Bitcoin-Rigging Criminal Probe Focused on Tie to Tether - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-20/bitcoin-rigging-criminal-probe-is-said-to-focus-on-tie-to-tether <comment><USER2> So Tether seems to have been hanging out at about 0.97 lately ... isn't that a massive problem? If anyone really believe they were worth 1.00 USD we'd be vacuuming up those 3 pennies.

<comment><USER3> There could also be 3 pennies of friction in getting the money into or out of Tether.

<comment><USER4> I have a feeling that the friction is _very_ directional.

There are lots and lots of stories about individuals losing money in bitcoin and tether, this is one way they do it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This doesn't seem like an inherent flaw in crypocurrencies as much as a feature of an entirely unregulated secondary market (BTC to USD).

Obvious counterpoint: a viable secondary market is a necessary step to adoption of a cryptocurrency.

<comment><USER6> It's a flaw in all current cryptocurrencies that they suffer from an opaque, trust-based exchange infrastructure.

I'd argue that it's inherent in the sense that none of them factored that into their model. As such, I'd argue that the models are inherently flawed because a trustless core is fundamentally compromised if you only have a trustful interface to the rest of the world.

To that end, I agree with your basic point: you need an interface to the outside word that has similar properties to the core model. At least, trustless, transparent, auditable. Probably anonymous as well.

<comment><USER7> You've just described Bisq

<comment><USER6> > You've just described Bisq

Not really but they're clearly making an attempt in that direction.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> As we've seen many times in the past, when the price falls, so do the scammers - this will be interesting.

<comment><USER9> Agreed. It will be fun to see who has gone fractional.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Frankly I'm surprised Tether hasn't gone nuclear already.

</comment><comment><USER11> Tether is very much not a cryptocurrency. It's centrally controlled. They can freeze transactions and mint new coins at will.

<comment><USER12> So is USDC and XRP right? And MIOTA. Where do you suggest we draw the line? I'm curious what the general thinking is on this.

<comment><USER13> In a world where I get to unilaterally set the rules, the line would be when one person or company is the only entity that can officially bless the mechanism that is tasked with approving and verifying transactions. As far as I know Ripple Inc, a for profit company, owns, runs, and controls all the nodes that approve XRP transactions.

I dont really see how XRP is really any different than Paypal. If they can ban me, stop me from sending my tokens to whoever I want, or reverse my transaction I don't feel as though im getting any of crypto's benefits.

Not sure if thats general thinking, but it is at least mine.

<comment><USER14> So much wrong information...

Ripple Inc only controlled all validating nodes until stable third party nodes were established. Each node decides which other nodes to trust. There is a default Unique Node List (trusted nodes) provided by Ripple. But, the UNL is not a list of all validating nodes.

At this time Ripple only controls 39% of nodes on the default UNL. If Ripple Inc turned to dust the XRP network would continue on.

[https://minivalist.cinn.app/](https://minivalist.cinn.app/)

No entity, not even Ripple Inc., can freeze XRP or prevent you from sending it. Assets can be frozen by the issuing entity but XRP cannot ever be frozen.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> If DOJ can show evidence of cartels, terrorist cells, and other unsavory entities laundering their money through bitcoin, ICOs, ethereum, altcoins and tether, then anyone who has ever taken crypto to work on a project, anyone who handled the influx of cash to exchange it for crypto by selling Tether (which is all of the major exchanges), are headed for a storm of hurt.

We are no longer in SEC turf and DOJ has a conviction rate of 93% as of 2012, a trend which has been increasing. It's one thing to argue against Howey Test or hide money from the Taxman. _It 's a whole new level of shit storm to be accused of laundering money for terrorists and drug cartels_.

[https://medium.com/@justsomeperson/uncovering-the-real- carte...](https://medium.com/@justsomeperson/uncovering-the-real-cartel-in- bitcoin-814427d00f54)

<comment><USER16> Cartels, terrorist cells, and other unsavory entities also use cash, but you don't see the DOJ prosecuting everyone who has accepted cash as payment.

<comment><USER17> In fairness, if I set up a bank which, by accident or by design, made it exceedingly easy to launder millions in cash relatively quickly, you can bet the DOJ would have a problem with that.

Transporting millions in cash is risky (either you trust the courier with that and risk their life, or you do it yourself and risk yours), and doing so internationally is extremely challenging and/or expensive. By contrast, doing it digitally is quite easy and fast.

It feels a bit disingenuous to insist the two are the same.

<comment><USER18> HSBC cooperated with cartels to launder money, apparently they even opened special counters for them to deposit cash at.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/HSBC_Mexico#Money_laundering](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/HSBC_Mexico#Money_laundering)

<comment><USER19> Public companies tend not to get punished because it ultimately punishes the shareholders. Chickenshit club book talks about all the reasons why the DOJ doesn't go after the big public companies with criminal prosecution.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Isn't this like, one year old news at this point?

<comment><USER20> From January 30 of this year: [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-30/crypto- ex...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-30/crypto-exchange- bitfinex-tether-said-to-get-subpoenaed-by-cftc)

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> If only someone had something about this a year ago...

</comment><comment><USER22> Hilarious, on the bubble chart "Why did the government let this happen", we are now at this point "pls g-men step in and dont let this disaster happen" and "put those responsible behind bars" etc.

</comment><comment><USER23> If this is true, will there have been any major rise of Bitcoin that hasn't been caused by illegal & unethical manipulation? Serious question.

<comment><USER24> Do you think a market that is easily manipulated would ever not be?

<comment><USER25> I'm almost certain it is being manipulated, so glad an actual investigation is happening. Many people have been duped into crypto.

<comment><USER24> I think crypto is very manipulated, but people aren't being duped because of that manipulation. (aside from a few situations like Paycoin where the "founder" Josh Garza promised a price floor; he has been since prosecuted)

Losses in cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and ICOs are the result of individuals hyping each other up and smoking hopium. Opportunities have to at least pass a smell test before you can claim you've been "duped".</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Vision scientists discover why people literally don't see eye to eye - <AUTHOR> https://news.berkeley.edu/2020/07/13/vision-scientists-discover-why-humans-literally-dont-see-eye-to-eye/ <comment><USER2> This clicked with me when I watched The Brain with David Eagleman [1] on BBC a little while ago. I've always know there is a disconnect between reality and what you interpret but the way he described it stuck. Note this is my layman's way of describing how I understand it.

Firstly your eyes are not connected directly to your "brain". You don't see what is in front of you.

Your eyes write a rough scan of elements of what is in front of you to a "frame buffer". Your brain looks at this "frame buffer" and interprets what it thinks you are seeing. At this stage it can fill in blanks and do all sorts of manipulations to make it look smooth and complete.

What can also happen is your brain can write to this "frame buffer", this is indistinguishable from the information the eyes have put there. This is pretty much how psychosis works - those monsters/spiders/people/objects seem as real as if they are there.

[1] [https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06yjrdp](https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06yjrdp)

<comment><USER3> It's also multiple frame buffers. The nerves before the brain already do some interpretation, and the brain an optimized version.

And the brain can rewrite the history it saved if it finds logical errors that came up because of it filling in gaps wrong.

Brains are awesome and scary.

<comment><USER4> That's the ultimate eventual consistency.

When you realize your previous approximation leads to a discontinuous function after new data arrives, just roll back your instruction pointer as well as your perception of time.

This ability to retroactively error-correct without affecting perceived continuity could also be affording our brains a greater margin of error.

<comment><USER5> Maybe, but then it turns out that your brain's cache isn't rolled back when you mispredict, and you have to close your eyes for ten seconds after looking at anything secret until another few hundred generations of evolution fix the bug.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> My father was a photographer and over the decades he worked with many other photographers in his darkroom (this was in the era of chemical photography). After several hundred occasions when he and another photographer were looking at a print under the color balancer, he realized they were literally seeing different colors. My father, who was scientifically inclined, eventually worked out the average variation, which I want to say was two clicks on the projector, but I'd need to check to find out what that actually meant in terms of frequencies. It's a small variation, but it was certainly real. Remember, these were all professionals with years of skill at judging color.

</comment><comment><USER7> I watched a program on PBS back in the mid 80's about San Fransisco and the Haight Asbury Free clinic.

They were speaking with a doctor about "acid casualties" LSD. What the doctor said was really interesting.

People who have flashbacks get scared thinking their brain is fried, and it's usually triggered by something visual. The patients have visual "abnormalities" and it scares them into thinking a new acid trip will start. In reality what LSD, Mushrooms, Peyote, etc. can do is strip away all the adaptations in the visual system. He said in most cultures that use psychedelics they usually talk about cleansing, or stripping away when using psychedelics, and with the visual system it's a true statement.

When he went on to say was that when we are born our visual system is like a blank downloadable computer, and as we grow, the visual part of our brain is making adaptations based on what it knows vs what is 'senses'. He said that due to small eye movements the sensing would jiggle, especially in our peripheral vision, but we learn the the world doesn't jiggle, so the visual system makes sure that stable items don't jiggle. Tons of adaptations take place, depending on our lives and experiences some of us have more adaptions than others.

Sometimes when taking psychedelics all those adaptations get stripped out, or only some get stripped out, leaving people with the untrained system, and that untrained system doesn't present things in the same way. Colors don't look the same, sometimes things in the peripheral vision jiggle or move, moving our heads quickly while quickly moving our eyes can cause 'trails'. All indications that our visual system has had some adaptations erased.

The doctor said that eventually over time things get usually restored to normal. However he said for colors, it's interesting because for people that grew up in a different area of the country and had their color perception set at that location, they sometimes find the when wipe out the adaptions and reset things the colors sometimes don't matched. Depending on where they grew up vs where the adaptations get reset the color of the sunlight can be different, and that will alert the color adaptation.

</comment><comment><USER8> Relevant Ted talk: "Your brain hallucinates your conscious reality | Anil Set" [https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lyu7v7nWzfo](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lyu7v7nWzfo)

<comment> core-questions Timothy Leary was telling everyone this decades ago, of course.

<comment><USER9> Crowley also mentioned it, very likely others before them too

<comment><USER10> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_(religion)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_\(religion\))

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> n=9 ...

[https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2020.082...](https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2020.0825#d47172744e1)

<comment><USER12> 9 might be okay if the effect size is large enough. (If the study was pre- registered there should have been a power analysis to determine the sample size given the hypothesized effect size.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> The article and its associated paper did not really engage me. Perhaps I am missing something.

However, I was reminded of something that I learned when taking drama lessons as a teenager, and which I have used as a teacher. Our attention of an object (such as another human) oscillates from eye to eye. However, it is biased to one eye. Generally this is the one on the opposite site to our writing norm (i.e. left handed = right eyed). If you really want to hold a scene when being filmed, look unwaveringly out of the eye that is nearest the camera. It will feel unnatural, but look dam cool on the screen. Look carefully... you can see Laurence Olivier and others doing precisely this.

As a teacher I use it in class to hold attention. But it's best effect is on the screen.

<comment><USER14> Do you have a link with a video or a visual explanation? I dont get what looking unwaveringly out of the eye closest to the camera means - what does it mean to look out of one eye?

<comment><USER13> Here is Michal Caine talking about this:

[https://youtu.be/bZPLVDwEr7Y?t=184](https://youtu.be/bZPLVDwEr7Y?t=184)

He tell a bunch of actors to always 'pick an eye' when in front of a camera. What Michel Cain does not say is that some actors prefer looking out of their 'handed' eye, believing it to have more impact.

As a demo of 'handedness' in eyes, try this experiment:

1\. Hold one finger around one foot in front of your face. Hold the other at arms length. Whilst try to look out of both eyes, ensure that the fingers are visually aligned with each other. This will be difficult, as the images from each eye will not correspond.

2\. Slowly open and close one eye. Then do the same with the other. The slow blink from one eye (eye A) will not affect the correspondence of the fingers, whilst the slow blink from the other (eye B) will.

The reason is that eye B is adjusting itself to match eye A.

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

Its called ocular dominance apparently.

<comment><USER15> He does mention choosing which of his own eyes to look out of, but when he says "pick an eye" he's clearly talking about picking one of the other person's eyes to look at. That's also clearly the source of the flicking back and forth that he talks about (and demonstrates).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> My understanding is that you only have a relatively small area in the center of your vision where you get a clear image. And so your eye moves back and forth so rapidly that you can't tell without slow motion, sort of scanning in the environment into a 3d map.

So maybe some of the variability is in that mapping circuitry.

</comment><comment><USER17> Is there an expert who could explain what's novel here ?

The layman summary seems to imply specialists are surprised that people judge distance differently which seem crazy to me. I mean we have known for decades that vision is the result of a complex process involving different parts of the visual system and that people results on tasks involving mainly vision (and coordination admittedly) vary.

What's the surprising part here ?

<comment><USER18> Not only that, Kant himself structured the idea of the world outside our field of experience in a critique of pure reason. Since then the idea that our experience is a perfect one and that all our ideas come from our experience has been questioned.

This is why when the interviewed said "We assume our perception is a perfect reflection of the physical world around us" it was really strange for me. Only those unaware of hundreds of years of advance in philosophy assume that. And this highlights possibly a field that is very much lacking in science, the critique of thought itself.

<comment><USER19> > Only those unaware of hundreds of years of advance in philosophy assume that

So then, nearly all children, and most of your average working-class people? Seems to me the author was just tailoring the piece for a layperson audience, which is kinda the default writing approach.

<comment><USER8> I would say even a lot of very educated people, despite maybe having read about these topics, will still feel and act as if what they are perceiving is reality itself.

I'm actually very surprised to see so many comments here dismissing the article as something almost obvious.

<comment><USER18> that is because this thread is about a scientific publication in a respectable university site, it suffers a different level of scrutiny.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> > "We assume our perception is a perfect reflection of the physical world > around us, but this study shows that each of us has a unique visual > fingerprint,"

I don't think anyone makes that assumption. I think most people know we don't actually "see" the physical world, our eyes receive electrical signals from photons and our brain interprets those signals and for lack of a better word we hallucinate the physical world (in the form of the visual light spectrum).

By its very nature, from a common sense point of view photons don't hit our eyes at the same time or the same angle; therefore, electric impulses will be different reflected Differently in our hallucinations. And even if 2 people had the same distance/angle, there are sometimes other issues differentiating our hallucinations, just one example being color blindness, where for various reasons one person hallucinates different colors than another based on the same electric impulses from photons. Even without color blindness this happens regularly (think of the blue/white dress vs black/gold viral photo a few years back)

<comment><USER21> Anecdotally I've always perceived that dress as blue/brown from the very beginning and I can't "switch" my vision to perceive it otherwise. It's incomprehensible to me that someone can see it as blue/white or even worse as black/gold :)

<comment><USER22> I don't want to trigger another thread about this old image, but I will point out that there are significant differences in monitor gamut and gamma across devices. Some cheap laptop LCDs crush blacks and whites _significantly_ if you aren't looking at perpendicular dead center.

It is for this reason that using light blue or light yellow backgrounds to demarcate ads is sinister -- one can A/B test their marker into literal invisibility for many users.

<comment><USER21> I'm an amateur photographer and have got quite good monitors that I calibrate regularly :) But I've got trained sight, especially for color balance because of that - I can see people faces greenish when they stand under a tree in a sunny day so that's that.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ubuntu 12.04 LTS (Precise Pangolin) Beta 1 Released. - <AUTHOR> https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-announce/2012-March/000156.html <comment><USER2> I spun up 12.04 desktop on physical hardware with discreet nvidia graphic card ( I have a lot of experience with server ) and I must say I was hugely impressed by the usability of the system.

Without thinking about it I was clearly able to get work done, navigate the system, access network shares.

If only I could have illustrator, Photoshop and the other graphics apps I use daily I expect I would be more than happy.

Would totally recommend checking 12.04 out.

<comment><USER3> The Adobe stack is really the only thing that keeps me on OS X. I'd much prefer to code on a system that shares the exact same stack as what I host with.

<comment><USER4> It's for this reason that I use Vagrant (<http://vagrantup.com/>) - don't have to care what my development workstation is; I just spin up a virtual machine to hack and test in. :)

<comment><USER2> So you spin up an instance with Adobe software in?

<comment><USER5> I think he means he uses a local virtualbox virtual machine for all his development stuff so he doesnt need to care about which OS (win, linux, osx) is running on his physical machine.

<comment><USER4> I should have been more clear, but this is what I meant.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Looking forward to 12.04. I liked Unity in 11.10 despite the community backlash. They need to move the "dock" horizontal and on bottom though, and let you reorganize the dock even after an app is locked into it. Basically, they should recreate OS X's interface except without the silly widgets. Also, the software download manager is nasty-ish in 11.10. It gets locked up quite a bit without being able to see why, and you have no way to stop download/installs other than killing it or restarting. Finally, the lack of a screensaver in Unity nor the ability to easily change display settings by right-clicking on the desktop is stupid.

<comment><USER7> Horizontal docks waste a lot of precious vertical space on widescreen monitors.

<comment><USER8> I agree. While it might take some time to get used to at first, I think it's worth it. In the end, you will be able to use more of your screen, because honestly, most applications are not optimised for 16:9 (/10) screens.

<comment><USER9> > take some time

I boot Ubuntu almost everyday, and I _still_ happen to position my mouse at the bottom when I want to access the application bar, before realising that nothing comes up and I went in the wrong place.

It's funny how the screen setup has become just like a reflex after years and years of practice. It's really hard to get used to new choices in design.

<comment><USER8> About how long have you been using Ubuntu with the vertical application bar for? I know it is highly personal, but I am trying to figure out a rough amount of time...

I have never really been a user of Ubuntu myself but when I (mainly) switched to Linux from Windows, it only took a couple of day to get used to it. Then again, I was never clicking the icons in the application bar before (win key -> typing -> enter).

<comment><USER9> i installed 11.10 in december, so about 3 months ago now. I should add that i use opensuse a lot on another machine, with an horizontal cairo dock, so i am not always on Ubuntu standards. I really like the win key to start programs, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> _> The technology that allows GPUs to go into a very low power consumption state when the GPU is idle (RC6) is now enabled by default for Sandy Bridge systems, which should result in considerable power savings when this stage is activated._

Awesome. Now they just need to get Optimus and Switchable Graphics working.

Also, nice of them to list the changes for the other Ubuntu variants as well, even though they're not officially supported. Didn't realize they did this.

<comment><USER4> > Awesome. Now they just need to get Optimus and Switchable Graphics working.

Would that they could. There is some work going on in bumblebee and its branches, but some of the design decisions made in X Server make it nigh- impossible to actually implement.

Wayland might, though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> It took a year, but Linux graphics finally runs on Sandy Bridge hardware: [http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=intel...](http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=intel_sandy_2011&num=1)

</comment><comment><USER12> > * A new way to quickly search and access any desktop application's > and > indicator's menu, called the HUD, can be accessed by taping the > Alt key > and entering characters.

I don't tend to be complain alot about updates of Ubuntu, but I really hope that button is customizable. I'd not be happy if I'd have to rebind meta key in emacs.

<comment><USER13> It doesn't trigger the HUD if you type a key sequence but it's quite easy to activate it nonetheless.

Anyway, the command below is all that's needed to disable it.

        gconftool-2 -s /apps/compiz-1/plugins/unityshell/screen0/options/show_hud -t string ''

You can also take the scenic route and use CCSM.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Are the application developers supposed to add any functionality to HUD or it just recognizes menu items automagically?

<comment><USER15> It populates from the menus themselves, using the framework already developed to pull the menu entries into the Unity panel. I believe it is possible to expand beyond this (e.g. having 'synonyms' recognized by the HUD) but it's still early days.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Loaded it on a MacBook. Works well. I really like the UI. It looks like they put a good amount of work into it.

<comment><USER10> MacBook Pro or Air?

<comment><USER16> Older, regular MacBook (not Pro or Air). [Intel Core 2 Duo, 2.4GHz].

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I upgraded three things at once - OSX Lion, VMWare Fusion 4, and Ubuntu 12.04 - and one or more of those things enabled the fancy graphics, windows fade in and out, the nicer task switcher, all that when you enable 3d graphics in the VM.

</comment><comment><USER18> Doesn't work on my T500 (Intel i915 graphics). Shows black screen after everything loads. Does anyone else have this?

<comment><USER10> Did you try increasing the screen brightness with the keyboard function? Happens to me too, but it's the brightness getting set to 0.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> how stable is it?

Can I upgrade my development environment, or are there still a lot of issues?

<comment><USER20> If stability is important to you, then I'd suggest waiting for at least the Release Candidate, though the actual release of a LTS version is probably as stable as you can get (considering a new release).

<comment><USER21> Ubuntu doesn't do Release Candidates anymore (at least for LTS releases...).

There is another Beta scheduled for March 29th, with a final release on April 26th.

In my opinion, if stability is really your top priority, wait until after the first point release (12.04.1) on July 19th. My 10.04 boxen will be staying at 10.04.4 until after 12.04.1 has been out for a little while.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Downloading the Xubuntu release now, hopefully it fixes the few little problems I've had since I switched desktop managers.

Also, I've completely clogged my pipes this morning with OS beta downloads, first Win 8, now this.

</comment><comment><USER23> Dunno if this is the right place to say it but there's a typo in the very first feature listing "taping" should be "tapping".</comment>


Typing the Technical Interview (2017) - <AUTHOR> https://aphyr.com/posts/342-typing-the-technical-interview <comment><USER2> 2017 - [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14078852](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14078852)

> This is the Old type art.

Modern Haskell makes this sort of think nicer. Of course, if one is so inclined (which is as big an assumption as anything else)

</comment><comment><USER3> Brilliant but old. Put 2017 in the title.</comment>


What is the 'sovereign citizen' movement? - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-53654318 <comment><USER2> From [https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence- report/...](https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence- report/2010/sovereigns-dictionary-peculiar)

> "Truth language: A complex and bizarre set of language rules designed to > mimic the secret language of the law. All sentences must start with the > preposition "for," have a minimum of 13 words, and use more nouns than > verbs. Punctuation rules are just as complex."

Minimum 13 word sentences seem to me to be the sort of aperiodic crystal framing under which one could easily hide a saner payload at a reasonable bit rate. But it's probably more amusing to imagine a "sovereign stegocipher" than to go looking for one that somehow uses PACER as a covert channel.</comment>


Apple will no longer unlock most iPhones, iPads for police - <AUTHOR> http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/2014/09/17/2612af58-3ed2-11e4-b03f-de718edeb92f_story.html

<comment><USER2> We're seeing quite a lot of these sorts of headlines across different companies.

It's important to keep in mind that:

\- It was not necessary for Apple to unlock devices for the NSA.

\- Police use Stingray devices and taps at phone towers to track you based on your location, which is out of Apple's jurisdiction.

\- Backdoor-equivalent features that are running on all modern iOS devices which do not require Apple specialists to activate were found and were disclosed at Blackhat this year.

\- Police have access to forensic kits that give them access to devices without working with manufacturers.

\- Backdoors are created in commercial products through ABBA, ORCHESTRA, and other programs and so often are not known by the company.

\- Other tech companies have a history of misleading their customers about the access police and government have to their products (Skype, Blackberry, Microsoft OneDrive/Sharepoint).

\- There is legal precedent which forces you to unlock your devices and hand over encryption keys in the case of an investigation.

\- Physical access (think geohot's original iPhone root) always means device ownership. Always.

\- Much of the data on your iDevice is automatically synced to the cloud (think recent celebrity nude leaks). Your device often does not need to be unlocked in this case.

</comment><comment><USER3> Discussion thread for the actual Apple policy is here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8333595](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8333595)</comment>


How to solve the chicken egg problem without a network - <AUTHOR> I made an e-learning website linked to a freelancing website. Users take programming courses in the e-learning part of the website and complete tasks for companies in the freelancing part of the website. But you can only apply for a task if you have completed its required courses.
The problem with my site is that users won't bother to complete complete courses until there are tasks on my sites and companies won't post tasks until there are freelancers to complete them.
Ive read that a lot of startups get their initial users from their personal network. But Im just a teenager and I haven't worked with any companies before. Also, most of my friends don't know how to code or are not interested in programming so they won't able to complete the courses either.
I had this issue before when I was trying to get instructors to post courses on my site. So, I solved it by posting copyright free creative commons courses I found recommended online like CS50 or automate the boring stuff. But I'm out of ideas now as to how to get tasks on my site or users to return and complete courses.
So, what can I do? <comment><USER2> Pay / otherwise compensate one of the sides. Either give the companies free advertising credit, or give something extra to the freelancers for finishing courses (some other service credit, access to another course, fancy cert, ...)

<comment><AUTHOR> I was thinking of maybe personally completing the first task for companies for free.

But Im not sure if that will work as companies can just use the free task I completed without posting any new task on my website

Also, Im low on funds so I can't really compensate the tasks side of things by posting my own tasks. So, that's not an option.</comment></comment>


Asthmapolis Wins Twilio + Union Square Ventures Contest - <AUTHOR> http://blog.twilio.com/2010/10/asthmapolis-wins-twilio-union-square-ventures-contest.html

<comment><USER2> Well, I thought the competition was for developers as in indie-developers and not startups! Here is what the description from contest page says -

"We've partnered with Union Square Ventures, who are investors in Twilio, to give _one developer_ the opportunity to travel to New York City to meet with Fred Wilson, Albert Wenger, and Brad Burnham."

This doesn't seem to be a appropriate winner to me. Please note, I'm not demeaning Asthmapolis' value proposition. I'm just saying, probably they are better suited for TechCrunch Disrupt kind of competiion as a startup, and not developer contests!

<comment><USER3> The theme for the contest was "Building a Business on Twilio" and the description was posted here: [http://contests.twilio.com/2010/09/build-your- business-with-...](http://contests.twilio.com/2010/09/build-your-business- with-twilio-and-win-a-meeting-with-union-square-ventures-ends-927.html)

While we can only commit to covering the travel costs for one developer, the contest was open to everyone - including existing startups.

"The partners at Union Square Ventures will serve as our judges for this round, and they will select one awesome Twilio-powered company to meet with them in New York City, all expenses paid. Three runners up will each receive $250 in Twilio credit to help get their businesses off the ground."

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I seem to recall a winner of the Twilio contest that developed a similar app for reporting symptoms. Couldn't this easily be extended to just about any condition?

<comment><USER5> Yep, we had this one win before: [http://blog.twilio.com/2010/08/chris- bennett-wins-twilios-an...](http://blog.twilio.com/2010/08/chris-bennett-wins- twilios-anything-goes-contest-for-as-journal.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> very cool - I wonder if a more generalized smart cap for prescription drugs could track usage in the same manner.

<comment><USER7> There are some companies doing this for general prescriptions. Vitality - <http://www.vitality.net/> \- has a wireless cap that helps track adherence.

But asthma is pretty unique since the inhalers are used in "rescue" situations and there are strong geographic correlations that arise from environmental issues.

<comment><USER6> Yeah the fact that it tracks the use of inhalers is very clever. It provides a much more rich history of use to help doctors decide the best way to manage their patients. Currently medications for asthmatics are determined by a asthma severity scale (symptom frequency, night time attacks, etc) - so a more fine-grained analytics would be interesting.

I would think this approach would work well if applied to other diseases where the frequency that the patient takes the medication is tied to symptoms - chest pain/nitroglycerin or acid-reflux/antacids are a couple of examples.</comment></comment></comment>


PG Wodehouse secures redemption as British Library acquires priceless archive - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/nov/27/pg-wodehouse-archive-british-library-redemption-nazi-collaboration <comment><USER2> This news item is an eye-opener for me. As a Wodehouse fan I'd always assumed the Nazi broadcast incident was a small blip in his life. Did not realize it had such a major impact on his life.

<comment><USER3> George Orwell wrote in 1946 a reasoned defence of Wodehouse[0]. In particular the final paragraph:

> In the desperate circumstances of the time, it was excusable to be angry at > what Wodehouse did, but to go on denouncing him three or four years later — > and more, to let an impression remain that he acted with conscious treachery > — is not excusable. Few things in this war have been more morally disgusting > than the present hunt after traitors and Quislings. At best it is largely > the punishment of the guilty by the guilty. In France, all kinds of petty > rats — police officials, penny-a-lining journalists, women who have slept > with German soldiers — are hunted down while almost without exception the > big rats escape. In England the fiercest tirades against Quislings are > uttered by Conservatives who were practising appeasement in 1938 and > Communists who were advocating it in 1940. I have striven to show how the > wretched Wodehouse — just because success and expatriation had allowed him > to remain mentally in the Edwardian age — became the corpus vile in a > propaganda experiment, and I suggest that it is now time to regard the > incident as closed. If Ezra Pound is caught and shot by the American > authorities, it will have the effect of establishing his reputation as a > poet for hundreds of years; and even in the case of Wodehouse, if we drive > him to retire to the United States and renounce his British citizenship, we > shall end by being horribly ashamed of ourselves. Meanwhile, if we really > want to punish the people who weakened national morale at critical moments, > there are other culprits who are nearer home and better worth chasing.

[0] [http://orwell.ru/library/reviews/plum/english/e_plum](http://orwell.ru/library/reviews/plum/english/e_plum)

<comment><USER4> Thank you! As someone who grew up in India and inherited a significant number of the Wodehouse collection from my Grandfather, I wasn't aware of any of this. Not all of my friends were into this kind of humor, but to me it was the British literary equivalent of the Three Stooges! There was a time when I'd read paragraphs over and over just rotfl.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > long tarnished by charges of Nazi collaboration

Is that an American or a British thing? I know quite a few diehard fans of Wodehouse in India. One of them even sent me transcripts of his radio broadcasts. The broadcasts seemed entirely innocuous to me. And my friends who don't like Wodehouse's writings are not aware of the broadcasts at all, suggesting that that's not the reason they don't read his works.

<comment><USER6> British thing I believe, at least I've never heard it mentioned Stateside, though Wodehouse isn't very famous here. I think a lot of people were angry at him at the time is happened and stayed mad for the rest of his life.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> He really is one of the funniest writers ever in the English language.

<comment><USER8> One of the greatest writers, even beyond considerations of humour. Reading PGW for reasons other the pleasure is probably misguided, but if you want to improve your English prose there is gold in those pages. This possibly explains his enduring popularity in India.

<comment><USER9> Condescending much?

There is a sophisticated and voracious readership of English in India. And it has given the world many great writers with unparalleled output in English - see [http://www.inflibnet.ac.in/ojs/index.php/JLCMS/article/viewF...](http://www.inflibnet.ac.in/ojs/index.php/JLCMS/article/viewFile/26/25)

And the writer RK Narayan, with his distinct characters and humorous stories, is the Indian response to Wodehouse. PGW is read, as he is all over the world, for his humo(u)r, wit and brilliance.

<comment><USER10> I'm British and I make a living as a writer. I wouldn't find it condescending to be told that I can learn something from Wodehouse - his prose is sublime.

Perhaps you overreacted to what was an innocent and general comment about learning from Wodehouse's prose, rather than a condescending suggestion that Indians could benefit in particular.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Mammoth moves: frozen cells come to life, but only just - <AUTHOR> https://phys.org/news/2019-03-mammoth-frozen-cells-life.html <comment><USER2> Doesn't this seem to imply that cryonics aren't that farfetched? If 20,000yo cells that are badly damaged can be almost-revived from being on ice, couldn't a well-frozen brain and body be restored?

Obviously there is some difference betweeen thawing a few cells in the substrate of another organism; and reviving a whole being, but the chance doesn't seem to be zero.

<comment><USER3> My layperson understanding of it would be that reviving a cell would be like finding a house 2,000 years from now that is preserved well enough that you can get the lights to turn on if you hook up the power. Getting a brain to turn on would be like finding an entire modern _city_ that's preserved in similar fashion. I may be wrong, but I think it's a massive jump in complexity.

<comment><USER4> Yeah, I think it's the jump between "we can entangle two atoms" and "Look! A functioning transporter! Jump in!"

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> They attempted to _use parts_ of a frozen cell, not to revive it. What they describe would be closer to cloning then anything else. I wonder here, what is the current cloning rate of success for the procedure they tried here but with fresh DNA? Is there enough experience with that to make sense taking on damaged cells now?

</comment><comment><USER6> I would point to: [https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Cryonics](https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Cryonics)</comment>


A study of how millions use Xbox Live - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2017/06/xbox-unleashed-our-deep-dive-study-of-how-millions-use-xbox-live/ <comment><USER2> Wow, it seems like the Xbox One is being kept alive by fewer (but bigger) releases than the 360. Are they, then, losing out to Sony?

<comment><USER3> It's a small data point, but the in-game market in Fifa17 suggests that there's 3 times as much PS4 activity than Xbox One activity. Given that it's one of the biggest games on either platform, that would suggest that yes, they are losing out to Sony.

<comment><USER4> Where are you getting this data from?</comment></comment></comment>


Rumor: Apple testing new MacBook Air powered by same A5 processor as iPad 2 - <AUTHOR> http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/11/05/27/rumor_apple_testing_new_macbook_air_powered_by_same_a5_processor_as_ipad_2.html <comment><USER2> This makes sense as an experment, and I don't really doubt Apple wants this eventually. i wonder what will happen first, Apple pulling the trigger on the switch to ARM or ARM matching in speed to current-time intel.

What strikes me as weird is that the source couldn't pinpoint if it was iOS or MacOS, which is cool because it means it looked completely different that both (a good sign that Apple is not settling down).

<comment><USER3> Or perhaps it was just running benchmarking software, who knows!

<comment><USER2> Yeah, that too. I guess I let my imagination generate a different image :P

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Crazy thought. What if Apple included an A5 and a Core i3 or i5? Further crazy, much like OS X using an available, discrete CPU if needed, it used the A5 as much as possible, but switched to the Core if necessary.

Such a thing may not even be pratical, but seems more likely to me than Apple dropping Sandy Bridge processors for ARM.</comment>


SQLAlchemy 0.9.0 Released - <AUTHOR> http://www.sqlalchemy.org/blog/2013/12/30/sqlalchemy-0.9.0-released/ <comment><USER2> a really solid, perhaps unique, library that, as far as i can tell, completely addresses the "impedence mismatch" argument. if you're directly using a database api in a structured way, you've probably already reimplemented the sqlalchemy core, and refactoring your program to use sqlalchemy will give you an orm, should you want one, and make your code portable across database implementations even if you don't. if you're already using an orm, refactoring to use sqlalchemy will allow you to to start optimizing the low-level database operations in a coherent way (i.e. not just sprinkling SQL throughout the models). there's a nice writeup in the architecture of open source applications ( [http://www.aosabook.org/en/sqlalchemy.html](http://www.aosabook.org/en/sqlalchemy.html) )

now, fantods aside, is there anything like this for java? according to the aosa writeup, sqlalchemy's author found python's multiple inheritance useful for implementing certain ideas, so porting probably isn't straightforward. also, the relevant stackoverflow question ( [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10537766/closest- equivale...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10537766/closest-equivalent- to-sqlalchemy-for-java-scala) ) seems inconclusive.

this is not to criticize java as a language, but rather because _i really wish there was something like sqlalchemy for java_.

<comment><USER3> > _i really wish there was something like sqlalchemy for java._

Ebean[1], perhaps? I've only used it for a project in Play 2.0 that was built on Java (it's built into Play 2.0), but it was far less painful compared to other Java ORM libaries like Hibernate.

[1] [http://www.avaje.org/ebean/getstarted_props.html](http://www.avaje.org/ebean/getstarted_props.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > support for Postgresql JSON types,

This. Finally :) I know I was searching this a few months ago and there was a long due ticket for this to be added. Thank you whoever did this patch.

A side note. I personally use Pyramid (I use Pyramid more, however) and Flask. For Flask project I never use flask-sqlalchemy because mitsuhiko doesn't seem to update the repository as often as he should. A lot of outstanding tickets and pull requests. Some are merged but they are never closed. So I always end up bringing up SQLAlchemy myself into Flask because I just don't trust the library. Is that how people feel too? For Pyramid, SQLAclemy is the "standard" ORM to use and with ini file it is supposed easy to integrate SA into Pyramid app.

<comment><USER5> Currently on a big project using flask + sqlalchemy and didn't want to use flask-sqlalchemy as well. At first, it was because it didn't seem like i needed to, then it was for a better understanding of the sqlalchemy session / flask request lifecycle coordination. That knowledge proved to be very useful once i needed to reuse my stack in a celery task.

<comment><USER6> To solve this, I have a custom Celery instance that wraps each task in my flask app's context. So you can treat celery tasks as just another request.

<comment><USER5> Yeap, that's what i did as well, and i think that's the documented way ( using a flask test request context i think). But having to do this let me understand a lot more about sqlalchemy session, flushing and object states, in a multithreaded environment. I recommend doing that for an in-depth understanding.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> sqlalchemy is the best database toolkit for python developers. you can use it as an orm or you can just use its core functionality; write sql expressions in python, define your tables, columns and types. anything you can think of, in terms of dbs, you can do with sqlalchemy.

i'd like to take a moment and thank to @zzeeek [1][2] and all of the contributors.

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=zzzeek](https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=zzzeek)

[2] [https://twitter.com/zzzeek](https://twitter.com/zzzeek)

</comment><comment><USER8> Thanks for this release. Learning SQL before ever touching an ORM, SQLAlchemy's approach makes a lot more sense to me than something "simplier" like Django's ORM.

Anyone know, is there any chance Django would pull in SQLAlchemy core as a dependency and implement their ORM on top of it?

<comment><USER9> The ORM is mediocre compared to SQLAlchemy, the template system is weak compared to Jinja2.

If you swap Django's ORM with SQLAlchemy and replace Django Templates with Jinja2, you end up with something like Flask.

The killer feature for me is Django's "admin" app. When I'm not using the "admin", the rest of Django kind of gets in the way. Nowadays I prefer a less opinionated framework like Flask if I'm not using the "admin".

Also, Django lacks any concept of multi-tenancy and does not support composite primary keys nor schemas, which makes it a poor choice for SaaS projects. That said, Django REST Framework is awesome for API-first development and makes it a whole different game (in a positive way).

<comment><USER10> In my experience the true killer feature of Django is the "batteries included" approach. If you stay within the boundaries of the framework you get a standard project structure, a decent ORM, a template language (dogmatically crippled, but that's a different discussion), a forms handling library, and the typical assorted framework toolkit (internationalization, logging, development server, utilities, etc) -- all equally documented and maintained. Compare this with having to choose and figure out individual libraries for every one of the things above, each coming with different levels and styles of documentation, communities, and resources.

The end result is that you spend less time deciding on small things and can just use what's in the box. The real value is that the _next_ person working on the code is already on the same page and can start working with it a lot quicker.

<comment><USER11> Nah, I'm not sure having all the libs bound together is the killer. I think it's having all those libs with a cohesive set of docks and with a "single" voice. I'm not sure that packaging Flask, Jinja2/Babel, WTForms, SQLAlchemy, and Werkzeug (dev / debug server) together -- that should cover the non-admin Django -- would improve the usage. Technically, Jinja2 and Werkzeug are already dependencies of Flask, and their extensions page [0] are fairly instructive on what other libs to pull in for the other needs. There's also no reason one can't use Django, Jinja2/Babel, WTF, SQLA, and Werkzeug... we do!

[0] [http://flask.pocoo.org/extensions/](http://flask.pocoo.org/extensions/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I dunno. I just don't get ORMs. I certainly see their use case in easy prototyping, but with the advent of NoSQL, why not just prototype with MongoDB, or similar, and if it turns out your data is close to uniform in structure, just switch over to MySQL, or similar.

To keep my code portable, I stick to standard SQL and don't use any stored procedures. I'm sure this is probably not a tenable strategy for web-scale apps, but with 100s/1000s of users and only millions of records, it seems to work just fine.

This comment is no way meant to disparage SQLAlchemy which by all accounts seems to be a first rate work of engineering. I am speaking of ORMs in general, and why should we use them.

<comment><USER13> Here are 3 primary advantages I can think of:

* Ability to programmatically add to/chain queries. It's really simple to add an additional "WHERE" clause in an ORM query; it's much harder to do so with a SQL string, where you have to account for escaping, comma placement, etc.

* Ability to automatically join entities in some cases, which can save on verbosity.

* Ability to add methods and attributes to models, which can abstract away additional queries or queries that might normally be really complex.

It's debatable if ORMs really add that much to productivity. I use them in some projects, and forgo them in others. For Python, I'm a big fan of Pony ORM because it can greatly reduce verbosity and basically maps Python code directly to SQL; I don't really use it for the relational "mapping" though: [http://ponyorm.com/](http://ponyorm.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Why is SQLAlchemy still under 1.0? Are there good reasons, or is it just the apparently typical (and typically irrational) fear of the version number "1.0"?

<comment><USER15> originally i was going to skip from 0.8 just to 1.0, but then a lot more new features and behaviors came into 0.9, so i figured lets just do the one more non-1.0 number. There's not going to be an "0.10", it'll be 1.0.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> I'd love to have something as good as sqlalchemy in go

<comment><USER15> I looked at Go a little bit as maybe a place to write a kind of "uber-Core" system, e.g. a high performance database abstraction layer that could power libs in other languages. But apparently Go is not at all designed to be embedded in other runtimes, it isn't even possible. Also it seems to lack a standard database API and the connectors that were there seemed a little all over the place.

<comment><USER17> Did you check out rust? That's within rust's feature set, though it isn't "production ready" yet.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> how does SQLAlchemy support for PostGIS compare to GeoDjango ORM?

<comment><USER19> Looks like it's pretty robust: [http://www.geoalchemy.org/tutorial.html](http://www.geoalchemy.org/tutorial.html)

<comment><USER20> It is, though if you're using PostGIS, I'd recommend GeoAlchemy2[1], which ties into SQLAlchemy a bit more naturally (because they get rid of support for all other engines). Also, seems to be more actively developed/maintained.

[1] [https://geoalchemy-2.readthedocs.org/en/latest/](https://geoalchemy-2.readthedocs.org/en/latest/)</comment></comment></comment>


Matrix – An open network for secure, decentralized communication - <AUTHOR> https://matrix.org/ <comment><USER3> Beyond the general idea of Matrix itself, a nice snapshot of all the stuff currently happening in the Matrix ecosystem right now is the This Week In Matrix blog series, which goes out every Friday. This week's one is at: [https://matrix.org/blog/2020/08/21/this-week-in- matrix-2020-...](https://matrix.org/blog/2020/08/21/this-week-in- matrix-2020-08-21)

Some of the stuff I'm personally most excited about right now is Hydrogen ([https://github.com/vector-im/hydrogen-web](https://github.com/vector- im/hydrogen-web)): a super lightweight web client which heavily leans on indexeddb for storage and so minimises RAM. My primary account has 3000 rooms and about 450K visible users - on element-web this uses 1.1GB of RAM, but on hydrogen it uses 14MB :) We're also looking at glueing E2EE into Hydrogen via the crypto layer of matrix-rust-sdk, which could be a massive win in terms of reusing and auditing a robust safe implementation for the Hard problem of encryption, rather than implementing it from scratch every time in every new client.

Dendrite (go server impl) progress is also very promising - we've been focusing on it (at last!) since the beginning of the year, and going to enter beta in the next few weeks. A typical small/medium live server is currently using 57MB of RAM (rather than synapse's ~500MB). We haven't started optimising yet :)

Synapse has also finally come of age - the whole codebase has almost been switched to twisted/asyncio rather than twisted deferreds, which both speeds things up a bit but also gives us way better visibility on profiling for future perf work. Almost all bits now scale horizontally (apart from the master dispatcher process). Synapse isn't going away - we see Synapse and Dendrite coexisting much as Apache and nginx coexist today.

Conduit is also super exciting as an entirely community developed Rust homeserver, which currently runs ~10x faster than either Synapse or Dendrite (but doesn't federate yet, or scale horizontally). It's really fun to see an indie FOSS server implementation properly take off :)

Finally, P2P Matrix is coming together well - compiling Dendrite to WASM and running it clientside, using Yggdrasil currently as an overlay network to tunnel through to other P2P nodes.

In short: the Matrix ecosystem is in a fairly healthy place right now - <USER2> next gen of clients and servers should be incredible :)

<comment><USER4> Thanks for the insight, and had completely missed the blog!

On dendrite: What's your impression of friction needed to migrate an existing synapse home server to dendrite? Would bridges like the mautrix family be API compatible or would they have to add additional support for dendrite? And how far away would you say you feel it is until dendrite is stable and ready for individuals as personal production server?

Not looking for dates, just a feeling for how worth it is to invest getting deeper into synapse if one intends to migrate to dendrite eventually.

<comment><USER3> The best way to migrate from synapse to dendrite will probably be by decentralised accounts. We have plans (driven by p2p) to let your account exist on multiple servers at the same time. The sort of way to do this would be to have @alice:example.com sign something on @alice:elsewhere.com to prove that she's the same person. She then participates in all the same rooms from both accounts, which are presented as a single logical identity to everyone else.

So example.com could be synapse and elsewhere.com could be dendrite, and she would automagically replicate her account over between the two. If she turned off example.com, she'd have migrated over.

This is scifi right now, but it's getting closer, as P2P isn't very usable if you can't sync your account across multiple devices/nodes.

Alternatively someone could write a script to migrate synapse's db into dendrite's schema (or dendrite's kafka logs), but it's be pretty fragile given how rapidly both synapse and dendrite evolve.

tl;dr: jump in with Synapse today - the water's great (even if others have been scalded in the past). Migration to Dendrite or Conduit or whatever in future should be transparent, one way or another.

<comment><USER5> Will it be possible to temporarily turn off example.com, let its absence propagate across the network a bit, then turn it back on under a new server? Synapse has been good to me, but I know Rust more than Python, and Conduit's use of Sled is one less moving part for me to maintain for my single-user server. Looking forward to migrating to a lighter server I can potentially hack on, and would rather not change the underlying DNS infrastructure much.

<comment><USER3> No, the idea is that to migrate you would have to run both servers side by side and then kill the old one. We haven't yet figured out how you'd point the old matrix id to refer to the new server (as I assume your concern is keeping the same mxid as before), but presumably there will be a way to do so.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Matrix is great for bridging[0] between different chat applications. Personally I use it a lot to bridge to IRC, which is a great alternative to the older method of setting up a server for use with an IRC bouncer. Since there's various Matrix clients for mobile (I use Element), you can chat on IRC from anywhere. If this gets more people into IRC I'm all for it because it's one of my favorite places on the internet for discussing and learning things.

There's a comprehensive tutorial[1] on how to connect to Freenode via Matrix. Gitter ⇔ Matrix bridge is pretty good too, since Gitter is pretty horrendous on web and especially mobile.

[0] [https://matrix.org/bridges/](https://matrix.org/bridges/)

[1] [https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-appservice- irc/wiki/Gui...](https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-appservice- irc/wiki/Guide:-How-to-use-Matrix-to-participate-in-IRC-rooms)

<comment><USER7> As someone who's in a Gitter room with a couple of people using the Matrix bridge: it works, but I wouldn't call it great. Messages by Matrix uses look like messages by the same user ("Matrixbot" or something like that), which simply prefixes its messages by `<username>`. @mentioning people no longer autocompletes, and you often see Matrix users trying to do it as well but inadvertently using someone's display name rather than their actual handle, thus not resulting in a notification. And when a Matrix users tries to edit their message, the edited message just gets sent again in addition to the non- edited one which is still there.

<comment><USER3> we're working with the gitter folks to do a much better job of bridging in the nearish future :)

<comment><USER7> Good to hear :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> em-bee previous and related discussions:

Matrix 1.0 and the Matrix.org Foundation [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20157809](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20157809)

Matrix 1.0 – Are We Ready Yet? [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19416678](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19416678)

Synchronous Messaging at Mozilla: The Decision [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21835749](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21835749)

Automattic invests in Matrix [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23256050](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23256050)

Cross-signing and end-to-end encryption by default [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23107564](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23107564)

Running your own secure communication service with Matrix and Jitsi [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22802645](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22802645)

We've decided to rename Riot [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23611863](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23611863)

</comment><comment> Funes- In my own estimation, if anyone ever wants to engage with instant messaging[0], and wants it to be in an actually secure manner, the best option would be Briar[1]. It's anonymous (uses tor), P2P (meaning no data is accessible to third parties--unlike Matrix, which is federated), encrypted, and quite censorship resistant.

[0] I don't think it's an efficient, non-distracting or just desirable means of communication.

[1] [https://briar.app](https://briar.app).

<comment><USER8> > meaning no data is accessible to third parties--unlike Matrix, which is > federated

I acknowledge that this isn't an option for everyone but for the HN crowd, it's fairly easy to run your own homeserver. You just need to install Synapse [0] (which has a convenient Docker image [1]) and give your server a domain name.

If you do this, your metadata will only be accessible to yourself and the homeservers of your contacts (who could share your server or run their own).

Message contents are usually e2e encrypted, so the homeserver you use is irrelevant.

[0]: [https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse](https://github.com/matrix- org/synapse)

[1]: [https://hub.docker.com/r/matrixdotorg/synapse/](https://hub.docker.com/r/matrixdotorg/synapse/)

<comment><USER9> It's not about running the homeserver but not leaving metadata behind. At least this is how I understood it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Keen to use this for notifications and web hooks etc. slack seems great but would rather not buy into yet another proprietary ecosystem if I can help it

</comment><comment><USER11> I think for Mattix to truly make a dent in the world,it will need libraries in popular languages.

I should be able to spin up a client or server in python, JavaScript, rust, c, etc with minimal effort.

<comment><USER12> There are client libraries for lots of languages, and a simple client is easy with just a HTTP library:

[https://matrix.org/sdks/](https://matrix.org/sdks/) [https://github.com/ara4n/random/blob/master/bashtrix.sh](https://github.com/ara4n/random/blob/master/bashtrix.sh)

<comment><USER11> Sorry if I wasn't clear - there also needs to be server libraries.

I can spin up a web server in python, Ruby, JavaScript, etc in a couple lines of code. With matrix I need to install java and then do a whole bunch of config.

My belief is that as long as that hurdle remains, it won't hit widespread adoption, even if the technology is great.

Personally, I really like it, and have used Riot For a couple years now. I'd love to use it for our company, but it's not yet there for ease of use on the server side.

I think it will get there, it's just not there now.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I've been running Synapse from home for more than a year, so far nothing is too painful about maintenance, except at every update its asking to review the changes of the homeserver.yaml config file from the terminal, I would have liked a more automatic approach, like when a setting is different from the new one, just leave it at it is and update the rest.

<comment><USER12> Running debian? You can place override configs in /etc/matrix-synapse/conf.d/ and let /etc/matrix-synapse/homeserver.yaml stay updated by the package

</comment></comment><comment> daniel-s Besides JSON, what's the main differentiator between Matrix and XMPP?

<comment><USER14> Matrix has a single implementation that supports E2EE and it uses electron. XMPP has multiple of them that do not.

<comment><USER3> This is completely untrue and disingenuous; there are loads of Matrix implementations that support E2EE, and only one that happens to use Electron.

As of a few months ago, the list is: Element Web (via matrix-js-sdk), Element iOS (via matrix-ios-sdk), Element Android (via matrix-android-sdk2), the old Riot Android app (via matrix-android-sdk), weechat-matrix (via matrix-nio), weechat-matrix-rs (via matrix-rust-sdk), Mirage (via matrix-nio), Nheko (via mtx-client), gomuks (via mautrix), Seaglass (via matrix-ios-sdk), OCRCC Chatbox (via matrix-js-sdk), FluffyChat Flutter, Daydream via matrix-rust-sdk, etc.

There's also pantalaimon (built on matrix-nio, and in future matrix-rust-sdk), which lets _any_ Matrix client talk e2ee.

Hydrogen (github.com/vector-im/element-web) is also about to sprout e2ee via matrix-rust-sdk.

<comment><USER15> So Pantalaimon is something that needs to be added and configured, how easy is it to fuck up this configuration and accidentally send a non-E2EE message? Is it a program you can forget to launch? Is it something that can crash and make the user vulnerable?

How many of the apps you listed in second paragraph spawn E2EE chat by default?

How many of the apps warn about E2EE not being enabled when joining a room?

How many of the apps warn when E2EE is broken by e.g. IRC-bridge-bots?

<comment><USER3> Pan won't let you send plaintext msgs in E2EE rooms. If you don't launch it, your client can't connect. It doesn't have any known downgrade vulns. You can't downgrade an E2E room to a non-encrypted one.

I haven't checked to see which of those apps spawns E2EE chat by default. Element does, and I'd assume the other client devs are following suit; there's no reason not to. Likewise, i haven't surveyed to see what UI they use to warn for unencrypted rooms.

We're currently working on an MSC to better advertise what bots/bridges exist in a room so you can track whether any is likely to be leaking your conversation to an unencrypted system. This is inevitably going to be on a best effort basis though.

<comment><USER14> > Element does

But does not warn regarding unverified seasons and will gladly send messages to them by default.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Please, stop using HTTP and JSON as a transport. I can't take any project seriously that thinks this is a good combination.

Everything at Uber was HTTP and JSON and all it did was slow things down and cause more bug surface area.

<comment><USER3> We use HTTP+JSON as the baseline default transport because it's so ubiquitous and well understood. Anyone who's ever touched a browser or curl knows how to use it.

However, Matrix isn't tied to any single transport - you are encouraged to use more efficient or exotic ones, eg [https://matrix.org/blog/2019/03/12/breaking-the-100-bps- barr...](https://matrix.org/blog/2019/03/12/breaking-the-100-bps-barrier-with- matrix-meshsim-coap-proxy/)

<comment><USER17> Is there anyone currently working on alternate transports?

<comment><USER3> yeah, the whole P2P Matrix project is using different transports. One is CBOR+CoAP+Yggdrasil, another is JSON+QUIC+Yggdrasil. The plan is to pull these back into mainstream matrix when proven, especially as a push replacement.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Decentralised, adj: hard to use

<comment><USER8> Step 1: Open [https://app.element.io/](https://app.element.io/)

Step 2: Create account

Step 3: Enter username, password and email address

Step 4: Click confirmation email

Step 5: Log in

Step 6: Share your username with others

What aspect of this is hard to use?

There's also another pair of decentralized systems you might be familiar with: email and the world-wide web. Do you think these are hard to use?

<comment><USER19> The steps you list above are not particularly difficult, but if everyone followed them, the decentralization features might as well be redundant because we would all be on one Central set of servers.

<comment><USER20> There are other public servers. Matrix is basically like email. Pick whatever server you like and talk to whoever you want on any other server.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Do they even have production-ready server software yet? Synapse is not great, and they say Dendrite isn't ready for production.

<comment><USER22> Recent benchmark showed Dendrite (go) is slower than Synapse (Python) but I'd guess it's from all the context switching with the multi process design of Dendrite

<comment><USER23> This has kept me from coming back to Matrix. Running your own homeserver can be pretty atrocious.

<comment><USER24> Their hosting is $10/month and totally worth it.

As a bonus, it helps to support the devs too.

<comment><USER25> They already got investments from large governments and Automattic. I don't believe they are in dire need of financial support.

I totally agree that more people should look into managed hosting, though.

<comment><USER3> The economics of this are curious actually. Element has had investments from Automattic, VCs and Status.im (no governments, ftr). However, the only reason people invest is in the expectation that Element can be a sustainable healthy business - which it does so by providing Matrix SaaS hosting, and support/consulting for big on premise deployments.

In other words, it's critical that folks use the managed hosting in order to be sustainable, otherwise we're just burning fossil fuel, as it were.

<comment><USER25> I misspoke. I wanted to say that the money from the governments are part of the revenue as "support/consulting for big on-premise deployments". Sorry about that.

In any case, I would be surprised that Element relies on getting significant part of their revenue from the SaaS. Isn't p2p-matrix going to cannibalize that market? I could swear that the strategy for you would be to chase the enterprise/government market and let p2p-matrix as an alternative for network effects and/or those who don't want to pay and prefer to manage things themselves.

<comment><USER3> np - just wanted to clear up the confusion if folks might think Element might be part-owned by nation states, which it isn't.

So we expect revenue from SaaS, where plain TCO says it's cheaper to get us to host your data than pay in-house people to sysadmin it for you. It's still your DNS and your keys, and we provide db snapshots if you want, so it really is just outsourced hosting. There is definitely a market for this, as well as separately providing support for massive on premise deployments.

P2P then drives both by network effects. It effectively becomes the default free-for-all platform - but anyone who actually wants a serious home for their data (e.g. any business) will want to find a server, whether that's selfhost or SaaS.

<comment><USER25> Ok, cool. Follow-up questions: I honestly believed that your SaaS offering was just a middle-market play and that you expected to be filled by a cottage industry of sorts. Don't you have any concerns about other business undercutting you? In a way what I am doing with communick competes already with your hosting (or I can dream about it) and I won't have the overhead of funding development. What if AWS/GCS/Azure decides to offer Matrix as well?

<comment><USER3> We don't expect to be the only SaaS players - but we still think it's a good market. The more hosting solutions the better - we believe there's enough customers for everyone to go around :) We've started maintaining a list in matrix.org - and if the big boys started offering Matrix hosting too; it sounds like a good problem to have! (Plus the sort of people interested in Matrix are probably not that interested in buying it from GAFAM ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Every time I hear Matrix.org being mentioned, I giggle: [https://matrix.org/blog/2019/05/08/post-mortem-and- remediati...](https://matrix.org/blog/2019/05/08/post-mortem-and-remediations- for-apr-11-security-incident)

Describing their practices as sophomoric may be giving them too much credit.

<comment><USER21> I believe they tried blaming this on the creator of the C++ port of their server software without any proof and it sort of left a bad impression with me.

<comment> Funes- I think everyone should be free to post whatever they want; nonetheless, providing some kind of source to incriminating claims would be great--if only to make verifying them easier to other users.

In any case, this kind of posts is a reminder to stay alert and think critically; otherwise, we would believe many instances of misinformation without giving them a second thought. And we cannot expect others to downvote comments to oblivion or moderate them: it's something we ourselves have to be responsible for.

<comment><USER21> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19418111](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19418111)

<comment><USER3> That post was nothing to do with the security incident in question here (which happened April 11th 2019; that post is from March). The details in that post are sadly true (as others confirm on that thread).

However, we have no reason to believe there was a link to the April incident.

<comment><USER21> You called him malicious/dangerous and said he is involved in an ongoing campaign of exploiting security vulnerabilities in Matrix.

<comment><USER27> Which is not what you claimed.

<comment><USER21> That's how I perceived it.

<comment><USER9> Maybe you want to look into your perception of the world in contrast to facts. Some bias in there apparently.

<comment><USER21> Based on what was said by Arathorn, it would be easy for anyone to perceive it that way

<comment><USER27> It would be easy to perceive Arathorn to be talking about some future event instead of the protocol issues he mentions earlier in the same comment?</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


FireEye - <AUTHOR> http://pastebin.com/ExXFZhDM

<comment><USER2> Is this for real? That is unfathomably shoddy work from FireEye/Mandiant.</comment>


How I overcame my gaming addiction and bootstrapped a business to help others - <AUTHOR> https://www.indiehackers.com/interview/how-i-overcame-my-gaming-addiction-and-built-a-business-to-help-others-56eaf03900 <comment><USER2> In increasing digital world, where do you draw the line between a healthy hobby versus an addiction? From the article, it seems like you would like to stop people from video games altogether versus curtailing their addiction to healthier levels. Organizations such as MADD have faced similar problems where they started as a way to rehabilitate people, but turned into organizations with an extremist agenda.

<comment><USER3> Unrelated to OP but I ditched computer games and do think that there is no healthy level. It's a lot like marijuana today. We're way past pong and some ditch weed. These are very potent products engineered to flood your senses and highly addictive.

I'm giving the creators here the benefit of the doubt that this is just a side effect of trying to create great experiences for their users. Not so with casual free2play games which are clearly designed to drain your wallet.

Either way, they don't really enrich your life, except for a handful of indie productions they're not art like movies, they're the equivalent of capeshit but designed to make you watch it over and over again. I would like the ten thousand hours spent playing Counter-Strike back now.

<comment><USER4> I don't think you can be so black and white about it. Too much of anything is probably bad for you. If you replaced counter-strike with chess or golf or model trains would you feel the same? I think the answer is the same for all of these categories and I'm wondering if you feel differently why.

Obviously some games really are insidious; I don't think it's fair for that to dictate an entire genre of activities.

<comment><USER3> No, I don't feel the same way about chess, golf, or model trains for the same reason I don't feel the same way about "classic" weed and pong: they haven't been honed on an industrial scale to make them extremely appealing.

Obviously, all activities evolve and change over time but these are more like your grandma's pie recipe versus industrially optimized Lays with a hundred million dollar ad campaign to make sure you'll appreciate all the hard work put in by the chemists. One you can do in moderation, and it's self- moderating, the other you're better off just avoiding.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Interesting article. I feel like I had a problem with gaming, but I didn't necessarily have an addiction. When I got an Xbox 360 (and by extension Xbox live), I was able to hangout with my friends without going to their house. Even when they weren't playing, it was because I made friends and connections to people all over. Towards the end of my Xbox Live days, I mostly played without my "IRL" friends.

Now, I rarely game alone, but I play games with my friends in person (Fortnite, Mario Party, Mario Kart, Smash etc.). I think for me, gaming was a substitute for social interaction. Most of my interaction is in person now, so gaming has fallen by the wayside.

<comment><USER6> Thanks for reading. Gaming is a very common substitute for social interaction - for me as someone with social anxiety it was easier to just stay home and 'socialize' online then to go out and meet other people, but that only left me more isolated and depressed. Getting out and interacting with other people has helped me more since I've quit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I know that computer and video games are designed to have some level of attraction in order to obtain and maintain engagement, but I still have to ask the devil's advocate question: what is missing in contemporary life such that makes computer and video games so appealing?

My parents would probably describe be as an addict now and then, so I'm not asking this question in a holier-than-thou manner: I'm genuinely curious about what characteristics games have that real life doesn't.

Is it escapism? Is it compelling gameplay? Is it granularity of control?

<comment><USER8> To start off with:

1\. Really quick feedback loop. 2\. Progressively improving our skills. 3\. Keeping score. 4\. Having a community/tribe

There was a hn top post article about a guy who gamified his interview preparation to get into Google.

I think gamification of our daily life is a good idea.

<comment><USER9> Does anyone have a link to that post?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Thanks Channing for sharing my interview here.

Hi everyone, my name is Cam and I'm the founder of Game Quitters - the website profiled here.

If you have any questions let me know.</comment>


Geographic variation in the prevalence of ADHD (Circadian and sleep aspects) - <AUTHOR> http://www1.adhd-congress.org/guest/IDfdb81a32950f48/AbstractView?ABSID=8411

<comment><AUTHOR> Here is more information: [http://www.brainclinics.com/association-adhd- intensity-sunli...](http://www.brainclinics.com/association-adhd-intensity- sunlight-adhd-prevention)

 _A study published today in Biological Psychiatry sheds new light on the increasing rates (prevalence) of attention-deficit /hyperactivity disorder, known as ADHD. Children with ADHD have problems with inattention, distractibility, disorganization, impulsiveness, and overactivity. This study found that "sunny" regions with high solar intensity, such as the US states of California, Arizona, and Colorado, and countries like Spain and Mexico have lower prevalence of ADHD. An apparent protective effect of sunlight accounted for 34-57% of the variance in ADHD prevalence. The authors speculate that this may be related to sunlight's effects on preventing circadian rhythm ("biological clock") disturbances. These results suggest ways to prevent or treat ADHD for a substantial sub-group of patients._</comment>


Paul Walker, age 40 passes away in car crash. - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/RealPaulWalker/status/406984510367350784 <comment><AUTHOR> I'm incredibly sad about his unexpected passing. One minute he's driving to a charity event his organisation set up and the next he is gone.

RIP O'Connor - you will live forever through your movies in the hearts and minds of fans worldwide.</comment>


The End of Religious Wars - <AUTHOR> http://alexyoung.org/2009/08/21/end-of-religious-wars/

<comment><USER2> This is really excellent. The title is, as mentioned, horrible, but the content is great. Language designers would do well to keep this stuff in mind. Almost all software projects would do well to keep better in mind the stuff about ease of installability.

</comment><comment><USER3> The author asks about books that include examples from multiple languages. On of the best was "The Elements of Programming Style", which used examples of failure to follwow their principles from other books. Most were Fortran and PL/I, which had high market share at the time it was published. If my copy was handy, I'd be able to name other languages it used (probably C, given the authors, but C wasn't yet in wide use.)

What's with disqus.com? As presented to me, the comments page had three comments but no visible link to make a comment, and the "Help" link sent me to a 404 page, whose help link sent me to the same 404 page.

</comment><comment><USER4> It's about programming, bad title.</comment>


New Papua tribe discovered - <AUTHOR> http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Science/2010/06/24/14509781.html <comment><USER2> It's stories like this that remind me just how big the world is - despite all of the satellites, instant communication, air travel, and all of the other things that sometimes make the world feel small there's still lots of things and people hiding out in the vast wilderness away from it all.</comment>


The Misfortune Cookie Vulnerability - <AUTHOR> http://mis.fortunecook.ie

<comment><USER2> "Misfortune Cookie is a critical vulnerability that allows an intruder to remotely take over an Internet router and use it to attack home and business networks."

"The Misfortune Cookie vulnerability is due to an error within the HTTP cookie management mechanism present in the affected software, allowing an attacker to determine the 'fortune' of a request by manipulating cookies. Attackers can send specially crafted HTTP cookies that exploit the vulnerability to corrupt memory and alter the application and system state. This, in effect, can trick the attacked device to treat the current session with administrative privileges - to the misfortune of the device owner."</comment>


Simplifier - <AUTHOR> https://simplifier.neocities.org/ <comment><USER2> I love this! Is there a larger technologist wiki from which you can learn the principles of how to actually build everything from raw materials and generic tools?

Examples: casting iron, making blades, making paint, making plastics, making printer ink, making pharmaceuticals that actually work, etc.

It really seems that at this stage in the game we should be able to form "off- grid" villages that actually have a pretty good standard of living. Or is that all forbidden knowledge in this stage of our technological enslavation? ;)

<comment><USER3> Not a single condensed source, but there's an abundance of this type of content on Youtube, from both hobbyists and professionals.

<comment><USER2> The only problem with YouTube is that it's not organized. It's not indexable or printable. Videos are on Google's servers - here today and gone tomorrow. Videos are GREAT for stuff that you can't put into text, and YouTube excels at getting info out there from people who aren't that good with computers :)

What I'm thinking is a real-life open-source "tech tree".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Nice site. It reminds me of the Primitive Technology channel: [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAL3JXZSzSm8AlZyD3nQdBA](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAL3JXZSzSm8AlZyD3nQdBA)

<comment><USER5> This is more like what everyone dreamed primitive technology would be. Instead every video is him using the same four techniques over and over again and not progressing through the tech tree.

<comment><USER6> He's 20, we should probably give him a few years before we judge him for not progressing.

<comment><USER7> Wow he's 20? I had no idea

<comment><USER5> He's not. He(John Plant, which is a great nominative deterministic name for a primitivist) is 36 now, and was 31 when he started the channel.

source(just listing his age as "mid-30s" in 2017 but close enough): [https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/15/youtube-primitive- technology...](https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/15/youtube-primitive-technology- shows-john-plant-living-in-the-stone-age.html)

<comment><USER6> Thanks for setting the record straight, I stand corrected.

<comment><USER7> :+1: no worries all good

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I have to say that aside from a few things* this is what I consider the _perfect_ blog design in terms of structure, styling, layout.

* use of HTML tables, month-first dates

<comment><USER9> This is really close to what a default blog site would look like using Svelte: same load times and essentially identical date/title blog post format is almost what you get out of the box, with Svelte and Sapper, the router.

Anyway, if this is something you like, that's one way to get it on your own domain name, without compromising on 'bloat' or load times.

<comment><USER10> I don't see how Svelte is related to a blog site?

<comment><USER9> Svelte is a JavaScript framework that's very close to pure JavaScript. It's ideal use case is probably a static blog site - like this one.

<comment><USER10> I guess I just don't see how you'd need Svelte for that at all.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Dr. Stone is also a fun way to learn some interesting science when everything has became primitive.

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

<comment><USER12> Was just about to post this! It's a shockingly educational show, and it's really fun to see hard science get the hyper-romanticized "anime treatment"

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I can confirm, working with clay allows a singular focus that one cannot get another way. There is nothing to be looked up, nothing to be copy and pasted from some mailing list or forum. Some techniques are explained on videos on line, but for the most part, it is you and the medium.

Depending on where you want to spend your energy and in what capacity, you can play with the clay and get analytical with the glaze or swap them, play with both or calculate with everything, your choice. We don't normally have these choices.

</comment><comment><USER14> This is like the Primitive Technology channel on Youtube. From the about page:

'Primitive technology is a hobby where you build things in the wild completely from scratch using no modern tools or materials. These are the strict rules: If you want a fire, use a fire stick - An axe, pick up a stone and shape it - A hut, build one from trees, mud, rocks etc. The challenge is seeing how far you can go without utilizing modern technology. I do not live in the wild, but enjoy building shelter, tools, and more, only utilizing natural materials. To find specific videos, visit my playlist tab for building videos focused on pyrotechnology, shelter, weapons, food & agriculture, tools & machines, and weaving & fiber.'

[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAL3JXZSzSm8AlZyD3nQdBA](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAL3JXZSzSm8AlZyD3nQdBA)

</comment><comment><USER15> They have a few videos up on youtube too [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7edFw3ys5w6eN6xMrIcOWg/vid...](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7edFw3ys5w6eN6xMrIcOWg/videos)

</comment><comment><USER16> This is like the Open Source Ecology project but for computing hardware.

</comment><comment><USER17> Funny that the first post sticks out from the rest (a digital project vs. the physical ones). Notably it's more 3x3 a lot of the time. I wonder if the creator also felt like they had to make use of all the 3 pixels of horizontal space for some of these characters. The lowercase "l" is what I'd be using for a "1", with my lowercase "l" being 2 pixels wide, for instance.

<comment><USER18> I thought the 4x4 grid was an odd choice, especially when calling it the "smallest" font. 5x3 is one fewer pixel of area per character, and about 10x more legible IMO.

Funny enough, I do have a 4x8 pixel RGB display, which frustrates me because I've long thought of 5x3 as the only viable tiny font. I might get more use out of it with this 4x4 font.

<comment><USER19> you can read it?

<comment><USER18> The 4x4? Barely.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Just opening now; this looks amazing. I can't wait to read through it all!

[https://simplifier.neocities.org/fluxset.html](https://simplifier.neocities.org/fluxset.html) is very interesting, for example.

</comment><comment> cool-guy-69 So this is what a 21st century luddite looks like!

</comment><comment><USER21> Wow - he made a triode! Several of 'em.

</comment><comment> 52-6F-62 This is really interesting. Bookmarked.

</comment><comment><USER22> This is very cool</comment>


Guardian pulls ads from Google after they were placed next to extremist material - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/mar/16/guardian-pulls-ads-google-placed-extremist-material <comment><USER2> Now UK government have complained about this with their ad too as has Channel 4 - [https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/mar/17/google- mi...](https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/mar/17/google-ministers- quiz-placement-ads-extremist-content-youtube)</comment>