentivized to automate everything, because that's just how labor costs work?

It seems implausible to me that the bottleneck to mass automation (or rather, more widespread automation) is the willingness of corporations to invest in it. The more feasible blockers—the fundamental technology even existing, the cost of research/production, etc—don't seem correlated to Coronavirus.

<comment><USER29> Surprisingly, no.

When companies are making easy money, there is very little incentive to improve efficiency, and a lot of incentive to continue the status quo. It's only during tight times do companies actually begin to seek out new efficiencies.

Example: automated oil rig machines have existed for quite a while, but they really didn't see a lot of usage until the oil crash in 2016[0]. After this crash the number of oil rig workers remained at low levels, even as oil rigs starting to produce again. Those jobs were already vulnerable to automation, it just took a financial crisis to trigger it.

[0] [https://medium.com/basic-income/the-real-story-of- automation...](https://medium.com/basic-income/the-real-story-of-automation- beginning-with-one-simple-chart-8b95f9bad71b)

<comment><USER28> That's fascinating, and makes sense. I didn't think of it until you brought it up, but the risk/reward of investing in automation vs. maintaining current margins certainly flips when current margins plummet.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> There will be many Covid survivors with lung damage who once the air pollution starts to increase find they struggle badly. In fact many of us may struggle if as predicted levels dramatically and quickly increase as lockdowns are lifted.

Plenty of us may also struggle with the noise pollution also.

There will be a massive push for clean air and possibly a more quieter world.

</comment><comment><USER30> This was all exactly what Yang was running on. His campaign must be fairly bummed to have not stayed on message and instead making the various faux pas with is supporters such as endorsing Biden and saying Asian Americans must be more American in face of discrimination.

</comment><comment><USER31> I can't be the only one who has noticed the huge influx of articles and comments for UBI in places like reddit and even HN, of late. It seems that the ongoing crisis is fuelling a lot of agendas.

<comment><USER32> Come on, you know the routine. No matter what your cause is: Never let a crisis go to waste.

<comment><USER33> If a crisis exposes a weakness in a system and you're making a good faith suggestion is that really a bad thing?

The US government's attempts to keep people afloat have pretty clear major issues, for instance. Is it really a bad thing to suggest that we should have a system in place to handle these sorts of events, even on smaller scales, rather than trying to rush something out when every day counts? I'm not arguing for UBI per se, but if somebody thinks it's the right solution then is it a bad thing to argue for it when an example of its usefulness is fresh in everybody's mind?

Obviously there are plenty of bad faith suggestions going around too, but I can't help but think platitudes like this do more to shutdown good ideas than bad.

<comment><USER31> Stimulus cheques handed out at an actual time of crisis is not the same thing as an unending flow of such cheques during times of low unemployment and economic stability. I think that distinction is being lost in this discussion.

A lot of people who are in favour of some kind of intervention right _now_ aren't necessarily going to want to turn this permanent.

<comment><USER34> > Stimulus cheques handed out at an actual time of crisis is not the same > thing as an unending flow of such cheques during times of low unemployment > and economic stability.

A regular flow of such cheques compared to crisis stimulus cheques has a couple of advantages though:

\- you don't have any ramp-up time, not even if you decide to up the amount in crisis time, as the system already exists

\- you don't need to coordinate with multiple levels of governments, insurances, ... to hand out the checks

\- regular UBI could offset/replace many struggling programs, from food assistance over child support to other financial aid, thus leading to less overhead costs

<comment><USER35> Most importantly, they provide a level of economic stability to the working poor that wouldn't happen with emergency measures.

<comment><USER34> ... which is probably the reason so many wealthy-ish are against UBI. A lot of jobs would have to be paid their actual worth and in improved conditions (farming, nurses, education, trash/sewage, "nannies", cleaning, meatpacking) if those working the jobs would do it out of passion instead out of the need to survive.

An awful lot of the wealth in Western states is based on this exploitation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> All I know is self-driving cars are going to be killing a lot of passengers and pedestrians when corporations and programmers now get government liability waivers, rush out the project and just say "oops" when the spot the bug in the code.

I mean who goes to prison when a car runs someone over and no-one is driving? What is a developer's motivation to be careful and defer to safety? We've already proven a good chunk of the population are sociopaths, they don't care who dies as long as they get their paycheck.

<comment><USER37> And what if the self-driving cars end up causing fewer deaths than human drivers?

<comment><USER5> If you assume something will automatically happen, without a particular mechanism, how likely is it to?

Seems to me that is a popular cargo cult few are immune to.

<comment><USER38> >If you assume something will automatically happen, without a particular mechanism

He didn't mention it, but there are some pretty obvious mechanisms for this to be true:

1\. Automated drivers don't get tired.

2\. Automated drivers may "see" more of their environment than a human can. Human sensors aren't upgradeable.

3\. Automated drivers don't get drunk.

4\. Automated drivers don't have emotions.

5\. Automated drivers aren't distracted by the infotainment system, the children in the back seat, or even some thought about what just happened at work.

6\. With time, automated drivers can be improved, while human weaknesses stay constant.

There are of course drawbacks:

1\. Humans have intuition about situations they've never been in. Most AI/machine learning still generalizes poorly.

2\. The programming may be buggy.

3\. The datasets may be inadequate.

So what will happen is definitely out there, but there are clear mechanisms for this to happen.

<comment><USER5> A list of possible advantages is not what I mean by "a mechanism". It's very, very much not. I'm not saying I disagree with anything in particular that you listed, but you can list any number of things and it simply doesn't even assert what those things sum up to.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Automation requires investment. Recession means less capital for investment. The estimate of $12 dollar meal implies that people would be spending the time they use to cook the meal to work instead. That is idealistic. People generally do not work every waking moment of their lives.

As we get to the bottom of the article we find the real point is to push UBI. When money is created and given to people who do not work, that money becomes worthless. What manufacturer is going to invest in robots to create products for people who have monopoly money?</comment>


This is what a 50-qubit quantum computer looks like - <AUTHOR> https://www.engadget.com/2018/01/09/this-is-what-a-50-qubit-quantum-computer-looks-like/ <comment><USER2> Linus (Tech Tips) did a really good walk through at D-Wave's facility here for anyone who's interested: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60OkanvToFI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60OkanvToFI)</comment>


Windows 8 on a laptop in-depth preview (video) - <AUTHOR> http://www.engadget.com/2011/09/16/windows-8-on-a-laptop-in-depth-preview-video/

<comment><AUTHOR> I think they made a mistake combining the 2 OS's. Microsoft, like any other incumbent, they prefer to continue to work _on top_ of the old technology. And that pretty much always turns out to be the wrong strategy when disruption happens. It's like Nokia deciding to improve on Symbian instead of going full force on Maemo or Meego later on.

The Windows7/desktop mode is creating problems and confusion for the Metro mode, and the Metro mode is frustrating those who want to use the desktop mode. This is why it's never good to combine the 2 worlds: the dying one, and the new one.

This is something Steve Jobs also saw, and it's why he kept Mac OS X and iOS separated: one OS for the old world, and one OS for the new world. As the old one fades into the background, the new one gets more and more popularity. That's how you make disruption happen, and how you can embrace it. But Microsoft seems to repeat every mistake in the book. I'm not saying they're not on the right track with Metro, I'm just saying they're choosing the wrong strategy for it, and it will probably ultimately fail.

I found Windows 7's learning curve bad enough coming from XP (never used Vista). I used to know where everything was in XP, and I still don't know where a lot of stuff is in Win7, and I've been using it since beta. Imagine how bad the learning curve will be for a "normal" user when they get all that plus the Metro stuff being forced on them, when all they expect is "Windows". Microsoft is in a very vulnerable position with this paradigm transition. It would've helped if they kept them separated.

<comment><USER2> Windows' biggest asset is their software library, and it's turning out to be a giant anchor preventing them from innovating like they need to. If they could find an elegant solution that leveraged their legacy software library into a useful touch-based experience, they'd have a great shot at succeeding. It appears they took too long to move (iOS and Android both have large software libraries already), and aren't able to leverage their legacy software in a meaningful way. They've just strapped "legacy" support on top of Metro, and are only providing it for some hardware. It was possible to "do everything for everyone" in the PC world, when that just meant hiring more people to provide driver support. It's not possible now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Wow, I'm actually getting excited about win8. Microsoft has really made a radical change to the GUI and seems 100% dedicated to Metro. So far I'm not _that_ impressed with how widget centric win 8 will be but I'm assuming there will be an option to completly turn it off and use win 7's GUI.

<comment><AUTHOR> So far they haven't provided one. At least not one that is user friendly.

<comment><USER4> Yeah, it seems to be only possible with registry hacks at the moment.</comment></comment></comment>


Minorities exploited by Warren Buffett's mobile-home empire - <AUTHOR> http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/times-watchdog/minorities-exploited-by-warren-buffetts-mobile-home-empire-clayton-homes/ <comment><USER2> A question to the educated commented:

What is the purpose of selling loans to people who you know will probably default?

Is it to sieze their collateral?

From the article, I noticed this snippet:

Shorts went into the store looking for payments of $300 to $400 a month, she said, something she could afford on her $749 in monthly disability benefits.

The saleswoman, she recalled, later told her that she was lucky to qualify for a loan on a bigger, used mobile home priced at $55,000. Clayton financed it for her with a Vanderbilt loan at a 15.77 annual percentage rate, after a down payment of $7,000.

When she and Leroy returned for the closing, they said that, like many other buyers, they were rushed through it. Agents quickly turned over page after page, saying, "You need to sign right here, sign here, sign here," recalled Leroy, who said he has been unable to work since he went blind in his right eye.

The monthly payments were $851 — about $100 more than the amount she received from her fixed disability payments. Shorts, who said she didn't realize how much she would have to pay every month, made just two payments, then defaulted in June 2014. Clayton filed to seize the home that October.

Even when loans go bad quickly, the sale can be profitable for Berkshire Hathaway. Clayton often marks up new homes about 70 percent over invoice, company documents show. After a 20 percent down payment and thousands of dollars in fees added into the loan, Clayton can recoup more than half the wholesale price of the home in a year.

When borrowers stop paying, the company can repossess and resell the home, again with another markup.

</comment><comment><USER3> _" The company's in-house lender, Vanderbilt Mortgage, charges minority borrowers substantially higher rates, on average, than their white counterparts. In fact, federal data shows that Vanderbilt typically charges black people who make over $75,000 a year slightly more than white people who make only $35,000."_

Huh? This is not clearly an example of that.

<comment><USER2> So much "slightly more" throughout the article.

Another note:

At one point I noticed "thousands of dollars over the life of the loan" which could be not that much if the loan is 20 years.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "creditor appears to use credit score to determine credit worthiness... more on this at 10"</comment>


Show HN - Bucketio uses your own S3 Account for requesting and sharing files - <AUTHOR> https://www.bucketio.com/

<comment><USER2> I feel pretty hesitant giving full access of my Amazon Account to this website I just heard of today. I love the concept but I'm too uninformed of the potential risks to actually go through with pasting my credentials in there.

Anyone care to alleviate my ignorance?

<comment><AUTHOR> It was an issue we discussed quite a bit when working on Bucketio. If you're S3 savvy, we recommend that you create a limited user and give it access to JUST the bucket you want us using. If you're not, then you can provide your Master keys and the system does the setup for you. We create a limited user with access to a single bucket we create, set the CORS needed for uploading, then we forget your master keys and connect using the new user ONLY.

<comment><USER2> Do you have any interest in providing a guide for your users to do that themselves? Obviously they'd have to trust you to some degree to follow your guide and assume you're not tricking them. I'm generally not a very paranoid person, but in this case I have a couple EC2 servers running for clients that would be a bitch to fix if someone messed with them.

<comment><AUTHOR> Great idea. I'll take some screenshots and make a guide.

<comment><USER2> That would be awesome. I fooled around with it and failed. I created a user with S3 full access (I have nothing else using S3) and it complains that access is denied.

<comment><AUTHOR> Here you go! Please let me know if you encounter any issues or if anything is unclear. Any and all feedback is absolutely appreciated!

[https://bucketio.desk.com/customer/portal/articles/1033741-m...](https://bucketio.desk.com/customer/portal/articles/1033741-manual- setup)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I'm going to need far more details before I sign up and give away any S3 access thanks very much.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sure, we understand, it's part of what we're trying to get figured out at this early stage. Can you let us know what you'd be interested in knowing and we'll work to provide more info?</comment></comment>


Save money flying from New York and San Francisco - <AUTHOR> http://www.flyshortcut.com/blog/save-money-flying-from-new-york-and-san-francisco

<comment><USER2> Don't airline companies really frown upon this practice? I can't recall if they can actually do something about it though.

<comment><USER3> I see two potential problems.

First, you probably shouldn't do this as the first part of a roundtrip ticket, as the airline can cancel your return if they think you're abusing the system. That may not be important for many people, but it's there.

Second, if something goes wrong (bad weather, can't find a pilot, whatever) the airline may reroute you through a different city, completely screwing up your plan. They don't really care where you connect, and as far as they know neither do you. If you book, say, JFK->LAX->SFO and the engine falls off your JFK->LAX plane while sitting at the gate, they might move you to a route like JFK->ORD->SFO, and saying, "but, but, I was going to leave the airport at LAX and skip my flight to SFO" is probably not going to get much sympathy from the agent.

<comment><USER4> Third,

the overhead compartments are full and you have to check your bag.

<comment><USER5> Just be first in line to board the plane.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> FYI doing this is a great way to get your mileage balance cancelled if you're a frequent flyer.

<comment><USER7> Cheap way for airline to write off points liability.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I have just been looking at tickets to the US. My intent was to stop for a few days in Japan or Malaysia, and book the first and second leg separately.

I checked flying Tokyo->Minneapolis and was given a few prices, in the $1100 range without having to rely on sprint etc.

I then checked KL->Minneapolis and got a price for $700 that flew first to Tokyo with AA. When I tried buying just the Tokyo->Minneapolis leg for the same flights I was quoted $4000!

Airplane routing and pricing is really unclear and deliberately opaque.

While I am glad this service exhists, it reminds me of early SEO and search engine wars. If this gets popular enough, this loophole will be closed.

</comment><comment><USER9> You require me to share on Facebook before you show me flight info? That's a great way to get me to close the site and never come back, never mind all the other risks associated with hidden city travel.

<comment><USER5> You can "share" it with yourself. Then go to Facebook and unshare it if you don't feel like your friends seeing you sharing a page.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Cached: [http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:Gs1w2FX...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:Gs1w2FX5AzoJ:www.flyshortcut.com/blog/save- money-flying-from-new-york-and-san-francisco+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us)

</comment><comment><USER11> Interesting hack, but it means that you can't check any luggage. That's a non- trivial drawback.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ya, absolutely. Make sure you have carry-on only. I've done it before where I've convinced the agent to let my bag off at the mid-point but I'm pretty sure I got lucky...

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> The site doesn't work for me -- maybe it's overloaded. I shared on Facebook and it just gets stuck confirming forever.

</comment><comment><USER13> This looks great. Any plans to open it up to international routes?

</comment><comment><USER14> holy crap this is so awesome. I've been on a kick to try to hack the shitty experience that is flying domestically in the US, this is very inspirational.

</comment><comment><USER15> Only if you don't have any checked baggage!

</comment><comment><USER16> Site doesn't work for me</comment>