FusionCharts mocks open source but uses it extensively - <AUTHOR> http://blog.overseas-exile.com/2014/02/fusioncharts-mocks-open-source-but-uses.html

<comment><USER2> Thanks for letting us know your stance on this but you have got the reading wrong. Let us clarify.

When we say hobby projects, we don't mean open source projects at large. We mean those charting libraries that an enthusiastic developer decides to build over a weekend, as a learning project, and release to the world. Developers in other organizations looking for a charting library come across it, pick it up and start implementing it in their applications. The initial results feel good, but as soon as the developer moves onto implementing advanced capabilities, they start running into product limitations, cross-browser compatibility issues etc. And when they go back to the creator trying to get a fix for it, the developer has abandoned the project because it was a hobby project for him and his day job is keeping him busy. At this point, if you want to stick with the same product, you've 2 options; either extend the project yourself, or find someone who can do it for you - both of which could be distraction for your main development, and delay execution for you.

We have been in business for over 11 years now and have seen a lot of players like this that come up, and hence our stance. As an enterprise, when you are building an application, charting might not be your core strength. And hence, when you are looking for someone to take care of that, you need to find yourselves an enterprise-grade charting component. Not only does that cover you on the product part of things and meaningful implementations that can inspire you, it also gives you extensive documentation, assurance that it will continue development and that when you have a tech query, you can go to a support team that will be there when you are running on a tight deadline and need a fix.

That being said, we are not against open source at all. A good chunk of our own development tools and infrastructure are open-source. There are some good open source charting libraries as well, which we have listed in a competitor comparison table on our website at www.fusioncharts.com/javascript-charting- comparison/.

Here's a good read on when choosing a commercial library, instead of open source library, for a niche purpose makes sense - [http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/581146/8-reasons-to- choo...](http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/581146/8-reasons-to-choose- commercial-library-instead-of)

But, at the end of the day, the decision is in your hand - for, developers are the king-makers!

</comment><comment><USER3> I call BS. Hobby projects doesn't mean open source. You are the one interpreting it as such and then claiming that is what FusionChart is saying.

<comment><USER4> I said the same thing on his blog and he called me out for posting anonymously. Real fun guy.

<comment><USER5> Not sure if you had the same problem I did. I also replied on the blog, selected "use my Google Account" to reply, but it never actually asked to authenticate me, and my response ended up being attributed to 'Unknown'.

Regardless, I agree that the author has misconstrued the intent. Flagging.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Who cares about FusionCharts anyway when we have D3.js.

<comment><USER2> d3.js is a great library and we love the capabilities. However, there are clear use cases for both, which have been highlighted @ [http://www.quora.com/What-are-some-capabilities-of-D3-js- whi...](http://www.quora.com/What-are-some-capabilities-of-D3-js-which-cannot- be-achieved-using-fusion-charts)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Since when does a hobby project automatically equate to open source? Sure, the wording is still shitty, but I don't think you have to view this as a direct attack on open source.

I agree that you're probably reading into this too much. But that's okay—by posting it up to HN, you were able to get a larger sampling of devs to run it past! :)

<comment><AUTHOR> "I agree that you're probably reading into this too much. But that's okay—by posting it up to HN, you were able to get a larger sampling of devs to run it past!"

That's certainly true :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Flame post with no basis. Avoid.</comment>


Ask HN: Was Called to Speak in My Daughter's Junior School – Any Ideas? - <AUTHOR> The principal wants me to speak for the kids, 4 and 5 graders about online safety, perhaps given I am a founder of an application security startup.
Anyway, I would appreciate your ideas about topics and content. I assume smartphones, App Stores, et al, are as important as web browsing, perhaps even more given their popularity amongst the kids.
It will be 45 minutes and I want it to be interesting and useful!
Thanks in advance for your advice. <comment><USER2> Whatever you do, start off with a story that will grab their attention. Maybe a hack you saw first hand, maybe a story of a seemingly innocuous social media post leading to unforeseen consequences, maybe youtube or twitch stars getting SWATted, anything to grab their attention and make them think right off the bat.

</comment><comment><USER3> Emphasize that talking to people online is not like talking to people in person. Posting stuff on the internet is not really a private conversation, even if it is just two people talking. It can be rebroadcast in a way that is way worse than someone you trusted repeating your spoken words.

Anything you say online is much more like posting to the front page of a newspaper or walking down the street with a megaphone and it can get out of hand very fast. Like the telephone game, what you said can rapidly become warped and it is magnified because of the potential size of the audience involved.

</comment><comment><USER4> There's lots of good online safety stuff published, eg for my local school area and by central government here in the UK.

Maybe select the best nuggets from them, and add your personal spin, eg based on anything that has happened to family and friends, and at work. Maybe ask the head teacher if there is any recent experience of theirs worth folding in. (I am a school governor, and I am aware that interesting incidents are fielded from time to time at school.)

<comment><AUTHOR> good idea, the personal angle. thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Do you have any cool branded tchotkes?

Still remember the time a dad came to speak at my school who was an airline captain. He brought toy Delta Jets and Crew Wings!

The kiddos will forget your 'meaningful/insightful' chat in 15 minutes. The tchotkes stick around.

</comment><comment><USER6> Maintain their interest and remember if you do a good job you'll not just be passing on best practices but inspiring a future generation of who knows... show the passion. Consider quizzes, activities, music, etc to enhance the atmosphere and reinforce the learning.

If you've not done a lot of work with this audience typedo a dry run with the principal and some teachers and ask for frank feedback; as you're speaking to minors in a formal setting I guess this is prudent anyway.

</comment><comment><USER7> I would address the fact that whatever they post online is probably going to be accessible and easy to find for the foreseeable future.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> thank you all for your advice!</comment>


How to Defeat Fake News with a Screenshot Verification Service (SVS) - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@aditya_advani/how-to-defeat-fake-news-with-a-screenshot-verification-service-svs-e80867dfbc58 <comment><AUTHOR> I plan to keep improving the article above for a couple days at min, potentially with explanations and diagrams of how PKI, e2e, Steganography, QR codes and fountain codes work, but I felt this draft was ready enough for publication, and I really just want to make a mark with a general audience. I appreciate all feedback, upvotes, comments. My personal email email@example.com, please include "SVS" in the subject if you choose that method to hit me up about this.</comment>


Facebook is running anti-vax ads, despite its ban on vaccine misinformation - <AUTHOR> https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/carolinehaskins1/facebook-running-anti-vax-ads-despite-ban-anti <comment> munk-a This, along with political ads, is a pretty amazingly good example of how facebook was wrong - they can't deliver advertising to customers at higher efficacy and lower cost than traditional media... what they can do is fail to properly vet ads for cheaper than traditional media spends vetting ads.

I feel like this problem should start the sounding of warning bells around the efficiencies tech companies create. A lot of good value is created in tech, but along with that value is the movement to accomplish a solution for most of the problem for far less of a cost. If you can managed to eschew portions of your product that are unimportant (creating a DB tuned to reading that does reading really well and slows way down during writes) then you might have the beginnings of a great business, but the portions of the feature set you're eschewing need to actually be optional. Building a peer to peer trading website without building in support for all those onerous requirements around preventing human trafficking and other black market dealings isn't a solid business - the government will shut you down and your product isn't groundbreaking and paradigm shifting - it's half-assed.

I reeeeally strongly suspect that a lot of web advertisers are feeling the pain now that HUD has started watching web advertisements for housing discrimination, now that the impact of politcal ads is becoming accepted and now that slimy businesses are exploiting FUD to push homeopathy... Preventing these has always been a requirement in the field of marketing, and your business isn't disruptive and edgy because it ignores them - it's living on borrowed time until a huge lawsuit drives it out of business.

<comment><USER2> Just because they fail to properly vet ads for cheaper than traditional media doesn't mean they can't still deliver advertising to customers at higher efficacy and lower cost than traditional media.

The cost just might not be as low as they had hoped.

I'd like to see some tech innovation around peer to peer governance and enforcement of rules. Government is going to struggle to keep up with the sheer volume of advertising on the web. Asking a central authority to police all of it is not a recipe for success. Can we incentivize consumers to enforce ad regulations in a meaningful way? That might lead to a better advertising world for all of us.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Why are they allowed to profit from spreading misinformation without consequence?

<comment><USER4> On the flip side, do you want Facebook or any company to control what you can or can not say?

<comment><USER5> Do I want regulations that would prevent things that are illegal to say on one media form to apply to all? Sure. You can't just go buy a TV ad that says "blue cars cause cancer", knowing that it will drive business away from a guy you hate that makes blue cars. But I can go have that facebook ad up in 5 minutes.

As part of living in a society, I am happy to cede some freedoms for a better world.

<comment><USER6> FTC is supposed to enforce truth-in-advertising laws regardless of the medium (television or online).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> What are the incentives or driving force behind anti-vaxxers? I am amazed why someone is putting money and efforts on anti-vaccination. Personally its hard to believe it become a big thing without some sort incentives/driving force.

<comment><USER8> I feel like Companies like Goop and other "natural" health companies profit from this stuff as a side-effect. Like who else could you market this type of crap to.

[https://shop.goop.com/shop/products/rose-quartz- bottle?taxon...](https://shop.goop.com/shop/products/rose-quartz- bottle?taxon_id=1291&country=USA)

<comment><USER9> Ironically, I've seen a lot of people (including firsthand) who consider things like Goop to be "liberal" nonsense, yet consider vaccines dangerous because of the conspiracy/general-distrust-of-experts angles.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Relevant information:

>"Facebook does not have a policy that bans advertising on the basis that it expresses opposition to vaccines," a Facebook spokesperson said. "Our policy is to ban ads containing vaccine misinformation."

The ad Buzzfeed thinks is in violation:

>One ad reads, "Is the vaccine the best option? And if not, what is?" Another says, "Click below for a FREE guide for Pertussis which will include: Vaccine Controversy."

Seems pretty cut and dry to me. The ad doesn't contain misinformation, merely opposition. Somehow I can't help but feel like we're sliding down the slippery slope though.

<comment><USER11> _> The ad doesn't contain misinformation, merely opposition._

Can you show me a formulation of "vaccine opposition" that does not require misinformation to be credible?

<comment><USER10> Sure: there's the idea of opposing vaccines because you want the absolute option of bodily autonomy over what gets injected into your bloodstream.

<comment><USER12> The thing about you deciding what goes into you is that it is harming other people. Your rights stop once you harm others.

<comment><USER10> That wasn't the point I was making, please don't strawman me. The GP asked for an argument against vaccination that didn't rely on misinformation.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Do you think stackoverflow is bullying users? - <AUTHOR> I had been using StackOverFlow and its other products, such as ServerFault for a long time. But recently my account at ServerFault had been abandoned. It's because that one of the community admins answered my question about resecuring a LUKS encryption disk.  And the admin thought this was a lame question. He voted down my question. And suddenly my account was abandoned.
Why are those amateurs bullying on StackOverFlow Community.
Will StackOverFlow be the next Wrong-Knowledge-Wikipedia? Why?... <comment><USER2> I'm always hesitant to ask a question. Recently I got downvoted immediately on a question about dynamic arrays in a union within a packed struct used in a data protocol.

I wish I don't need to start a question with "I know what I'm doing, I've been programming for 20 years". So no overflow for me anymore.

<comment><USER3> You're right, I've also been downvoted lately with no apparent reason, it seems they are getting more and more difficult

<comment><AUTHOR> Anyone can downvote anything that he/she doesn't believe. But real answer is usually coming from few people who know the truth. The vote doesn't mean the truth but here it can hurt people who know the truth that most people don't believe...</comment></comment></comment>


Anonymous hosting? - <AUTHOR>

Is it possible to entirely host a website so that it cannot be connected to me?
I find myself checking the top 100 lists on The Pirate Bay for movies and tv shows daily to see if anything new is there and cross-referencing against IMDB to see if they are worth watching, meaning is the IMDB score > 7. Pirate Bay top listing is not in chronological order, but rather bounces up and down. In other words, the current TPB top list is more like Reddit, while for checking out new torrents it would be better for it to be more like Digg where things get promoted to the top rather than move up and down. That way you know what you already got and what you decided not to watch.
I don't intend to filter torrents out outright, but rather just show the score. For other categories some other score might be more meaningful, for example for games it would be the Metascore. I thought I'd share this list on a website because it would probably be useful for more people, and I could crowdsource out the score checking part.
I wouldn't even be linking to torrents, but rather linking to a site that links to torrents, but I still believe this would get me into trouble. <comment><USER2> I picked a webhost in .my for a sensitive project a few years ago. There were many choices in a number of locales where the hosting company made it clear they were allowing you register a domain and pay for hosting anonymously. All they required was a single email contact point (free webmail was fine) and payment which ranged from the traditional to the pseudo-anonymous digital cash systems to mailing an international money order.

Note that these hosts still had TOS's that you could violate and have your service cancelled (though mostly they were extremely liberal and only reacted to complaints), and it preclude a government forced takedown. At the time, at least, malaysia didn't seem to care what you were hosting as long as a) you didn't use the .my tld, b) you weren't .my citizen and c) you didn't discuss .my politics.

</comment><comment> mike-cardwell You can host websites anonymously inside the Tor network using "hidden services". I believe there are also several gateway websites which allow people on the "normal" Internet to access hidden services.

</comment><comment><USER3> What might work better is linking to a google search for those torrents. In this instance you're linking to google, not to sites that are associated with torrents.</comment>


Ask HN: Good sources to find part-time contract work? - <AUTHOR> I have been having trouble finding a new web dev job for a while, but recently luck fell in my favor and found a new contract job I'm enjoying. This job sort of fell on my lap, rather effortlessly compared to other job interviews I've had. It's also not web dev related, and  in a language I've wanted to get professional experience in (C#).
It's also a part-time job which makes my current situation interesting. I'd like to supplant it with another contract job as otherwise I'm not being paid well enough as I would as a full-time contractor. So I have a few months till this contract expires, and ideally I'd like to get a second part-time contract (preferably also in C#) to fill the rest of my time.
Where should I go to get another part time programming job like this? I know part-time is not very common in software development. Am I required to take a more freelancer approach to this? I also don't want to use those freelance job sites that create a race to the bottom in price and quality due to global competition. <comment><USER2> [http://gigworks.blogspot.com/2017/04/moonlight-work-for- soft...](http://gigworks.blogspot.com/2017/04/moonlight-work-for-software- engineers.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> I have found good developers for small projects on upwork.com in the past and was quite happy as a customer, not sure about the other side tough... One thing I can tell you, I never took the lowest offer but had quick chats with every developer to see what knowledge they had on the subject - stock trading in my case, before hiring them... For me what was important was a quick and quality work, not to save few thousand dollars...

<comment><AUTHOR> I found Upwork.com too restrictive but I might give Freelancer and Bonsai a shot again. I'm hoping I can at least find a good client in a smaller niche. To be more specific my contract job is working on a commercial indie game title. I've been mostly doing speed optimization and computer graphics work.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> At the end of this contract, can you ask your current contractor for leads? Depending on the area you live in, nature of the work, perhaps you could visit a local chamber of commerce meeting and find opportunities to start conversations about how you can help.

<comment><AUTHOR> I plan on doing that towards the end. I'm just looking for a way to get another contract job concurrently with this one. Don't think the local CoC would work as this is a remote job and every developer in the team works remotely.</comment></comment>


The things make got right (and how to make it better) - <AUTHOR> http://blog.jgc.org/2010/11/things-make-got-right-and-how-to-make.html <comment><USER2> There are lots of things I like about plain GNU make, but the fact that I need this is maddening:

LEFTPAREN:=(

A robust way to quote/escape something is sorely needed.</comment>


Ask HN: What are the best programming books you could read in a weekend? - <AUTHOR> I'm a big fan of books like Code Complete and SICP but they are huge and take a long time to get through. What are some books small enough to finish in a weekend that you've learned a lot from? <comment><USER2> A Tour of Go [1] (If you are a novice, you really should try writing the programs yourself. You will end up finishing it in an day or two. If you just read through, it would be just a couple of hours)

The Little Schemer [2]

[1] [https://tour.golang.org/welcome/1](https://tour.golang.org/welcome/1)

[2] [https://www.amazon.com/Little-Schemer-Daniel-P- Friedman/dp/0...](https://www.amazon.com/Little-Schemer-Daniel-P- Friedman/dp/0262560992)

</comment><comment><USER3> "Understanding Software" by Max Kanat-Alexander

Book review: [https://www.infoq.com/news/2017/10/understanding-software- re...](https://www.infoq.com/news/2017/10/understanding-software-review)

Release announcement:[https://www.codesimplicity.com/post/understanding- software/](https://www.codesimplicity.com/post/understanding-software/)

<comment><USER3> More on "Understanding Software" by Max Kanat-Alexander and how it helped me:

Thanks to this book, I've started re-factoring code before adding new features, our code base is getting a little better every day (more maintainable) which reversed a trend, it was getting harder to add features, now it is easier; plus when I design now, my designs are cleaner and result in maintainable code.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Debugging by David J. Agans. It's about 206 pages and the information is pretty high level, but it taught me to systematically debug problems instead of blindly changing random code.

</comment><comment><USER5> \- [https://drboolean.gitbooks.io/mostly-adequate-guide- old/cont...](https://drboolean.gitbooks.io/mostly-adequate-guide-old/content/)

\- [https://leanpub.com/javascriptallongesix/read](https://leanpub.com/javascriptallongesix/read)

</comment><comment><USER6> Some of the Little Schemer books you could do in 2-3days

There's a new one coming out on Dependent Types [https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/little- typer](https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/little-typer)

</comment><comment><USER7> How fast can you read?

\- Clean Code

\- Code Complete 2

\- The Pragmatic Programmer

\- Professional PHP

\- Effective Java

\- Domain Driven Design Distilled

</comment><comment><USER8> I read Programming Elixir in a weekend(ish) including doing most of the exercises. Was quite eye-opening to the world of functional concurrency.</comment>


Clixpy is recording your actions right now - <AUTHOR> http://clixpy.com/demo <comment><USER2> Clixpy is a decent clone of clicktale.com, userfly.com, and exactostats.com, but doesn't seem to have a "shtick" that differentiates it from the other offerings. With userfly.com, we tried to make everything dead simple, and much cheaper than clicktale. We also focus on capturing quality user sessions (lots of page views, lots of actions fired per page, bounced users don't count against your quota).

However, at the end of the day, watching individual user sessions, one after another, doesn't really scale; you need a way to aggregate the data to identify trends that may suggest pain points for the end user, and we haven't really cracked that nut (and neither have our competitors).

</comment><comment><USER3> Testing this now. One issue for me is that I get a lot of traffic from reddit, stumbleupon, etc.. these users don't stick around for more than 5 secs and they are going to use up my captures quickly. I would suggest only counting captures that have clicks.

Another suggestion: I'd love to be able to see how users browse a particular page, but i might have to wade through a ton of captures to do so. Would be cool if you captured every user session and I could then search to find some that include that page, then unlock those session by using some of my purchased credits.

EDIT: One problem I'm seeing is that when the user goes to a new page the timer freezes and it takes about 10 seconds to start playing again, but it jumps 10 seconds ahead, so you miss some activity there. Looks like th is is because my website takes awhile to finish loading (lots of images below the fold).

</comment><comment><USER4> Great demo as soon as you arrive.

<comment><USER5> That is, hands down, the best demo I have ever seen on HN. I just showed it to my Japanese coworkers and I didn't even need to tell them what it was doing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Be nice if I could see how much it costs before I give it my email address :/

<comment><USER7> This what I found on registering:

You get 10 free captures on signup.

After that, plans vary from '$5 for 100 captures' to '$30 for 1000 captures'.

[edit #1]

I added this to one of my websites. Holy Shit, it is good! I've bought 100 captures for now, for $5.

[I shamefully admit that this is one of the ideas I had but didn't execute all. These guys have done an _amazing_ job.]

[edit #2]

Thanks to paraschopra's comment, I checked out userfly too. I am going to try that too. Clixpy didn't detect keystrokes correctly on one of my websites. Lemme see how userfly fares for the same test case.

      Note to self : Competition is good.
      </comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>

It is like a neighborhood coffee shop getting _more_ traffic because of a Starbucks opening nearby, contrary to the tiny shop's fears. I wouldn't have become a user of userfly today without clixpy.

[edit #3]

( Userfly dude rambles for quite a while in the demo :-) )

Notes on Userfly:

Userfly's performance can be better. Hmm. Definitely. But I like it too.

I wish Google released a product that has this functionality. I don't trust userfly or clixpy completely, since they didn't replay my test drive properly. But I'll definitely be using them until something more robust comes along.

<comment><USER8> I hope to god Google does not (though I would not be surprised if they _already_ do this internally)

Google already has a LOT of information about it's users. No more please

<comment><USER7> Google will get the data if it wants. Do you think that sharing that with us webapp creators makes it worse? Also, I don't necessarily want it to be only from Google... just want a solid tool that you can rely on. Google is the only company that came to mind when I thought who can deliver that.

<comment><USER8> No doubt. As I mentioned, in all probability, Google already does it. And sharing it with webapp creators does not make it worse. Heh.. I used to create web applications and am a developer for a MORPG.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Didn't work for me - perhaps it needs Flash or Java?

In any case I thought stuff like that has been done for years? There are apps that draw you a heatmap of your site based on mouse movements, too?

</comment><comment><USER10> Wow very nice. I wonder how it handles different browser renderings though? For instance the clicks and stuff could seem off.

<comment><USER11> I have a lot of experience with motion-recording web apps like this (built one and launched it a couple years back, and it worked exactly as this one does). Rendering issues can become a major problem with some pages, as well as things like Javascript executing "on page load" (while the recording has already started playing), or an element changing size/position, that can throw off an entire recording.

This is not to mention the fact that if you change the page (unless Clixpy has some provision for this), your old recordings are entirely useless.

With regards to accuracy, ignoring the aforementioned problems: a script like this can be fairly accurate, and the actual "recording technology" behind this is fairly simple (albeit still interesting). The data can be useful, provided you enjoy wading through many, many very unhelpful recordings.

The real challenge, and what I believe is more useful, is extracting and distilling the data into heatmaps, graphs, and the like. This would provide someone with more of an overview based on the recoded data (think CrazyEgg, but even more in depth). This is something which I am working to solve, as is -- as someone else mentioned -- ClickTale.

Regardless, I commend Clixpy for diving into this space.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> There was a similar app by HNer I remember: userfly.com

<comment><USER13> I tried userfly on a site I operate and it really wasn't much use because it was incapable of recording the advanced AJAX stuff the site does. It also sends requests back to the original server on playback which would have caused me some problems.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Very cool and extremely well implemented.

But somehow my paranoia bubbles to the surface on viewing that demo. This is in a way scary, getting even more information on the users.

It's probably just me but I'm getting increasingly paranoid of the amount of information that is being collected on the Internet (and a LOT of it without disclosure)

<comment><USER14> NoScript is your friend.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Very cool, but in itself not very useful? Can you add some metrics for tracking how users use the site? (If this is already there plz ignore)

What would help me is seeing the aggregation of use across several users instead of the mouse movements of one.

<comment><USER16> I think the concept is similar to Clicktale and even simple User testing. But instead of asking users to perform tasks you get to watch real users using your site.

Something quantifiable is nice, but after watching a few of these videos of your users, you will quickly find some of the big problems your site faces. You likely won't notice the small ones, but you should be able to see some of the big ones, which are the ones that need your greatest attention anyway.

I also would like to see their price before giving them an email.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> This is completely terrifying.

You don't know who Clixpy is. You put this on your site, a user types in their password and so far we just have their word that they are not recording it - has anyone looked closely at the JS?

<comment><USER18> Yes, but that's true of _any_ widget/Javascript you include. Why is this particularly scary?

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Looks great...another site like this that I've been using lately is Clicktale. You get 100 free captures per week on one domain, or 20,000 per month for $99. One of the nice features that Clicktale has is scrolling heatmaps, so you can see what percentage of users scroll to different parts of your page, where they spend the most time, etc. Useful for landing pages.

</comment><comment><USER20> This looks amazing. I've been wanting something like this but I didn't realize it was possible.

This is going on my website tonight.

[EDIT]

Looks cool, but still has some bugs in it. In particular, some of the Javascript that is on your site seems to activate while you watch the replays.

</comment><comment><USER21> I thought perhaps it would work with the iPhone but that does not seem to be the case. Looks pretty neat and simple. As others have said similar to userfly.com.

</comment><comment><USER22> The text I typed into the "AJAX" tab along with the Google results did _not_ show up in the re-played demo w/ Safari 4 on OS X.

</comment><comment><USER23> It seemed to double-click the checkboxes - selecting them and deselecting them.

Safari 4 final on Leopard, if it helps at all.

</comment><comment><USER24> Not working for me -- after playback it shows just empty gray page.

Using Google Chrome 188.8.131.52 on Vista.

</comment><comment><USER25> Does anyone know if this will work behind logins? Or does the site have to be visible from clixpy.com?

</comment><comment><USER26> Didn't do anything on Chromium/Ubu.

</comment><comment><USER27> "Clixpy`s Demo" -- wrong quote.</comment>


Were video games to blame for massacre? (2007) - <AUTHOR> http://www.nbcnews.com/id/18220228/#.Ttqaa_KHPKc <comment><AUTHOR> Example of how people use tragedies to promote their own agendas.

>"He might have killed somebody but he wouldn't have killed 32 if he hadn't rehearsed it and trained himself like a warrior on virtual reality. It can't be done. It just doesn't happen."

Wonder what they'll say when Hololens and other VR and AR devices become mainstream devices.</comment>


Can anything curb the dominance of the internet's big guns? - <AUTHOR> http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/apr/22/can-anything-curb-dominance-of-internet-big-guns-amazon-google

<comment><USER2> Probably not. Hal Varian discussed this very issue in his 1990 paper, "Economic Incentives in Software Design" ([http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~hal/Papers/Software.pdf](http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~hal/Papers/Software.pdf)) See also: Microsoft Windows.

Dear Guardian: please remember at least the recent past, OK? Otherwise, you'll be condemned to repeat it.</comment>


Elon Musk wants to bring the Internet in space - <AUTHOR> https://ekjeacheblog.com/elon-musk-spacex-wants-bring-internet-space/

<comment><USER2> My big question is how fast can this put Comcast out of business? Because that would be awesome.

</comment><comment><USER3> > The director of SpaceX is developing a network of satellites above the Earth > that could speed up web surfing and could provide access to isolated > communities. And the most interesting thing about this project is that it > will use the profits to help colonize the planet Mars.

Is there that much money to make in delivering internet to isolated communities??

<comment><USER4> Nope. Many people have theorized that this is to ensure that Tesla cars and other automated vehicles (land, sea, air or space) have access to the internet at all times, anywhere.

<comment><USER5> This is an existing market called M2M [1], and interestingly enough, one of the existing players in this worldwide is Orbcomm, which is halfway through launching their new constellation on Falcon 9!

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

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm sure this must have been mentioned before, but one of the biggest issues with a usable network connection of any type is latency. Given that the satellites will be in space, hundreds of kms away, and there has to be a return journey, how is the latency issue going to be addressed?

Mentioned in this discussion:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8944944](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8944944) The New Space Race: One Man's Mission to Build a Galactic Internet (businessweek.com)

Here's the actual discussion:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8945672](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8945672)

        </comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>

And now that I've searched, that's pretty much the _only_ discussion. Although there may be more, here are the others I've looked at:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8599177](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8599177) Elon Musk confirms plans to provide global Internet from 100s of satellites (rt.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8624500](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8624500) Elon Musk: SpaceX Will Launch Micro-Satellites (thenextweb.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8893525](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8893525) Elon Musk's SpaceX to launch ViaSat-2 high speed Internet satellite (utsandiego.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8903135](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8903135) Revealed: Elon Musk's Plan to Build a Space Internet (businessweek.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8903450](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8903450) SpaceX to build 10B global satellite Internet (geekwire.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8903658](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8903658) Elon Musk spills details on SpaceX's $10B space Internet venture (engadget.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8904304](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8904304) Elon Musk wants to spend $10B building the Internet in space (theverge.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8904435](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8904435) Elon Musk's Plan to Build a Space Internet (businessweek.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8905059](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8905059) Elon Musk wants to spend $10B building the Internet in space (theverge.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8905277](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8905277) Elon Musk's Plan to Build a Space Internet (businessweek.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8905474](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8905474) Elon Musk's Plan to Build a Space Internet (businessweek.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8905562](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8905562) Elon musk is going to build Internet for space (thenextweb.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8907045](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8907045) Elon Musk is trying to bring the Internet to space (cnet.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8908019](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8908019) Elon Musk wants to build a new Internet from space (venturebeat.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8917258](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8917258) I Told Elon Musk We Should Have Space Internet, Musk Announces It a Month Later (adamslists.com)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8922038](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8922038) Elon Musk and SpaceX Plan a Space Internet (businessweek.com)

<comment><USER7> The hundreds of kilometers between the Earth and the satellites must surely be a drop in the bucket with regards to latency. After all, the distance between Europe and the US is roughly 6000 km at the minimum, nevermind the distances to Australia or East Asia.

I'm not entirely sure why today's satellite internet connections have such high latencies, but it doesn't seem physically impossible to develop low- latency satellite Internet access.

Edit: It appears nearly all of the current Internet access-providing satellites are in geostationary orbit, which is much further away than a few hundred kilometers, causing a great amount of latency. If Musk can successfully find a way to use satellites in low Earth orbit to provide Internet access instead, that will get rid of most of the latency.

<comment><USER8> > I'm not entirely sure why today's satellite internet connections have such > high latencies

Geosynchronous orbit's radius is 42164 km. Ever tried to play FPS on an Australian server?

<comment><USER7> Yeah, see my edit. I didn't realize that all the satellites providing Internet access were in geostationary orbit until after I posted my comment.

Reading Wikipedia, it seems Internet access through LEO satellites is possible today, but provides far slower Internet acccess speeds.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Elon covered all of this and more during the launch of the SpaceX Seattle offices. He pretty much goes over the entire game plan in this video -> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHeZHyOnsm4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHeZHyOnsm4)

</comment><comment><USER10> Surely you can send emails to the ISS? I think this is how the astronauts are tweeting - they send the tweet via email.

Astronauts on Twitter:

[https://twitter.com/AstroSamantha](https://twitter.com/AstroSamantha)

[https://twitter.com/AstroTerry](https://twitter.com/AstroTerry)

[https://twitter.com/StationCDRKelly](https://twitter.com/StationCDRKelly)

[https://twitter.com/AntonAstrey](https://twitter.com/AntonAstrey)

</comment><comment><USER11> This could be a huge deal. What I wonder is if repressive regimes like China will be able to block or censor the signal from internet satellites.

</comment><comment><USER12> Good, because space would get boring without being able to check my emails or see my Facebook feed.

You wouldn't even be able to send selfies.</comment>


Should I take a Help Desk Job? - <AUTHOR> I'm currently in a computing program and I'm looking for internships. If you'd like more info about me, I asked a question before: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1718229
Basically, I'm looking for some sort of programming related job, be it testing or anything else as long as it's a bit related to it.
I was offered what I think a Help Desk job the other day. I'll be upgrading the firm's hardware and provide maintenance support. It's a bit far from where I am ~2hrs commute. I don't have any other interviews as of now and I'm not sure if I should accept the offer.
I'm afraid that I might not give my 110% because it is not truly what I want although I can see myself doing it. With the current state of the economy right now and given that I have no experience in anything IT related (mostly fastfood and retail), I'm seriously considering this.
I live in Vancouver if that matters. I'd like to seek some advice from you guys as I have no idea what to do right now. Should I take it or wait? <comment><USER2> My first professional software job was at a great software company, but I had a horrible commute each day. I ended up leaving that company to work in tech support (enterprise software) at a software company much closer to my home. I remember feeling a little embarrassed about it - it was definitely a downgrade -- but I chose it for the lifestyle improvements it offered at that time.

Turns out, it was probably one of my smarter moves. I really enjoyed solving problems for the customers. People sent emails and actual snail mail to my company raving about me. That was cool. Then, I noticed a need for a utility in the field. I wrote it and did some testing with it and then the development manager caught wind of it and came by to talk to me.

He wanted to recruit me in to the development team! Simultaneously, I was being recruited into sales consulting. Not only that, but our customers were trying to hire me left and right. I ended up taking the internal position for sales consulting.

Moral of the story: You can create opportunities for yourself even when in a position that may not be your ideal role. Hard work, creativity and initiative go a LONG way.

Taking this job clearly depends on your goals. It seems to me that one has endless opportunities right now if they are willing to be self employed or work for a startup and don't have heavy income requirements. Lots of functions like startup weekend, group meet-ups, etc... can get you in front of the right people. If your goal, however, is to work for the man, then why not take a position like this and see what doors it opens?

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm going to take a counter position to some of the other advice on this thread.

Consider taking this gig. As an internship, I suspect that it's going to last 3-6 months. Yes, the commute sucks but I suspect you'll learn something far more important:

1\. How users react to systems that geeks/engineers put in place.

2\. How to talk to non-technical users (who, I assume, are the likely callers)

I did a short stint at a helpdesk many years ago and it certainly helped me learn how to talk to non-technical people. (I also did two summers selling cars at CarMax which, IMHO, was a _fantastic_ way to learn how to sell yourself to anyone.)

</comment><comment><USER4> Like you, I decided to get into IT kind of late. My first position in the IT industry was help desk support for a local and quite successful ISP. We did both sales and tech support. It was a very busy job with high call volumes, lots of shift work and the shortest legally required break times. Coincidentally enough, I also had a long commute to this job, though it was < 2 hours. After about three months I found a new position working in web design/development which was more like what I was wanting to do. This was lucky because shortly after I left, the local ISP was sold and everyone was told they could relocate across the country or lose their job.

I learned a lot from working help desk and don't regret doing the job at all, if nothing else, it was good to have something other than study on my resume. But I could tell even after three months I was already starting to burn out and was getting a bit sick of being treated more like a resource than a human being. In my experience, help desk workers tend to be treated as being pretty expendable and easily replaceable, whether this is actually the case or not.

My advice would be if you _need_ a job now or feel that you might benefit from the experience of working a "real" job (assuming this is your first foray into a professional position), then take this help desk job. If you don't _need_ a job now or don't feel the experience of this job would be helpful, don't take it. _But either way keep looking for something that's more inline with what you're really after._

<comment><USER5> I had a similar experience sans commute with a helpdesk. I also credit that gig as being a good learning experience and eventually getting me interested in web development. I couldn't find a web development job though, so I did freelancing instead. The nice thing about development is that you don't have to wait around for something to come to you, instead, make things happen yourself. Work on getting freelance gigs, in the downtime, work on an open source project or work on your sales tools (portfolio, web site, connectivity via social networks, reputation management, etc.)

<comment><USER4> After some years of working in "enterprisey" environments, I've recently starting a partial transition into something a little more freelance and self determined. Always glad to hear from people who are on the same wave length. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'd consider asking yourself what you expect and/or hope to get out of it. A two-hour commute for an uninspiring job does not sound like something terribly enjoyable or fulfilling.

Perhaps others here could suggest different opportunities in the Vancouver area?

</comment><comment><USER7> I've been keeping a list of CS internships/research opportunities on delicious, maybe you'll find something interesting there: <http://www.delicious.com/psawaya/Internships?page=1>

Also, I don't know if you're looking for an internship for the summer, but if you are, check out the Google summer of code program. You'd learn a lot more about programming by contributing to open source than you would at a helpdesk, plus you get paid a little.

</comment><comment><USER8> A _2 hour_ commute? Each way or total? Unless you are hard up for cash or this is the most amazing opportunity ever, this is a waste of your time. Find something closer.

<comment><AUTHOR> Unfortunately, it's each way.

<comment><USER9> Nah! That's way too much of your life wasted.

As for the main question. If you plan to be programming or building systems, then 6-12 months on the help-desk will make you so much more aware of the sorts of things that are show stoppers for _average_ users. In my experience technical staff with help-desk experience make better usability decisions.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> 2 Hours?! That's 10 hours a week (20 hours if you meant one way) that you should calculate into your hourly pay rate. However, if you really don't have any IT experience help desk support is a good stepping stone. Just make sure you never go backwards.

</comment><comment><USER11> Do yourself a favour and find something else you truly feel excited about. A long commute for a position that you cannot get 100% behind is a recipe for disaster. Stay true to yourself and your ideals.

</comment><comment><USER12>
        I have no experience in anything IT related (mostly fastfood and retail)

Since you've no experience, I suggest you take the job.</comment>


The ethics of recycling content: Jonah Lehrer accused of self-plagiarism - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/science/2012/06/the-ethics-of-recycling-content-jonah-lehrer-accused-of-self-plagiarism/

<comment><USER2> I reject the concept of self-plagiarism because I believe that people are entitled to use their own works as they see fit, provided that they have not transfered ownership or copyright. Even so, that is beside the point because the issue has nothing to do with plagiarism.

The issue has to do with the violation of the terms of the contract. If the publisher wanted something unoriginal, then they would make an explicit request to publish a previous work. (In other words, the publisher would say to the author, "We want to publish your previous work X. Can we negotiate a price?") When no such request is made and the publisher instead offers to pay the author to write something, it is implied that they want something original. That implicit request is part of the contractual agreement between the author and the publisher. When the author publishes something unoriginal and then takes money for the service of publishing something that is original, then the author has effectively stolen the money.

</comment><comment><USER3> I don't get why this matters to me, the reader. If he writes well and I learn something, why would I care if he wrote about it before.

<comment><USER4> Well, I don't imagine it would matter much to the reader. There are people who say it's not right for him to do it, but who it really matters to are the New Yorker and the Wall Street Journal, depending on who owns the rights to Jonah Lehrer's writings while he was at the New Yorker.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> How much less of an offense would it be if he took more time to just reword things, even if the same message was kept?

<comment><USER6> Depends on the extent of the rewording. The courts have methods to test for derivative works, and testing for a rote or uncreative transformation is one of those.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> If you're going to re-use your own work and present it to readers, at least acknowledge that you're doing it. This American Life does this well, starting each re-run with a note saying, 'This is a re-run and we are playing it because XYZ'

</comment><comment><USER8> As a columnist for my college paper, hopelessly past my deadline on a week's column, I recycled (with slight updates) some earlier work I'd first done for another campus paper.

I knew it was a sort of cop out, a disfavored option. But since it was my own work appearing under my own name in a signed opinion/satirical slot, I thought a re-run of some of my better, less-seen work was preferable to offering nothing. I didn't yet realize that 'self-plagiarism' was even a thing. I got the message from the disappointed tsk-tsk look/tone from my editor.

I think it wound up running with a disclaimer about having appeared before elsewhere. Does precise self-attribution cure self-plagiarism?

</comment><comment><USER4> The title threw me off. When I read self-plagiarism, I read that as using your own work that you already wrote before. Reading into it a little more revealed the catch. He took content he wrote for another publication and used it for his current publication. The issue is: who owns it, the publication or the writer? As the author points out, it comes down to what's in the writer's contract, although I have to agree with the author: even if it was in the writer's contract that he retains copyright over his articles and he is legally permitted to reuse his work for other publications, it just doesn't feel right that he used work someone else paid him to do to finish work his current employer is paying him to do.

<comment><USER9> _even if it was in the writer's contract that he retains copyright over his articles and he is legally permitted to reuse his work for other publications, it just doesn't feel right that he used work someone else paid him to do to finish work his current employer is paying him to do._

If programmers thought like this, we would all still be using ENIAC.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Legal advice for a programmer - <AUTHOR> I have a friend who is caught in an IP issue with their employer regarding a side-project. They told their employer about the project multiple times in detail, and the employer explicitly encouraged and promoted their involvement.
Now the employer has started an investigation because they've learned that the project is taking off and is commercially viable. Whether the employer is trying to defend themselves or something more sinister, my friend does not have a legal contact who can offer advice.
Can anyone recommend my friend a lawyer in the London area?
Following similar advice on HN before, I've told my friend to keep quiet until they've gained legal advice. Are there any other immediate things my friend should do?
Thanks <comment><USER2> Check out [https://www.lawdingo.com/](https://www.lawdingo.com/)

They're a YC company, good place to start a search and get some advice

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks Tim

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Hope your friend never worked on the project during work...

<comment><AUTHOR> They did not. One of the crippling points though, is that there's a clause in their contract stating that any work generated during the time at the company belongs to the company.

Is it still common for people to sign these agreements?

<comment><USER4> [not a lawyer] that clause usually states that any work done on company time [time paid by the company], belongs to the company. If you work on your side project from home and you are not paid by the company for that time, the project belongs to you.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Play Flappy Bird with Friends - <AUTHOR> http://ping3.com <comment><AUTHOR> Just plugged in Flappy Bird (open source version called Floppy Bird by nebez) on the leaderboard system I'm developing for HTML games.

Any feedback you have for Ping3 would be great. Thanks.</comment>


Cannabis and Frankincense at the Judahite Shrine of Arad - <AUTHOR> https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03344355.2020.1732046 <comment><USER2> From The Histories of Herodotus (d.424 BC):

"Hemp grows in Scythia: it is very like flax; only that it is a much coarser and taller plant: some grows wild about the country, some is produced by cultivation: the Thracians make garments of it which closely resemble linen; so much so, indeed, that if a person has never seen hemp he is sure to think they are linen, and if he has, unless he is very experienced in such matters, he will not know of which material they are. The Scythians, as I said, take some of this hemp-seed, and, creeping under the felt coverings, throw it upon the red-hot stones; immediately it smokes, and gives out such a vapour as no Grecian vapour-bath can exceed; the Scyths, delighted, shout for joy"

<comment><USER3> Cannabis seeds and hemp seeds don't contain thc

<comment><USER4> It was most likely the flowers of a female plant (that contain the seed) that were thrown on the rocks.

Also, hemp == cannabis.

<comment><USER5> > Also, hemp == cannabis.

Sure, but plants grown primarily for it's fibers wouldn't have anyting near the THC levels of the skunk mutants grown for narcotic use today

<comment><USER6> I know people in the industry, and hemp with significant amounts of THC commonly occurs. Unless people in the past were selecting for low THC on purpose, it's likely that THC content in hemp fluctuated and was significant enough to smoke.

I've also purchased hemp for the purposes of consuming CBD, and it got me high.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > Two limestone monoliths, interpreted as altars, were found in the Judahite > shrine at Tel Arad. Unidentified dark material preserved on their upper > surfaces was submitted for organic residue analysis at two unrelated > laboratories that used similar established extraction methods. On the > smaller altar, residues of cannabinoids such as Δ9-teterahydrocannabinol > (THC), cannabidiol (CBD) and cannabinol (CBN) were detected, along with an > assortment of terpenes and terpenoids, suggesting that cannabis > inflorescences had been burnt on it. Organic residues attributed to animal > dung were also found, suggesting that the cannabis resin had been mixed with > dung to enable mild heating. The larger altar contained an assemblage of > indicative triterpenes such as boswellic acid and norursatriene, which > derives from frankincense. The additional presence of animal fat―in related > compounds such as testosterone, androstene and cholesterol―suggests that > resin was mixed with it to facilitate evaporation. These well-preserved > residues shed new light on the use of 8th century Arad altars and on incense > offerings in Judah during the Iron Age.

<comment><USER8> After all that I was expecting a description of carvings depicting a figure with demonic wings and tentacles or snakes on its face. I was a little disappointed.

<comment><USER7> Ha. Well, they were probably smoking mellow weed plucked from the ground, as opposed to modern day laboratory high THC weed.

<comment><USER8> But they were smoking it mixed with dung. Sounds just right for a death cult of a mad god to me... :)

<comment><USER7> Oh true. Sounds magical, man.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Danny Nemu has an interesting paper on entheogens in the Old Testament.

[https://akjournals.com/view/journals/2054/3/Special- Issue/ar...](https://akjournals.com/view/journals/2054/3/Special- Issue/article-p117.xml)

And a lighter article looking at Frankincense in particular.

[http://psypressuk.com/2016/12/22/three-kings-orient-drug- run...](http://psypressuk.com/2016/12/22/three-kings-orient-drug-runners-not- kings/)

</comment><comment><USER2> Smoking cannabis in pipes occurred only after Columbus and the import of tobacco. I find that a little shocking, especially in India, where cannabis has religious value. Archeological work is sadly very rare in India... But if anyone finds an older chillum pipe, it will be a major discovery.

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

<comment><USER10> I believe the use of cannabis in this particular ritual is referred to as the ancient practice of suffumigation. This practice goes fairly far back in the literature.

> Suffumigation, by definition, means "to fumigate from below." This practice > involves herbal incenses burned for magical purposes and is used in > Ceremonial Magic to attract certain spirits. When an object is consecrated, > it is held in the smoke of the incense, thus suffumigating it.

(The Witch Book: The Encyclopedia of Witchcraft, Wicca, and Neo-paganism)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I always felt that the burning of incense had to cannabis.

Burning a half lb bundle in a medium sized room of even low quality cannabis would feel like a spiritual moment.

<comment><USER12> There's one reading of the recipe for Holy Anointing Oil that includes Cannabis, making the result basically a topical weed oil.

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

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I didn't realise "The History of the World, Part 1" was actually a documentary.

<comment><USER14> The concept of rolling papyrus is perhaps not so far off then.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I picture the ceremonies being accompanied by chants about being "iron like a lion in Zion".</comment>


State of the MirageOS: an OCaml unikernel [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.irill.org/videos/oups-december-2014/MirageOS

<comment><USER2> The slides themselves (served via a unikernel) can be found at [http://decks.openmirage.org/irill14-seminar#/](http://decks.openmirage.org/irill14-seminar#/)

<comment><USER3> Very interesting content, but unfortunately bad rendering on Firefox. Better on Chrome but no scrollbars.

<comment><USER2> That's unfortunate. I just checked on firefox on my mac and I do notice a slight lag if I try to flick through slides quickly. I'm not sure what you're referring to by scrollbars though. Can you give any more detail? Feel free to email me (see my profile).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> One thing I'm interested in is in Jitsu. I've tried to find more, but there is hardly anything out there. Can it do/is it easy to plugin something for load- balancing? With a 100ms boot, you could easily scale by starting VMs on the fly.

<comment><USER2> There's a paper we'll be presenting at NSDI next year on Jitsu, so there'll be more to read about soon. The repo is at [https://github.com/MagnusS/jitsu](https://github.com/MagnusS/jitsu)

Regarding the scaling, it's definitely something we're keen to do. For example, we should be able to create hyper-elastic clouds by rapidly spinning up and culling unikernel VMs in response to demand. e.g a simple scenario might be me serving my personal blog from a cubieboard but if a post ends up on HN, then my infrastructure should automatically scale with the demand -- complete with load balancers etc and elsewhere on a public cloud provider. As demand falls, my footprint shrinks back into just the one VM on the cubieboard.

I'm sure these ideas aren't new but unikernels should make them easier to realise.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> via [https://lobste.rs/s/hgknhb/state_of_the_mirage_an_ocaml_unik...](https://lobste.rs/s/hgknhb/state_of_the_mirage_an_ocaml_unikernel)

Submitted here, to get a wider audience, and ask: does anything in Rust preclude this from being done in Rust rather than OCaml? Sounds like a nice idea...

<comment><USER4> Personally I rather that they keep on using OCaml with the C parts rewritten in Rust.

If they are successful with OCaml, it is a win for OS low level programming in GC enabled languages.

And in the process, it helps to improve the OCaml eco-system.

This without taking into consideration that the whole MirageOS architecture is based on OCaml modules, so changing language is a bit like starting from scratch.

EDIT: typo, level was missing.

<comment><USER5> I was thinking on the same line while watching the video. Does anybody know how feasible would be to rewrite the C part in Rust?

<comment><USER6> I sometimes hack on the C part (e.g. porting Mirage to ARM). The C code in Mirage is basically:

\- malloc

\- printk

\- openlibm (standard maths functions)

\- gmp (fast big ints for crypto stuff)

\- garbage collector

\- support code to make the above C code compile (assert, various standard header files, etc)

Once Rust has matured, and if reliable, well-optimised replacements for all these libraries become available, then it would be interesting to use it. But until then, there isn't much C code you can replace, because there is a minimal core you need to provide to compile C libraries like gmp, and we're pretty close to that already.

Rust's linear types / lifetime support is interesting, though. For example, when you pass a buffer to Xen for transmission on the network, it's important that you don't modify it again until it has been read (or you'll get a race). Rust's type system can express that statically, whereas OCaml's can't. On the other hand, OCaml has functors, is far more mature and has lots of libraries available.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Driver who died in a Tesla crash using Autopilot ignored 7 safety warnings - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/06/20/the-driver-who-died-in-a-tesla-crash-using-autopilot-ignored-7-safety-warnings <comment><USER2> From a UX (and potentially legal) standpoint, it matters less how many warnings he ignored in the few minutes prior to the crash, but how many warnings he—and others—ignored on other drives.

By way of extreme example, if every time anyone engaged autopilot, it issued a warning every minute, you would quickly ignore them. Information fatigue.

<comment><USER3> > _Since the crash, those reports have said, Tesla has updated its Autopilot > feature to include a strikeout system, whereby drivers who repeatedly ignore > safety warnings risk having their Autopilot disabled until the next time > they start the car._

Looks like this concern has been addressed already.

<comment><USER4> _One_ concern is also whether this is fair criticism or talking shit about a dead person. Any changes that came after the crash are completely irrelevant to that concern.

<comment><USER5> > talking shit about a dead person

Being dead does not automatically command more respect. If someone's fuck-up caused them to die, there's nothing wrong with criticizing them for their fuck-up.

<comment><USER4> Did I say it is? I said that _one_ concern is "whether this is fair criticism or talking shit". And for that question the state of the autopilot _then_ is relevant, not any improvements afterwards. Speaking of autopilots I'm really curious what thought processes, if any at all, lead to such downvotes and responses. It doesn't get more simple than basic chronology, after all.

<comment><USER5> > Did I say it is? I said that one concern is "whether this is fair criticism > or talking shit"

You said "whether this is fair criticism or talking shit _about a dead person_ ", which can easily be interpreted as saying you think people that are dead deserve an extra level of respect simply for being dead.

Obviously your message has been misinterpreted by multiple people.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm not sure I like the focus on the driver here. I do think he was a fool for trusting the device.

It genuinely sounds like the autopilot failed to prevent a collision that, whether right or wrong, we would expect it to before broadly deploying these devices.

A semi is a very large and pretty reasonably defined visual mass that intersected with the path of the vehicle.

What did the autopilot do and when did it do it seems to be missing from this round of reports on this incident and thats pretty lame.

Edit- Notice there is no mention of a COLLISION warning being issued? Only nagging "hands on wheel".

<comment><USER7> Despite the terrible name Tesla's system is supposed to _assistive_ , the driver is still supposed to be in the loop.

If the driver totally abdicated all involvement, the accident is his fault. He's the final safety system and it sounds like he didn't even try to do his job.

<comment><USER8> Names are important. Calling it "autopilot" implies that it does the driving for you, and people will take that at face value. It should be named in a way that accurately describes its abilities.

If it is actually just assistive, and isn't autopilot, then calling it such is incredibly dangerous. It'd be like calling homeopathic junk a "cancer medicine", which is illegal mind you.

<comment><USER9> "Autopilot" in an aircraft doesn't imply it flies for you. And in an aircraft, there are multiple levels.

"Autopilot" is no worse than "cruise control" in this regard.

<comment><USER10> "Autopilot" is worse, not because of what "autopilot" actually means in aviation, but because of what "autopilot" _suggests_ to the car-buying public, who are, generally, not aviators.

<comment><USER11> What does the car-buying public think those folks in blue suits are doing at the front of the plane?

<comment><USER12> Giving each other handskys!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Sounds like he either committed suicide or was unconscious/disabled before the accident.

An autopilot shouldn't just hand over control to the driver and pray when it needs help and the driver is unresponsive; it should try to come to a stop on the side of the road, then shout for help. Shouting via a cell call to 911 (or country-specific equivalent) wouldn't be a bad idea.

"This is a Tesla P85. My driver is unresponsive. The car is stopped on I-95 southbound, 2.1 miles south of exit 4 past I-295. The car is red. Please send help. This message will repeat three times."

<comment><USER14> But this wasn't a _disengagement_ of the autopilot, he just didn't have his hands on the steering wheel.

Not to mention that you don't actually need to have autopilot running to get the emergency braking feature. Autopilot or not the car should brake before going full throttle into the back of a semi.

For example: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eD89Fc_ofXc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eD89Fc_ofXc)

<comment><USER15> It's not a terribly informative video as one can't tell what the car did and what the driver did. Did the car or driver steer around the car in front, who/what operated the break first, did the driver have to specify the degree of breaking or was that all down to the vehicle. Was the driver watching the car in front of the vehicle he was following; did the vehicle do that, what - if anything - did the vehicle react to. At what point does the driver receive control back from the vehicle if it did take over control, was it full or partial control and up to what point.

None of that appears in the video AFAICT?

Extra credit: if the vehicles in front were attempting a carjacking is it possible for the Tesla driver to floor it and push the car in front out of the way?

<comment><USER14> Description says autopilot was disabled, and the quick successive beeps you hear are the emergency braking system detecting an impending collision and braking. The driver is steering (and was before; no autopilot).

This is how emergency braking works in every car that has it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> The article mentioned how newer Tesla vehicles have a "strikeout" system where the autopilot software disables itself until the next car startup if the driver repeatedly ignores warnings.

While this is definitely an improvement, how does that actually work? If the driver isn't paying attention, how do the newer vehicles force the driver back into paying attention and back to taking full control of the car? This seems like a really hard problem, and the article doesn't really dig into it.

Related: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_man%27s_switch](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_man%27s_switch)

<comment><USER17> The vehicle starts to slow down (eventually coming to a stop) and turns the hazard lights on.

Here is a video: [https://youtu.be/UiNDVdmF9ws?t=47s](https://youtu.be/UiNDVdmF9ws?t=47s)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> While some (elsewhere) are arguing the system could have gracefully handed back control by slowing down to an eventual stop, it's pretty clear the driver was at fault. It's also not clear how the autopilot could have done better - is slowing down on a high speed road any less dangerous? It needed a human in the loop.

The evidence was that the driver was wilfully ignoring the safety warnings, just like ignoring a fence or sign above a steep cliff. That increased the fatal risk to him and other road users. Any other (less litigious) country would immediately place the fault where it clearly lies.

<comment><USER19> > , it's pretty clear the driver was at fault

It's pretty clear both the driver is primarily at fault and Tesla's poorly designed system (as it existed at the time) compounded the driver error.

> is slowing down on a high speed road any less dangerous

Yes, slowing down gradually and pulling over is safer than careening down the road with zero input the human driver which as you admit "needs to be in the loop".

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I know they changed the software somehow (although I don't know exactly how).

It seems like if the driver isn't interacting and following the rules (like not keeping their hands on the wheel) why not slow the car and have it pull over with hazard lights on?

My car's systems (though not as advanced) will simply turn off if you're not doing your part.

<comment><USER2> They did. From the article: "Since the crash, those reports have said, Tesla has updated its Autopilot feature to include a strikeout system, whereby drivers who repeatedly ignore safety warnings risk having their Autopilot disabled until the next time they start the car."

<comment><USER7> That's good. Like I said I didn't know the exact change they made (WaPo is paywalled, I read the Ars article).

Thanks.

As long as they are so advanced having the system eventually pull over seems like a good idea. Turning the system off won't work great if the driver falls asleep and the beeps don't wake them. At least if it pulled over they'd be safe. Probably a really hard thing to do though.

<comment><USER20> It doesn't pull over yet, but if you repeatedly ignore warnings it will put on flashers and slowly pull to a stop.

<comment><USER7> Really? Excellent. That's most if the way there.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I'd love to compare the results of this final analysis with the FUD that I remember coming out following this crash on Reddit et al with a series of people saying 'I told you so'.

Complex systems of risk mitigation tends to get pushed in the media as an ideal solution to these accidents well before the complete facts come in. Common sense precaution is typically ignored in this culture of total risk adverse superiority that floats to the surface after these events and would ultimately result in very few of these experimental products, which drive innovation, being tested (as is clearly the case in many risk adverse cultures such as Japan and Switzerland).

With any early adopter's of automation whose success is partially dependent on human intervention (ie, flying planes) having stories of failures of incentives to know when or not to actually listen to the warnings provided by the interface over your own intuition is helpful not only in training but also in the design of these systems.

To not expect a certain degree of these types of failure situations where the system largely acted as intended is naive and ultimately defeatist.

I hope the drivers realize the risk they are engaging in here and take appropriate behavioural change as a result but I can't imagine many formal systems that would practically be effective here at deterring these situations other than maybe adapting educational training and the content of the warning systems.

<comment><USER8> As someone who doesn't own a car but is often a cyclist or pedestrian, I don't want to be reliant on drivers' (potentially lacking) common sense for my safety.

<comment><USER21> That's why when I bike daily in Toronto I take full lanes where it's obvious there isn't much room for bikes on the side or cars are turning right.

I also pass on the left when cars will clearly be turning right on a green or red light.

I'm amazed that this is a rare thing for a biker to do, when it should be common sense, but it's always best to design systems for the lowest common denominator. Still I'm amazed so many bikers put so much trust in other cars and assume they are looking into to their mirrors when they turn or merge.

The best advice I've heard as a cyclist is that it's safest to assume no driver is paying attention and act accordingly. This is common sense precaution.

When it comes to designing automated driving systems there is also a safe assumption that common sense (by other people) isn't expected to a certain degree so prepare for edge cases.

But in the particular case I'm not sure what you can do beyond running those 7 warnings before the crash. All I said is that the language used and severity of the warnings could be tested in experiments as well as considering the marketing of the efficacy of the systems to early adopters of alpha systems. Basically eliminating over confidence in existing oversight mechanisms.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> This was the crash where the Tesla drove at full-speed into the back of a trailer yes?

I don't see how the "7 safety warnings" are relevant here, that was just the cars reminder that he should put his hands back on the steering wheel. It does not mean the car detected it was losing vision and would stop steering the vehicle shortly. The safety warnings had nothing to do with the Tesla failing to recognize the obstacle ahead and brake.

I don't think the future looks good for autonomous driving if the NTSB is going to accept an explanation that there is no vehicle failure here because it gave some regular reminders to put your hands on the steering wheel.

<comment><USER22> The hands on the steering wheel is a proxy for paying attention. That's really the key point of these "assist" features: you need to be paying attention just as much as you would be otherwise. Unfortunately, this reduces their effectiveness to being backup.

<comment><USER14> That's great, if you're looking to take someones license away. That is not what the NTSB does. The assist feature failed to recognize the obstacle ahead and worse yet, it failed to recognize it's own failure. This is what the NTSB is investigating.

The autopilot did not disengage. If it disengages and tells the driver to take over immediately, hey maybe (big maybe) we can accept that this was not a technical failure and solely the drivers fault. But that didn't happen.

<comment><USER22> At no point should the system have to "[tell] the driver to take over immediately", because the driver should always be in control. That is the point of the assist technology: to act as a backup for driver error. The driver is not acting as backup for the autopilot error.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Until we get to real autonomous cars, we'll probably have more issues with people and their hubris. My car has a bunch of these features, and I have them only in case of messing up. They are redundancy. Nothing more.

Some people are way overestimating what these systems can do or are paying less attention because they think the car will correct for their mistakes. We're going to be in for a rocky few years or so where these advanced systems may lead more crashes from inattentive drivers.

Having used these various technologies, I can firmly say that I can't wait for fully autonomous cars.

<comment><USER7> Mine does too, but instead of calling it 'Autopilot' it's 'adaptive cruise control' and 'lane keep assist'. The names make it clear the car is not driving its self (although it's clear to me its close to capable for the simple case).

The car makes it VERY clear you MUST steer. The car mostly keeps itself in the lane but is a little bit unsmooth about it (I assume to encourage drivers to do it themselves) and will yell at you loudly if you go more than 10-15s without doing steering yourself and disable its self.

It's a great feature and helps a ton with high crosswinds... but it's very clear it's not meant to be relied upon to drive the car.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Maybe the biggest problem is Tesla calling it autopilot. Just call it lane assist or adaptive cruise control. I know many of the cars will stop working if you take your hands off the wheel too long.

<comment><USER25> But their plan is to slowly evolve it into a full autopilot feature. I think Elon says they're demoing a CA->NYC no-hands trip sometime in the next year.

Maybe they could have branded it differently early on?

<comment><USER24> Call it autopilot when it works like an autopilot, but right now it really doesn't do all of that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> The crash had nothing to do with the driver ignoring autopilot warnings. For some reason the automatic emergency braking feature of the Tesla did not work. This is a serious problem and AEB should be completely separate from autopilot. What is the point of a safety feature which is supposed to stop you from crashing if it doesn't activate? In this case the driver appears to be an idiot who wasn't paying attention, but imagine if he had a seizure, fell asleep, got cut off and brake checked, or something else?

<comment><USER15> To be fair a vehicle coming across you at a crossroads is hard to judge the speed of, hard to see in time and hard to decide what to do. If you break will it slam in to the side of you; do you need to floor it, maintain speed? What if you're in amongst traffic and can't see the vehicle (visually or via tech assist)?

Is there other info you're using to come to your conclusions here, the article doesn't seem particularly informative about the crash (location, circumstances, etc.).

<comment><USER26> From the NTSB Report ([https://dms.ntsb.gov/public/59500-59999/59989/604694.pdf](https://dms.ntsb.gov/public/59500-59999/59989/604694.pdf)):

>In concluding the interview, the witness offered the opinion that both drivers had sufficient time to have seen the other vehicle and should have been able to slow or stop sufficiently to have avoided the crash.

The full witness statement is on page 19. It sounds like the truck was making a left turn across the Tesla's path and according to the witness they both had enough time to see the other car - the truck was moving slowly and the Tesla took around three seconds to reach the intersection from the time when the witness first saw it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Worth noting that the driver seemed particularly enthusiastic about autopilot, to the point of frequently recording his experiences and publishing them on YouTube:

[https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/02/business/joshua-brown- tec...](https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/02/business/joshua-brown-technology- enthusiast-tested-the-limits-of-his-tesla.html)

> _CANTON, Ohio — Joshua Brown loved his all-electric Tesla Model S so much he > nicknamed it Tessy._

> _And he celebrated the Autopilot feature that made it possible for him to > cruise the highways, making YouTube videos of himself driving hands-free. In > the first nine months he owned it, Mr. Brown put more than 45,000 miles on > the car._

> _"I do drive it a LOT," he wrote in response to one of the hundreds of > viewer comments on one of his two dozen Tesla-themed videos. His postings > attracted countless other Tesla enthusiasts, who tend to embrace the cars > with an almost cultish devotion._

That he was a Navy SEAL who specialized in electronics and bomb defusal probably also gave him additional confidence/hubris when driving.

</comment><comment><USER28> Why does autopilot continue to drive the car without someone holding the steering wheel in the first place? If the car can't drive itself without driver input, then why isn't letting go of the steering wheel the equivalent of disengaging autopilot?

Tesla's technical hubris could have killed more than just the driver.

</comment><comment><USER29> [https://www.tesla.com/blog/tragic-loss](https://www.tesla.com/blog/tragic- loss)

I think Tesla's original statement is relevant to post here. Although likely somewhat biased, they provided a succinct explanation to the reason why the Tesla did not brake automatically to avoid the collision.

From the statement: "Neither Autopilot nor the driver noticed the white side of the tractor trailer against a brightly lit sky, so the brake was not applied. The high ride height of the trailer combined with its positioning across the road and the extremely rare circumstances of the impact caused the Model S to pass under the trailer, with the bottom of the trailer impacting the windshield of the Model S."

</comment><comment><USER30> Has anyone driven one of these using Autopilot?

It strikes me as an eerie feature in that semi-autonomous means you're not controlling the car but at any moment you may have to jump in generally unaware of the forces the car/tires have been experiencing.

It just seems like a major mindset shift from mostly idle passenger to active driver and offhand I feel like until the car can reliably drive itself I'd rather just drive the whole way.

</comment><comment><USER31> 1\. I think any autopilot system which makes users to keep their hands on steering wheel and pay equal attention is totally useless. In fact it's detrimental since it gives false sense of control and naturally leads users to lapse.

2\. Anyone who read Don Norman knows this is usually fault of the design of the system not the user. The system needs to do more to assist users in these edge cases.

<comment><USER7> 1\. Yep, which is why they never should have named it that. That was a very dangerous decision.

2\. No, it's the fault of the marketing and system designers for vet giving users the impression it was a 'true' autopilot (see #1)

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> For a high tech vehicle with so many safety features built in, I don't understand why an automatic collision avoidance system didn't override the autopilot system and start braking well ahead of this high speed impact. Maybe this model doesn't have such a system, or the traffic conditions changed so rapidly there was no time left to brake?

</comment><comment><USER33> This again brings us back to the fundamentals.

Do you trust your self-driving car AI algorithm? Yes? Sure lets remove the car controls(Accelerator, break and steering wheel). And then safety and other liability is on the car manufacturer.

If you don't have this level of trust on your algorithm you don't really have a self driving car.

</comment><comment><USER34> Our family is looking at getting a Tesla and my wife brought up this incident. I told her that Teslas are not fully capable of driving themselves and that the guy was probably not paying attention to what he was doing. I'm sad this guy lost his life, but ignoring safety warnings for whatever reason eared him the Darwin award.

<comment><USER35> am going to disagree there. Tesla names its system autopilot. Uses the fact that autopilot that includes collision avoidance reduces accidents by 40%, and then claims that there system is safer than a human (assisted human safer than a human, genius!). Elon musk has a statement every month about self driving autonomous driverless cars. They even have the gall to say that new cars have "full self driving hardware", is proof of outrageous statements even required? And all this hype/misleading advertising is fine because Tesla showed a few warnings? And the driver didn't have sufficient reason to believe the car was capable of complete autonomy. A simple Google search will tell you that this driver wasn't the only one.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Ars Technica has an article that's not paywalled:

[https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/06/tesla-model-s- wa...](https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/06/tesla-model-s-warned- driver-in-fatal-crash-to-put-hands-on-steering-wheel/)

<comment><USER36> Yes, and you pay in the form of giving away your data to advertisers.

To be sure, WaPo also sells data to their advertisers. At the same time, WaPo has broader coverage and probably needs a larger newsroom as a result. Ars Technica is a subsidiary of Conde Nast, and Conde Nast as a whole has paywalled publications (like New Yorker).

In general, I think it's perfectly fine to promote paywalled content on HN so long as the content itself is good. We have to fund quality reporting/writing, and HN can serve as a curation mechanism to surface "content worth paying for".

<comment><USER7> I tend to see 1-2 articles a month I want to read from WaPo, but it's about $50/year for a subscription. And many of those articles aren't much more than what other sites have (because they're not deep investigative features).

I'm not interested in paying about $3.33/article.

When they do big investigations I'd be happy to to pay $1 or $2 to read it.

This? No.

<comment><USER36> You might want to try subscribing to WaPo through Apple News or Google News Stand. They have monthly quotas on # of articles you can ready.

While the principle of "per article" pricing is appealing, it won't probably work in practice: generating content worth paying for is not like spinning up servers because the cost of production occurs upfront _and_ have non-zero marginal cost.

<comment><USER7> I'm not surprised the pay-per-article thing has never taken off.

I've never used Apple news, I'm kind of hesitant to. I already track the sites I care about through RSS and see many of the same things through Twitter first. I don't really want to start using a third thing that overlaps with the other two.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


"The Facebook" before it was famous - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1MWFzf4i3o <comment><USER2> The guy that got his start from mommy and daddy</comment>


Facebook Introducing New Facebook Pages - <AUTHOR> https://www.facebook.com/about/pages/

<comment><USER2> I just don't understand why any business would ever put their brand under complete control of facebook. That never made sense to me. When I think of all the posters I have seen that only tell me how to find the company on facebook, I shake my head and sigh.</comment>


ZPM Espresso and the Rage of the Jilted Crowdfunder - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/03/magazine/zpm-espresso-and-the-rage-of-the-jilted-crowdfunder.html

<comment><USER2> I'm an original backer. I backed at the machine level, so would have received a unit.

My _full_ take away from the situation was simply that they had bad business sense and burned through cash on a several bad decisions, then hoped to pull success from the jaws (or more realistically, the stomach) of defeat, so made ridiculously upbeat postings in an attempt to hand wave over the cracks in the project.

It was a risk; I took it on. Not my most expensive bad investment by far. I checked out of monitoring the Kickstarter feed once it became clear that it was going no where. That was well before the final gasps from the ZPM people.

I'm glad that Kickstarter has pushed projects to post risks, avoid renders, etc. None of that would have mitigated the bad-businesspeople issue, however.

-

Edit: To make things clear, I really don't hold a grudge on this. I threw money at some clever ideas, but we all know making them happen at scale can be hard. They didn't handle things well but I felt that the hugely negative response was largely an overreaction.

<comment><USER3> It seems Kickstarter should allow people to set a maximum number of donations and cut it off after that. It they could have handled building/wanted to build 50 machines, but not 5000, they should be able to set an upper limit on the number of backers to their project to prevent runaways like this.

<comment><USER4> Kickstarter does allow this. Rewards such as physical hardware are associated with specific reward tiers, and individual reward tiers are allowed to (and frequently do) have hard limits.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm pretty unhappy with them, but for different reasons. I ordered more than a year after their Kickstarter -- as a pre-order through their Shopify site. At that point, they had indicated they were going to ship units "soon", so I felt the pre-order would be fulfilled in a timely manner.

I had intentionally avoided backing the Kickstarter because I didn't find the risk to be worth it at the time.

One thing I learned through the process, which everyone should be aware of: there is no consumer protection available with either Shopify or American Express Platinum (famous for it's high level of customer service, "return protection", extended warranty on purchases, etc) if more than 60-120 days passes after a purchase and you haven't received the item.

Lesson: file claims early.

Don't order pre-order goods with uncertain delivery dates (or if you do, don't let them slip past 60 days from the order date without filing a claim for a refund with the merchant provider or your credit card company).

</comment><comment><USER6> This comment from one of the original consulting engineers is really interesting:

"Bio-Med Engineer Langhorne PA 13 hours ago I worked in an engineering design consultancy that was contracted early on to help productize the ZPM design, and as such am intimately familiar with their initial concepts. In my opinion, the founders were initially earnest and dedicated but also naive and lacking in engineering judgement. They confused the ability to raise money with the ability to make sound engineering and technical decisions. Falling in love with one's ideas is a trap into which many inventors fall, and ZPM fell hard.

Additionally, I believe that ZPM received a lot of questionable advice from people who did not have their best interests at heart, and were swayed by strong personalities.

But the early backers - particularly the engineers - should have had the sense to realize that open-source firmware that is intended to control a consumer product that delivers scalding hot water is a fundamentally BAD idea, and that using a PID loop to manage the process is totally unnecessary.

What this article highlights is that Mr. Polyakov's talent is in raising money and expectations. It is unfortunate that neither his ethics, nor his engineering abilities can match those talents."

</comment><comment><USER7> _" As someone involved in the project from its beginning, he felt entitled to know everything."_

As a business owner, and a fairly transparent one, that sickens me. In what world should customers feel "entitled to know everything" about a business.

Absolutely entitled to ask, to take their business elsewhere if they don't like the (lack of) answers, but entitled to know? No way.

This sounds to me like another group who confused Kickstarter with Amazon pre- ordering, or an investment fund where they became shareholders. You assessed the risks, took the risk to put some money down, and it didn't work out.

It's often said that Silicon Valley works, in part, because of its acceptance of failures. This is a witch hunt that says more about the hunters than those they are chasing. Good luck building the American Dream in a society where failing to deliver on a Kickstarter project means it's _" entirely appropriate that he never work in technology, finance, consulting or the coffee fields (sorry, that kills the barista career) again."_

<comment><USER8> I don't agree with your characterization of Kickstarter. They've always been quite clear that there is a legal contract between backers and businesses that obligates the business to provide the goods and services they promised. [1]

The company in question broke the terms of their contract. As such, backers are legally entitled to their money back. If the company cannot pay, the company is insolvent and may need to declare bankruptcy. That's life as a business; you need to pay your debts.

[1] As mentioned in the article, that contract changed recently. Businesses can now be absolved from their obligations by being transparent. Basically, backers for new projects _are_ entitled to know what happened if the project fails. [https://www.kickstarter.com/terms-of- use#section4](https://www.kickstarter.com/terms-of-use#section4)

<comment><USER7> You make a good point in regards to Kickstarter, and while I still feel some of the responses in the piece are naive the link you provided certainly supports some of their arguments in a way I didn't fully appreciate.

I still don't think it extends as far as the two quotes I used (the first one was the NYT paraphrasing; the second was direct).

Even in a direct customer situation, where far less _" there's a chance something could happen that prevents the creator from being able to finish the project as promised"_ grey area exists than with KS backers, there's no entitlement to know everything about the company. And to suggest people who try, and risk, and fail aren't even eligible for barista work sickens me personally and would create enormous problems for society.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Did you notice how things went downhill once they entered the stealth mode? What kind of startup consultant would suggest that and for what reason?

<comment><USER10> (I preordered one myself).

No, I don't think that's accurate. Things had gone bad long before that, but it wasn't obvious right away that the ship was sinking. That said, going stealth didn't help them one iota but caused a lot of ire.

My experience with ~ 25 KS has been mixed. ~ 4 failed to deliver, more than half delivered successfully. A couple delivered a lousy product. ~ 1/3 are still pending. Almost _all_ of them are late or very very late, especially SW projects seems to drag on forever.

My appetite for KS has cooled a lot and frankly I'm surprised my experience hasn't been worse.

<comment><USER11> I've had a few bad experiences with KS but as someone whose been using it since very early on, I'm generally pleased with it. KS launched in April 2009 and my first backing was in December 2009. Since then, I've backed 75 projects, 20 of which have yet to deliver, but only 2 which I think will probably fail completely. Most of my pledges are for board games, books, and small gadgets, all of which seem like pretty safe categories.

Around 2009, I had been thinking that the future of music and art might be a return to the patronage system, only with mass audiences funding artists instead of rich individuals. KS, Patreon, and other sites like them seem to have proven that theory out. And I'm happy to see them do so. I still strongly believe that distributed patronage is the best way for artists, musicians, game designers, and even film makers to be able to produce what they and their fans want.

<comment><USER12> > Around 2009, I had been thinking that the future of music and art might be a > return to the patronage system, only with mass audiences funding artists > instead of rich individuals. KS, Patreon, and other sites like them seem to > have proven that theory out. And I'm happy to see them do so. I still > strongly believe that distributed patronage is the best way for artists, > musicians, game designers, and even film makers to be able to produce what > they and their fans want.

Smart words, 100% agree.</comment></comment></comment></comment>