Results: Two dishtowels can be as effective as an n95 mask - <AUTHOR> https://smartairfilters.com/en/blog/best-materials-make-diy-face-mask-virus/ <comment><USER2> Rewriting titles like this is against the site guidelines. Accounts that do that eventually lose submission privileges, so please review the rules and follow them.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

<comment><AUTHOR> Got it. Thanks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Surgical mask, not N95 as stated in the editorialised title. Additionally they noted that it was hard to breathe through this improvised dishcloth mask.

<comment><USER4> Rewritten title: "not breathing more effective than surgical mask"

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> This research, of course, has implications for volunteers who are trying to make DIY masks for health care providers, to use as a last resort.

But I think the broader message should be: Wearing a mask in public, regardless of what material it's made from, is better than nothing.

It offers at least some protection to the wearer, and it also offers at least some protection to people around the wearer.

In several Asian countries, it is totally normal for people to wear masks in public to protect themselves and others from infectious diseases.

Perhaps this pandemic will help normalize the practice in the US. I really hope that resistance because of dumb cultural factors doesn't lead to more severe outcomes. Sure, bud, you look silly in a mask, but better silly than on a ventilator.

</comment><comment><USER6> Dishtowel is pretty non-specific. If it was, for example, terrycloth, like a bath towel...I can see some surface area, and standoff advantages. I've seen dish towels made from many very different types of cloth though.

</comment><comment><USER7> I may be mistaken but I can't see N95 mentioned anywhere?

The common surgical masks and N95 masks are two very different things.

</comment><comment><USER8> A surgical mask isn't a N95 mask.

</comment><comment><USER9> How easy it is to breathe through this material? -128% !!!!! Harder than surgical mark!!!! \--- Researchers' Pick for Best-Performing Homemade Mask Material

Based on particle capture and breathability, the researchers concluded that cotton t-shirts and pillow cases are the best choices for DIY masks.

</comment><comment><USER10> dang, fix the headline, please.</comment>


Vvvv: A hybrid visual/textual live-programming environment for easy prototyping - <AUTHOR> http://vvvv.org/ <comment><USER2> I wonder if the project runs into any issues of confusion with the relatively popular game named VVVVVV that's been around since 2010.

[http://store.steampowered.com/app/70300/](http://store.steampowered.com/app/70300/)

<comment><USER3> Vvvv has been around since 1998, so it's quite established.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Vvvv is a "Hybrid Visual/Textual Development Environment"[1].

[1] [http://vvvv.org/propaganda](http://vvvv.org/propaganda)</comment>


Are we heading for a human-powered future? - <AUTHOR> http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/science/08/01/Human.power/index.html <comment><USER2> No. You think growing corn so that we can burn it to generate electricity (or to generate ethanol so that we can burn that to power automobiles) is inefficient? Humans are _far_ less efficient at converting fuel to work than electrical power plants or automobiles are.

</comment><comment><USER3> "Human Powered Future"?

That's what the movie "Matrix" was all about.

Definitely don't want that.</comment>


Design ≠ Aesthetics - <AUTHOR> http://wrttn.in/85b86a

<comment><USER2> Thank you. I've been frustrated with all of the comments making these same mistakes this past month on Hacker News.

Thought: one problem that might lead to the confusion is that in some situations aesthetics is the where the solution to the problem lies (think apparel design or poster design). In those cases, the other problems have long been solved and all that is left to iterate on is the appearance. <http://www.usabilitypost.com/2011/11/11/timeless-fashion/>

Side note: it's interesting how people are quick to admit Steve Jobs was a genius and built great products, but they fail to take away what was probably the thing he advocated most.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you as well! At times beauty is indeed an important part of the user experience.

If you wish, to help spread the message you can share the essay with your followers on Twitter. That will be massively appreciated!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I do not have many things to say about it, besides... how precise that is.

I agree to the strongest.</comment>


Ask HN: Projects for social good? - <AUTHOR> I am a university professor but I feel deeply unhappy that I am not working on any of the real world problems. I work on machine learning and distributed systems to some extent. But I feel I am wasting my time solving problems which could either benefit big companies or irrelevant for anyone. What can I do to make the world a better place with all the talent and time I have. I also have number of students who can help me in these projects while earning their credits. <comment><USER2> Please check merit.world and see if it is something that might interest you. Ideally the system (which has been successfully tested "in vivo" with ~ 1000 participants) should be implemented as a decentralized app and AI would be useful to detect abuse. More use cases might crop up down the road. Use the contact info on the site if you want to get in touch.

</comment><comment><USER3> I got a related question: how well do you manage a good work/life/doing-good balance?

\- working on something interesting

\- working to earn money

\- working on something for greater good

\- having time to rest, learn and for my partner, friends and family (for me that means having to work less than 5 days/week)

I managed to get to a 4 day work week. Though I'm now not sure If I can keep that privileged while changing jobs (as a product manager, or anyone with "lead" or "manager" in the title it seems harder to get this from the get go).

</comment><comment><USER4> Thanks to HN I just discovered this website, which may be right up your alley. It seems the guy is involved in a lot of the sorts of things you mean.

[https://chrisalbon.com/](https://chrisalbon.com/)

[https://chrisalbon.com/about/chris_albon/](https://chrisalbon.com/about/chris_albon/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the link. One obvious suggestion I often get is working on health and medical domain. But one issue in this domain is lack of publicly available data. Unless you have special deals with hospitals or health authorities bootstrapping research in this direction is hard.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Machine learning probably has applications in NGOs that you feel sympathetic towards? You could work with them outside or inside your academic role.</comment>


The mod firing squad: Stack Exchange embroiled in row - <AUTHOR> https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/10/01/stack_exchange_controversy/ <comment> ga-vu duplicate: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21113344](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21113344)</comment>


Ask HN: Pivot to embedded Linux, pentesting, or robotics? - <AUTHOR> tl;dr: I'm an embedded systems engineer who programs on bare-metal micros. I feel my domain will be obsolete in coming decades and want to pivot to either embedded linux development, pentesting/reversing, or robotics. The question is, which one?
I have some interest in each of these areas, and given enough time and effort, I believe I could work my way up to an acceptable level of ability. However, I don't really have a good pulse on how these industries are going and what it's actually like to work in one of these fields. Here are my preliminary thoughts about each:
Embedded linux engineer: +field doesn't change quickly, is similar to my current embedded work, which I do enjoy -might get boring; kernel debugging sounds somewhat stressful
Pentester/reverse engineering: +very exciting work, lots of interesting tools and sometimes assembly (I love looking at ARM disassembly and poking registers!) -minimum bar might be exceedingly high, making it hard to break into the field -may not be very stable as a career choice
Robotics engineer: +many interesting applications of machine learning and state-of-the-art techniques -requires a hardcore math background to understand things at a deep level (I've only studied up to intro-level linear algebra) -field changes rapidly every single year (hello CNNs)
Do you work in one of these fields? What is work like for you day-to-day? Where do you see your industry going, and do you believe you've made a good long-term career choice? <comment><USER2> If you have been working on bare metal all these years and don't have any embedded Linux experience, I'd say definitely get that under your belt.

You don't need to kernel hack all day. I would say most of the major SoCs I work with already have a stable tree and anything that's not super-exotic already has a driver or can be adapted from another. I haven't seen the need to fine-tune kernel performance to any serious degree.

One area that companies always need is experienced bootloader and BSP work. That lets you tinker at the register level as well as understand the build process. The demand for secure bootloaders/HAB and secure field upgrades over IoT will definitely be increasing as time goes on, and that can be very specialized work based on the SoC and platform. That also kind of ticks the security aspect of the role...maybe look into that?

<comment><USER3> Not OP, but do you have any pointers where to learn more about bootloader security ?

<comment><USER2> I've been doing a lot of iMX work lately, so here's some reference material I've used in the past:

[https://boundarydevices.com/high-assurance-boot-hab- dummies/](https://boundarydevices.com/high-assurance-boot-hab-dummies/)

[https://www.nxp.com/docs/en/application- note/AN4581.pdf](https://www.nxp.com/docs/en/application-note/AN4581.pdf)

[https://blog.quarkslab.com/vulnerabilities-in-high- assurance...](https://blog.quarkslab.com/vulnerabilities-in-high-assurance- boot-of-nxp-imx-microprocessors.html)

A lot of it depends on Das U-Boot, the favorite open-source bootloader of the eLinux crowd:

[https://www.denx.de/wiki/U-Boot](https://www.denx.de/wiki/U-Boot)

<comment><USER4> What are the use cases for HAB on i.MX these days? I was under the impression it was broken.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > I'm an embedded systems engineer who programs on bare-metal micros. I feel > my domain will be obsolete in coming decades

What makes you think so? These days embedded Linux programming is mostly done for SoCs (unless you embed a PC in a nuclear station), and those SoC embed (sorry) more and more micro-controllers. Skimming through various job posting from silicon vendors should give you some idea of the situation -- there are frequently jobs openings for programming these embedded cores.

</comment><comment><USER6> I am an embedded OS (both Linux and vxWorks) engineer for a defense contractor. Day to day work is actually more about maintaining the OS, making sure applications get loaded successfully, and continuously keeping it both secure and fast (emphasis on secure). The initial board bring up and driver development is usually at the beginning of the project, and you usually only have to do small tweaks as the project matures. There'll be spinoffs based on successful implementations, but again, it's not too terrible. Debugging can be very stressful, but since I'm in defense, the schedule itself is usually quite long, so I have always had more than enough time to fix any issues.

It's a solid career choice, especially if you want to branch out into automotive where they are hitting this field hard. The skills you learn are also applicable to pretty much anywhere where you use Linux, so the transferable skill set overlaps a good deal.

There's a really good book I recommend that describes basically anything and everything you need to know called "Mastering Embedded Linux Programming" by Chris Simmonds. It'll teach you pretty much everything you need to know to get up and running in the embedded Linux world. It's also a ton of fun if you've never messed with something like a BeagleBone.

That said, I'm looking to get out of the defense industry and getting back into app development. Part of it is because I want to work with newer, more exciting technology. I'm looking towards possibly going back to mobile development, even. Unsure at the moment... Keep in mind that this has nothing to do with the stability of the market. I honestly feel it's way more stable than most people seem to give it credit for, especially the embedded Linux side of things.

</comment><comment><USER7> I liked embedded systems because I didn't have to write a GUI - most use of the module usage was with other systems so I had to design message protocols (no users, yay!)

For me, transition into API design and web services was a natural progression. FWIW.</comment>


N-O-D-E Volume 1 - <AUTHOR> https://n-o-d-e.net/nodevol01.html <comment> chupa-chups Would be nice if there was an abstract of any kind either here or on the linked site.

Is it a book about node.js? Or something else?

<comment><AUTHOR> Nope no relation to node.js. N-O-D-E is sort of a blog about cyberpunk, robotics, biotech, technology, DIY, etc.

Here is their YouTube channel:

[https://youtube.com/channel/UCvrLvII5oxSWEMEkszrxXEA/videos](https://youtube.com/channel/UCvrLvII5oxSWEMEkszrxXEA/videos)</comment></comment>


How Group Think Rules What We Like - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/magazine/2009/12/st_clive_thompson/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29&utm_content=My+Yahoo

<comment><USER2> hmmmm... <http://www.grupthink.com/></comment>


JPMorgan CEO: Govt will crack down on virtual currencies before they get big - <AUTHOR> http://fortune.com/2015/11/04/jamie-dimon-virtual-currency-bitcoin/ <comment><USER2> This will be an interesting fight to watch. But he is right about government loosing control over his currency, because monetary expansion and contraction need to respond to government policies. This can be achieved by interest rates, but not completely.</comment>


Finding the Right Name - <AUTHOR> https://chrisbowler.com/journal/naming-things <comment><USER2> Choose any name, get it out of the way- i have seen projects stalled and waste time on the "perfect name"

The name can be changed after you get traction-

Stripe started as /dev/payments Gusto started as ZenPayroll tinder was matchbox

</comment><comment><USER3> Every minute you spend on coming up with a 'perfect name' is time you're not spending developing the product.</comment>


Ask HN: Who are the best Sales Training companies? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Leaders in Sales Training vary widely by industry & business models. A few to consider -

\- Miller Heiman is the Corporate America Gold Standard, now incorporating SPIN Selling > [https://www.millerheimangroup.com/huthwaite/](https://www.millerheimangroup.com/huthwaite/)

\- The Challenger Sale by CEB Group is strong, geared toward large enterprise, complex scenarios > [https://www.hirevue.com/offer/sales-training-companies- corpo...](https://www.hirevue.com/offer/sales-training-companies-corporate- executive-board-ceb)

Challenger Sale - is based on the brilliant insights of Matt Dixon > [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSfE8zZUoMc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSfE8zZUoMc)

\- Mike Weinberg is probably the most accessable and useful to a wide range of SMB companies, he's quite good! And his 'New Sales. Simplified' book is a Must Read > [http://www.newsalescoach.com/services/](http://www.newsalescoach.com/services/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Awesome, thanks!! Just so I know, are you affiliated with any of the above?

<comment><USER2> No affiliations, associations, nor alliances with any of the above. I've known individuals who took Miller Hieman/SPIN selling training. I have read both books referenced. Curious -- what prompted you ask?

<comment><AUTHOR> Just asking for probity — really appreciate the quality and depth of your answer! Wanting to go through some programmes but it's hard to cut through the marketing bluster! Cheers!

<comment><USER2> Got it, here's one more -- check out Ian Altman, author of Same Side Selling > [http://www.ianaltman.com/](http://www.ianaltman.com/)

Recommend his book, some good ideas on client discovery. Although I actually get more value out of his podcasts. His workshop training looks interesting. See schedule of dates/cities.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I would recommend looking at selling power top 20. I am affliated with Carew International and we have been top 10 for 10 years. Check us out at www.carew.com or email me email@example.com

<comment><AUTHOR> Will do, thanks!</comment></comment>


Yahoo is shutting down its research labs - <AUTHOR> http://yahooresearch.tumblr.com/post/139436148571/yahoos-new-research-model <comment><USER2> That's not the title of the article, it's also not what the article says.</comment>


A Rare Look into the Imprecise World of Art Identification - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/08/arts/design/with-misattributed-masterpiece-a-rare-look-into-the-imprecise-world-of-art-identification.html

<comment><USER2> Isn't it a bit sad that art is judged 1000:1 based on who painted it rather than its artistic merit?

<comment><USER3> Imagine you are an editor, and get two proofs (500 pages each) of an unproven hypothesis. One is written by someone who's on top of the field, published 200 papers, and all his papers are cited hundreds of times. Another from an undergrad from a dinkytown's DinkyU. You have limited time. Who would you rather check?

And that's for a purely objective field, where you can logic your way through a proof. With art, you don't even know if the proofs are right or wrong. Given two papers with very similar content, and one genius in the field and one unknown, and very little means to tell which one is strictly 'objectively' better, how would you judge them?</comment></comment>


The Illegal Map of Swedish Art - <AUTHOR> http://googlemapsmania.blogspot.com/2016/04/the-illegal-map-of-swedish-art.html <comment><USER2> Reading the article from the Swedish national radio, the court decision found that wikimedia database of photo has a "commercial value" that can compete with commercial enterprises of the copyright authors who created the public statues or paintings on buildings.

The journalist asked a lawyer if this mean that its illegal now to take a photo of public statues, and the lawyer said that it legal since the law explicitly says so, but it might not be legal to publish it" on the Internet" as that action might be considered to have a commercial value.

In my view, its a bit weird.

<comment><USER3> This court decision is a result of the change of law that in part was motivated to happened to get piracy back in 2005. When it was amended there were many, many more restrictions placed on digital distribution than before. The law in question explicitly say "Artwork can be depicted if contained in a collection or catalogue, but not in digital form". So a book detailing famous art is allowed, but a website doing the same is not.

This also means it is not illegal to post Facebook photos with a statue. Since clearly that is not a database, just a random photo.

The paragraph in question: [https://lagen.nu/1960:729#P24S1](https://lagen.nu/1960:729#P24S1)]

And the full law: [http://rinfo.stage.lagrummet.se//publ/sfs/2005:359/pdf,sv](http://rinfo.stage.lagrummet.se//publ/sfs/2005:359/pdf,sv)

(This law - 2005:359 - is also the law that added the "data tax" in Sweden of 0,4 kronor per MB.)

<comment><USER4> The decision from the supreme court is available online: [http://www.hogstadomstolen.se/Domstolar/hogstadomstolen/Avgo...](http://www.hogstadomstolen.se/Domstolar/hogstadomstolen/Avgoranden/2016/2016-04-04%20%C3%96%20849-15%20Beslut.pdf)

As I understand it, actually the sentence that you quote, §24(3), is not relevant in this case. §24 provides three exceptions to the general system of copyright, and this case turns on §24(1), which says "artwork can be depicted if they are permanently placed in a public place outdoors".

So, it would naively seem that photos of public art are not copyright protected. However, the court reasoned that the word "depict" does not cover the act of publicizing the pictures in an open database. They reason based on what kind of use they think the legislators had in mind when passing the law: they think it is intended to allow taking photos of streets, and selling postcards of sculptures, but that a database has more commercial value than a postcard, and therefore the legislators did not intend that to be included in the term...

<comment><USER5> How do you determine what commercial value something has? Apparently not by whether it costs money or not. The map is offered for free, without ads. Postcards are usually for pay.

<comment><USER4> They don't say anything about how to determine the value. In general, it seems to me that this decision will create a lot of uncertainty about what is copyrighted and what is free.

They do say that the test is whether someone _could_ sell it for money, so the fact that in this case Wikimedia is a non-profit and does it for free does not affect the outcome.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Lest you think that this is some oddity that does not happen in the US it is an issue in Portland, OR. The Portlandia statue [1] sitting in public display and on a public building. The artist retains copyright. Raymond Kaskey, the sculptor, sued the studio that made Body of Evidence which used the statue in the background of some shots and won. While I can understand the artist's desire that the work of art is respected and the high likelihood that chotchkies and such would not pay to use the likeness. It is at conflict with fair use and parody.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portlandia_(statue)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portlandia_\(statue\))

<comment><USER7> Any art paid for with public funds should be in the public domain. It seems like an unfortunate oversight that the artist was allowed to retain copyright here.

<comment><USER8> There are many ways around that. Instead of buying the artwork, it could be on a 99 year lease. Or a museum wins a bid to host the artists exhibition for 10 years.

Another question - is there some threshold which triggers the switch to public domain? Eg, if the public pays for 10% of the cost, through taxes, and private donators pay for the rest, then is it still placed in the public domain?

I agree - I think the Portlandia case should not have let the artist keep that restriction on use. But I think it should be done as part of the contract, rather than a blanket rule that any public funds => public domain.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I am happy to see copyright raising its ugly head in circumstances that might concern the general public as well, not only hackers and hippies in the bit- sharing underground. Maybe in a few decades people will realise it doesn't make any sense. The only thing that remains is that we'll have to stretch this further until it becomes universally absurd.

</comment><comment><USER10> Mods: consider switching this from the original blogspam to Wikimedia's blog post: [https://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/04/04/strike-against- freedom...](https://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/04/04/strike-against-freedom- panorama/)

</comment><comment><USER11> The app provides pictures of art without permission. That part seems clear.

The OP claims 'even when its in a public place and owned by the public'. That part seems odd. It would be good to (be able to) read the decision.

<comment><USER12> There must be some subtly in the law. Or perhaps Sweden has unusual laws about what you can photograph in/from a public space.

That being said, I wonder if an architect could claim an unusual/interesting building as a work of art, and then have it removed from google street view?

<comment><USER13> This is actually something that is attempted every now and then; architects claiming that they own the (commercial) visual rights to something that exists in public space.

In 2004 the architect of a bridge in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, tried to claim that photographs and reproductions of 'his' bridge were unlawful, and that a fee would have to paid for any sold reproduction of that bridge (such as a postcard). Luckily this was prevented by an EU directive that states clearly that any art or architecture located in a public area may be photographed, provided that it is reproduced as-is.

I wonder if this EU directive is applicable to this situation in Sweden?

<comment><USER4> Hm, maybe you can find some more details about that case? As I understood it, the EU copyright directive does not say anything about freedom of panorama either way (see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_panorama#European_U...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_panorama#European_Union)), but maybe there are some subtleties.

<comment><USER13> From what I can tell without any legal expertise, the EU Copyright Directive provides a way for countries to make certain exceptions (article 5(3)), which literally includes the case of architecture and sculptures in a public setting.

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

So whereas the Netherlands sensibly chose to enact this exception, other countries selectively allowed certain situations, such as the lights of the Eiffel Tower and possibly Belgium's Atomium landmark.

This blog post (in Dutch) contains a good summary of the Dutch bridge case:

[http://www.nandoonline.com/?p=4543](http://www.nandoonline.com/?p=4543)

<comment><USER4> That makes sense, but it would mean that the EU directive does not override national law, right? So it would not be helpful in Sweden.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I was bored recently and scanned the terms for an amusement park ticket. I gave all rights to my likeness and it was specifically listed that I could not make copies of photos taken by park equipment without explicit permission (I assume when you buy a CD or whatnot you pay for that).

</comment><comment><USER15> Does this also make Goole Street View illegal?

<comment><USER3> No. The law in question explicitly allows depictions of building, they are seen as separate from artwork.

<comment><USER16> Street View depicts other things than building. The following example is almost certainly illegal:

[https://goo.gl/maps/3KCxh5LRs3B2](https://goo.gl/maps/3KCxh5LRs3B2)

<comment><USER3> No. Street View does not offer a list of all artwork, and a way to find the images of them. Thus it would not fall under the "database of artwork" umbrella mentioned in the law. There is no metadata such as author of the work etc. that would make it a database of artwork.

<comment><USER15> If you enter 'statue' in the search, it'll give you a list of famous statues. If you click any of them, you are shown the artwork together with a description.

This seems to fit the description of a 'database' given elsewhere in this thread, but it may be that some detail in the law allows things like this. Perhaps because it is a database that contains other things than art as well.

<comment><USER3> That is the same argument that typing "Avengers 3 torrent" in Google Search gives download links, so Google are liable for copyright infringement the same way Pirate Bay is. While technically true, there is a diference in intent here that needs to be taken into consideration.

<comment><USER17> No, Google themselves are providing Street view, the maps and taking the all the photos.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> current title "The Illegal Map of Swedish Art " is clickbait. The map is fine, photo of work of art were included in the map and those were found infringing.

<comment><USER19> No, it is the act of pooling images into a database that is the issue. According to the court including the copyleft licensed photos in the database creates value that the creators then have a claim on.

It is however from the ruling not clear exactly how the photos and metadata create value; for instance it seems clear like just hosting all the offending images on a separate service and naming them with guid:s will be perfectly fine so long as the user has to navigate and find the image themselves.

Ruling: [http://www.hogstadomstolen.se/Domstolar/hogstadomstolen/Avgo...](http://www.hogstadomstolen.se/Domstolar/hogstadomstolen/Avgoranden/2016/2016-04-04%20%C3%96%20849-15%20Beslut.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Who was the plaintiff in this case? The defendant was Wikimedia!

I was curious "who is the plaintiff here" because I didn't see that in the discussion anyplace, so I ran vilhelm_s's helpful link to the decision [http://www.hogstadomstolen.se/Domstolar/hogstadomstolen/Avgo...](http://www.hogstadomstolen.se/Domstolar/hogstadomstolen/Avgoranden/2016/2016-04-04%20%C3%96%20849-15%20Beslut.pdf)

through translate.google.com and learned to my horror that the defendant in this case was Wikimedia, not some map/app designer.

I could not tell who the plaintiff was, it translates as "Plaintiffs in the district court Image Copyright in Sweden oak. for., 769610-3121 Hornsgatan 103 117 28 Stockholm" I looked at that address on google maps and discovered that it is hard to find the front door of a building in Stockholm.

<comment><USER4> BUS ([http://bus.se/en](http://bus.se/en) ). It's a copyright collecting society. That is, if you own the copyright in a visual work, you can assign it to BUS and they will sell the publication rights for you (and take a 20% commission). They also manage some compulsory copyright licence schemes. This is a standard way of managing royalty fees in Europe ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_collective](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_collective) ).

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Related: [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3136945/Absurd- new-E...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3136945/Absurd-new-EU-law- mean-ll-face-legal-action-taking-pictures-famous-landmarks-Photos-punished- breach-copyright.html)

<comment><USER22> dailymail should go on your forbidden list, UK red tops are terrible;

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabloid_journalism#Red_tops](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabloid_journalism#Red_tops)

example; [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1296282/I-dos...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1296282/I-dosing- How-teenagers-getting-digitally-high-music-download-internet.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Background there is a Swedish highest court ruling that bans photos of copyrighted art. [http://www.thelocal.se/20160404/wikimedia-breaks- copyright-l...](http://www.thelocal.se/20160404/wikimedia-breaks-copyright- laws-with-pics-of-public-art)

It has not been tried in the European court yet so it may not be illegal in EU if the EU court over rules the swedish court.

</comment><comment><USER24> Related: [http://www.thelocal.se/20160404/wikimedia-breaks- copyright-l...](http://www.thelocal.se/20160404/wikimedia-breaks-copyright- laws-with-pics-of-public-art)

</comment><comment><USER25> The public may own the physical artwork, but may not own the licensing to reproductions of it. Searching Cloud Gate on shutterstock.com will quickly show you that all of the images are editorial use only for this reason.

</comment><comment><USER26> Could they replace the pictures with links to a Google Image Search of the statue's name?

</comment><comment><USER27> The current headline is ambiguous. The blog is about copyright law around the map website.

</comment><comment><USER28> > Therefore Offentlig Konst can no longer show you a picture of a work of art, > even when the artwork is in public ownership, on public display and sited in > a public area,

Does the same courtesy apply to human beings?

</comment><comment><USER29> I find it interesting that many of these types of cases seem to be unique to Europe while the US seems to get the brunt of the copyright criticism.

Why is this something artists in Europe sue about? Do they want their work hidden?

</comment><comment><USER30> If artist are concerned about copyright, then they should make art that can't be copied; take some comfort in knowing Banksy agrees with me, though even then, I'm still have the same opinion.

</comment><comment><USER31> Now I'm curious to see photos of said mapped artwork..

</comment><comment><USER32> I'm not familiar with all the details but as I understand it, the problem is not taking photos of the art, but compiling a catalog of said photos.

</comment><comment><USER33> Copyright law makes absolutely zero sense these days.

</comment><comment><USER34> So, do they sue wikipedia next now?

<comment><USER4> Probably, unless Wikicommons voluntarily takes down the photos. Apparently, "Wikimedia Sverige will be consulting with our lawyers and Wikimedia Foundation the coming weeks about what this really means and what our options are." ([https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Deletion_requests...](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Deletion_requests/Template:FoP- Sweden) )

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> In the UK you can get into trouble "publishing" a photo of just about everything

</comment><comment><USER36> So, will Ingress be banned in Sweden, as that pretty much does the exactly same thing?

<comment><USER37> I was asking the same thing. After thinking about it for a bit and reading more about the case, I think the short answer is no.

I think it could be argued that the nature of Ingress and the main purpose of it is NOT to exploit pictures to the public without paying the artist/sculptor in question. However this could obviously be up for debate, and I guess part of it depends on whether anyone sues Google over it.

Another important point to make is that the suing party in this case states in their press release, that Wikimedia could just have paid the organization a few 1000 SEK per year (~a few 100 USD) in a license fee and it would all be deemed legal.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> why not just move this project outside of the jurisdiction of Sweden?

<comment><USER4> In this case I think it would not help. The project is done by Wikimedia, which has its servers in Floria. But the U.S. version of freedom of panorama is fairly weak (buildings only, see [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Freedom_of_panora...](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Freedom_of_panorama#United_States) ). With this decision, it seems Sweden will also turn buildings-only. So U.S. courts will recognise the Swedish copyright.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Sweden is such a perverse mutation of civilization for so many reasons. This is just one example of a symptom.

<comment><USER40> Every nation has some weird and unpleasant laws. You're going to have to cite a lot more _really_ weird things about Sweden in particular if you want anyone to take you seriously.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Where Adblock+ injects 20K CSS rules, HTTPSB injects one - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/gorhill/httpswitchboard/wiki/Adblock-Plus-memory-consumption <comment><USER3> HTTPSB just isn't userfriendly enough for me. I run Adblock (not plus though) + Ghostery, and perhaps they use more memory and CPU, but if they do I've never noticed nor cared about it. Their userfriendliness is amazing though. HTTPSB randomly cripples sites, much like NoScript, and I really can't be bothered to deal with that anymore.

With Adblock + Ghostery I feel completely in control. If I want to enable the Disqus script on a single page for a single session, Ghostery easily lets me do that. HTTPSB makes that hard, or perhaps I'm missing something.

Case in point: When I tried to post this comment, I got a "Dead link: users don't match" error which went away when I disabled HTTPSB.

<comment><USER4> Sorry to be slightly off-topic, but since you mention NoScript and are familiar with that, this (HTTPSB) and ABP, can I ask. Is HTTPSB more of a NoScript alternative or an ABP alternative?

<comment><USER3> From the little experience I have with HTTPSB, I'd say that it _was_ more of a NoScript alternative. It feels to me like a webbrowser firewall. They seem to have moved into the adblocking field now though. Here's how I see it:

* Adblock (Plus): Blocking ads, No / minimal user action required

* NoScript: Blocking scripts. Lots and lots of user action required.

* Ghostery: Block privacy intrusions. Basically an application-level firewall for the browser. In a normal firewall, you'd block e.g. port 80 from IP x.x.x.x. In an appliction firewall you simply block, for instance, bittorrent traffic. Minimal user interaction required, and where it is required, it's very easy to use.

* HTTPSB: A low-level web browser firewall ("block port 80 from IP x.x.x.x) that now also does (better) adblocking. The adblocking is on par with Adblock (plus): no user action required. The browser "firewall" is basically unusable. Lots of user interaction required, and when it is required, it's basically impossible to understand.

<comment><USER5> Sounds a lot like we need some volunteers to build a better UI for simple (adblock mode), a 2nd option to do a noscript equivalent, and a 3rd option for wild-west-browser-firewall mode.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Given that advertising pays for a lot of the services we all use, the use of Adblock and similar programs constitutes defection in game theory terms - <USER2> more people who do it, the worse off we all are - which means even if you choose to do it yourself (I personally don't), it is against your interests to encourage other people to do it.

Also, given that computing is one of very few areas of technology in which our species is still making substantial progress, and that progress is driven by market demand, even if you want to make your workload computationally cheaper for yourself, it is very much against your interests to encourage other people to follow suit; if every web browser starts using less memory, everyone is worse off.

I'm not going to start trying to persuade you personally to cooperate rather than defect - that's a value judgment you have to make - but please at least appreciate that it's a bad idea to encourage other people to defect!

<comment><USER7> Banksy says it best:

 _People are taking the piss out of you everyday. They butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear. They leer at you from tall buildings and make you feel small. They make flippant comments from buses that imply you're not sexy enough and that all the fun is happening somewhere else. They are on TV making your girlfriend feel inadequate. They have access to the most sophisticated technology the world has ever seen and they bully you with it. They are The Advertisers and they are laughing at you._

 _You, however, are forbidden to touch them. Trademarks, intellectual property rights and copyright law mean advertisers can say what they like wherever they like with total impunity._

 _Fuck that. Any advert in a public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours. It's yours to take, re-arrange and re-use. You can do whatever you like with it. Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head._

 _You owe the companies nothing. Less than nothing, you especially don't owe them any courtesy. They owe you. They have re-arranged the world to put themselves in front of you. They never asked for your permission, don't even start asking for theirs._

<comment><USER8> The salient part is "public space". Websites aren't public space.

<comment><USER9> A website displays on _my_ computer. I should have more control over that "space" than a "public space", for sure. There's nothing wrong with wanting complete control of how my computer is being used.

If the business model of the advertisers requires that they trust that my computer displays their ads then I see it as their fault for misplacing their trust.

<comment><USER10> > _A website displays on _my_ computer. I should have more control over that > "space" than a "public space", for sure. There's nothing wrong with wanting > complete control of how my computer is being used._

Who cares if it's _your_ computer? It's _their_ product or service you're using, which is offered to you under well-defined terms of use. You're free to not use it if you don't agree with the terms of use.

Let's assume that breaking the terms of use _is_ illegal or immoral. Then how does doing it on _your_ computer absolve you of responsibility? A person's basement is also _his_ private space. Should he have free reign to hold people there against their will? Having a private space doesn't give you carte blanche, especially when other people are involved (e.g. the people who built the products or services you're using).

> _If the business model of the advertisers requires that they trust that my > computer displays their ads then I see it as their fault for misplacing > their trust._

The essence of your argument is that whenever you can screw somebody over and they're powerless to stop you, it's their fault when you screw them over. This is not an argument I'd be proud to make.

By this logic, a local convenience store that hasn't installed security cameras is at fault when you steal from them, because they misplaced their trust in their customers. A woman walking alone at night is at fault when someone attacks her, because she misplaced her trust in society.

By the way, I use AdBlock. But I don't think your attempts at ethically justifying AdBlock hold any water.

<comment><USER11> The site sends a bunch of data to my computer. My computer can choose to render it or not, and make further requests e.g. from ad servers or not. If a bunch of people show up at my house and I only let some of them into my basement, that's not the same as kidnapping!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> MY GOSH! I never realized how ______slow my page loadings were. Removed ABP (and a couple of extensions) after reading this and the memory consumption just went to 1 /2 of what it used to be, the page loading times are just incredible... I always wondered why Chrome is soooo much slower compared to Firefox (ABP not installed on Firefox) but never investigated further. Thank you so much!

<comment><USER13> I'm a big fan of Privoxy. Just get that stuff out of the browser entirely.

<comment><USER14> Yep. I run Privoxy and a DNS resolver configured to be authoritative for the worst 5000 or so ad farms. Zips along nicely, and works for every machine on the LAN or via remote VPN.

Fuck ads. Find a different business model.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The thing with all these plugins, I shouldn't care as a user, I should be informed about these issues.

If you use [http://www.sublimetext.com/](http://www.sublimetext.com/) you will get a dialog when scripts are running slow, as in, "Script XYZ took more than 1 second to process this file, you can disable it"

All I want in FF or Chrome is the same.

"Adblock blocked the UI for 4 seconds" "Adblock increased memory consumption by double"

Or they could even be more harsh and kill plugins that take too long and impact user experience like the Flash timeout.

<comment><USER16> Chrome shows the memory consumption of plugin here : chrome://memory-redirect/

I don't think most users want pop-ups about technical details in browsers. Sublime text is a different story - it's meant for tech folks.

<comment><USER17> Plugin memory usage tracking is only realistically possible for Chrome where plugins run in a sandbox with a really limited API. Even then, if the plugin manages to allocate memory inside a page's sandbox (for example, by injecting some CSS or JS in there), the reporting will be wrong.

The adblock plus problem is in fact one of those - it injects styles into pages in order to filter ads, which increases the memory footprint of the page. So neither Firefox nor Chrome can tell you 'adblock plus is increasing memory usage by X', because the memory usage is hidden along with everything else owned by the page, not by the addon.

<comment><USER18> Firefox is adding "add-on compartments" (bug 990729) that allocate separate memory arenas for each add-on. Firefox will be able to use this information to track (most) memory usage for each add-on.

[https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=990729](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=990729)

<comment><USER19> It can already measure some parts of add-on memory usage, and you can see this by looking for "add-ons" in about:memory. Bug 990729 will improve the accuracy of the measurements.

<comment><USER20> There is also this addon ([https://addons.mozilla.org/en- us/firefox/addon/about-addons-...](https://addons.mozilla.org/en- us/firefox/addon/about-addons-memory/)) which has a somewhat nicer interface.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Adblock+ has been fine for me. Has anyone had any problems?

Personally, Adblock+ has earned my trust over a long period of time, so it's hard to see myself switching to something else unless the reason was dire.

<comment><USER22> Trusting Adblock is hard because of the "acceptable ads" feature. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adblock_Plus#Controversy_over_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adblock_Plus#Controversy_over_ad_filtering_and_ad_whitelisting)

<comment><USER3> As far as I know (anybody please correct me if I'm wrong on any of this), it's Adblock PLUS that can't be trusted. Adblock (without the plus) is a completely separate project that's much more trustworthy. Adblock PLUS basically usurped Adblock by appending a "plus", making it seem like it's somehow better than Adblock.

<comment><USER20> It's not like that. A long time ago (2005?) there was an extension for Firefox called "Adblock". Eventually the development of this extension died, and it got forked with the name "Adblock Plus" in 2006 or so.

The Adblock you're referring to (the Chrome-only extension, right?) was published in 2009. As you can see, Adblock Plus predates it by 3 years or so.

<comment><USER3> Good to know, thanks for the correction.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Could someone explain _why_ Adblock injects CSS rules into the document? I presume it's to hide the ads, but what I don't understand is why that's the way it hides the ads. Why not simply remove the element containing the ad¹ instead? Additionally, presuming my earlier assumption is correct, if you hide the element with CSS, doesn't the browser still need to fetch the ad?

¹Get rid of as much crap ad HTML as possible. Ads seem to come layered in all manner of divs and iframes.

<comment><USER24> What other options do you see? Searching and manipulating DOM in JavaScript wouldn't be faster than a single CSS stylesheet. Remember that there are >20K rules in play.

<comment><USER25> 20K rules probably isn't that big, when you compile that to an automata. Most nodes are probably behind the edges that never traversed.

If there would be an option for a extension to hook into DOM element creation (i.e. when browser parses HTML and builds a tree, it'd call some user-defined predicate function) - that would possibly solve the issue.

I believe CSS is slow because of cascading nature - it requires re-compiling it from the very plaintext source on every page view, to combine ad-blocking rules with others - this certainly could be optimized (if browser side would provide tools for that). No idea about horrendous memory usage, though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Is there any plan to port this to Firefox? It'd be nice to see HTTPSB as an alternative to ABP there too.

<comment><USER27> [https://github.com/gorhill/httpswitchboard/issues/86](https://github.com/gorhill/httpswitchboard/issues/86)

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> To reduce the number of filters in Adblock, a simple way is to let it run for a few days with a popular black list such as EasyList. Then open the list in the preferences, sort it by number of hits, and unselect all the filters with 0 hits (there are so many of them, that probably something like 99% of them never get any hits). You can select the filters, and press "Space" to disable them all in one go.

</comment><comment><USER25> Apples and oranges.

ABP filters out (or, more correctly, modifies by styling them to not display) DOM elements, HTTPSB filters out HTTP requests. That's two completely different approaches, each with its own pros and cons, but neither is a real replacement for the other one (although both apples and oranges are suitable for eating).

On an unrelated note, a fun approach to fix ABP would be to introduce non- cascading style sheets, possibly with limited styling capabilities, specifically for adblocking. Those could be well-precompiled and run extremly fast while taking much less memory. But that would require hacking browser internals, so that's not gonna happen.

</comment><comment><USER29> Okay, so how can we get the ABP people to do likewise?

I'd love to see a reaction from them explaining either why they can't do it, why it wouldn't help, or when they're planning on doing it...

<comment><USER30> Wladimir Palant(ABP dev) gives a short response here:

[https://adblockplus.org/blog/on-the-adblock-plus-memory- cons...](https://adblockplus.org/blog/on-the-adblock-plus-memory- consumption#c005360)

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> I have not had any significant problems with ABP, but after trying out HTTPSB earlier this week it's become my most essential extension. It's not as user- friendly as Ghostery, ABP and a few others, but I really appreciate its ability to quickly show me what's actually happening on a given page. I would love to see it develop into a general-purpose diagnostic tool. After only having it installed for a few days, it's hard to imagine life without it - which is about the highest compliment I can give.

<comment><USER32> Same - I installed HTTPSB as a dec tool, but ended up liking how much control it gives back to me about what is loaded on my pages. There was an initial period of frustration as I had to unblock the bare minimum required to make youtube/gmail/vimeo/facebook work as expected, and after that it's smooth sailing. ADP is gone, and I _feel_ like I get my pages quicker and cleaner.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> Dear god... Why haven't I found this plugin before? This is pure awesomeness - makes up for lack of NoScript for Chrome...

I can finally disable ABP and Disconnect - ever since I used them, my web experience in general felt definitely more sluggish.

Thanks!

</comment><comment><USER34> The only reason I'm using an ad blocker is because of Youtube's ads. I think the whole marketing industry took a big hit when Google introduced ads to Youtube, because lots of people were forced to install the ad blockers. All of my friends use ABP now......

</comment><comment><USER35> Not sure how a Chrome-only plugin is supposed to help with Firefox memory consumption.

<comment><USER36> By setting an example of how element-hiding blocklists should be implemented

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> As a temporary workaround for AdBlock (and for Firefox since it's not supported by HTTPSB), here's EasyList stripped out of all its CSS rules. It obviously lets some banners slip through, but most of them are still blocked.

[http://www.xamasoft.com/adblock/easylist- nocssrules.txt](http://www.xamasoft.com/adblock/easylist-nocssrules.txt)

</comment><comment><USER38> With AdBlock+ and HTTPSB you still get the network traffic from unwanted sites.

AdSuck, from the good folks at Conformal, blocks unwanted connections and thus decreases unwanted network traffic.

[https://github.com/conformal/adsuck](https://github.com/conformal/adsuck)

</comment><comment><USER39> I solve the issue with a (free) OpenDNS account where everything in the (crowd-sourced) "Advertisers" list is just resolved to 127.0.0.1. This works for phones, tablets, and any browser on any OS in my home network.

The problem is what to do once I leave my home network.

</comment><comment><USER40> I like it, though every once in a while something will be blocked in the middle of the screen and I can't dismiss the red blocked area to get to the actual content.

</comment><comment><USER41> Prepare for the huge spike of user adoption. This is just incredible, never knew this existed. Super useful.

</comment><comment><USER42> Why bother installing an ad blocker if your brain already has an ad ignorer plugin? Furthermore, this ad ignorer software is quite good at learning: the advertirzers may shift place and shape but it will only fool you once, or none. Hence the need of massive user bases on 'free' online services, because only a tiny percentage of brains fall for the ads and even a tinier chunk of these clickers turn into buyers.

</comment><comment><USER43> I rage quit Firefox years ago because it's impossible to discuss it's critical perf issues without people pointing shifting blame to plugins. It got so bad I ran clean installs that never had a plugin ever, still had perf issues, and people on the internet simply refused Firefox could be at fault.

I switched to Chrome and have never looked back. I also have never had a single issue with any AdBlock plugin in Chrome. Maybe they're doing something insanely stupid. I don't know. I use Chrome where it just works so I also don't care.

<comment><USER44> Once you get past about 30 tabs, Chrome performance drops through the floor while memory usage just balloons; by contrast, both Firefox and Safari hold up pretty well. That, plus sending every keystroke in the URL bar to Google, and a bunch of really quirky UIs that I deeply dislike, keeps me from using Chrome for anything but testing.

Edit: This seems to be a controversial comment. I'm curious whether folks disagree with me that Chrome doesn't work very well for many tabs, or if they think that's irrelevant to the discussion, or what?

<comment><USER45> I don't think I've ever had the need for 30 tabs; the magic of the internet is that if I ever need to see a specific website, I can just type in a URL.

<comment><USER46> I use tabs/windows as a todo list. I have 84 tabs open in my main window, and 36 windows open. Mostly I have 1 window per task, each with a few to a dozen tabs of related stuff. When I complete a task (or decide not to pursue it) I close the window.

It's not the best way of organizing, but it actually fits my ADD/scattershot style of working pretty well.

<comment><USER47> I'm interested - what are each of your to-dos? Are they like, articles to read or are they actually specific pieces of work, say like, a wordpress page to edit?

<comment><USER46> I won't list them all, but here's a selection:

A hobby web site I was editing where I got stuck on some css, a (long) video I want to watch, research for an audio program I'm designing, data about an electronics hobby project I want to start, 2 pull requests I need to follow up on, an appliance I need decide on and buy for my kitchen, a web forum I need to integrate into a site of mine, a couple bug reports I need to follow up on, an amazon page of a video game I heard was worth my time, etc.

So...just random stuff. Some are personal, some are professional, some are home related, some are just key nuggets of info to remind me of something I want to look into at some point.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Russia's DST invests where other angels fear to tread - <AUTHOR> http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/a2a42578-2ef1-11e0-88ec-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1CuCPSonG

<comment><AUTHOR> Interestingly, and perhaps mistakenly, this story in the print edition of the _Financial Times_ (where I found it) had the headline: "Y Combinator invests where other angels fear to tread".

Not seeing YC explained by way of pg's personal credibility was also a good sign, I thought, of the incubators rapidly-realised credibility.</comment>


How YouTube's Algorithm Really Works - <AUTHOR> https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2018/11/how-youtubes-algorithm-really-works/575212/?single_page=true <comment><USER2> I'm surprised there isn't more "reverse engineering" of YouTube's black box recommender, considering how much money there is to be made by uploading popular videos.

Being able to auto-generate mashups of other videos which get recommended a lot could be incredibly profitable.</comment>


An iPad clone that has Flash, Firefox, filesharing, and a keyboard - <AUTHOR> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_N900

<comment><USER2> And 1/8 the size.</comment>


Show HN: I created a Padmapper clone to promote my startup - <AUTHOR> http://maps.kissr.com/

<comment><USER2> I don't see anything. Did CL shut you down too?

<comment><USER2> Scratch that, it looks like you're doing it client side but the SOP isn't letting requests through</comment></comment>


Show HN: WebGL Fluid and Particles in Haxe - <AUTHOR> http://haxiomic.github.io/GPU-Fluid-Experiments/html5/

<comment><AUTHOR> Click and drag to interact, I'm trying to get a handle on WebGL, so let me know if it doesn't work with your setup :)

[https://github.com/haxiomic/GPU-Fluid- Experiments](https://github.com/haxiomic/GPU-Fluid-Experiments)

<comment><USER2> This is great, do you have a trip report? I've been using Haxe for a while, but have done precious little WebGL.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm working on the write up for this project at the moment. The best aspect of the language in my eyes is having a scriptable compiler with Haxe macros (macros themselves are also written in Haxe). In this project there's a macro that parses and extracts the variables from the shader glsl - so rather than the usual method for passing variables to shaders:

      gl.useProgram(program);
      mouseCoordLocation = gl.getUniformLocation(program, 'mouseCoord');

... then later during rendering ...

      gl.useProgram(program);
      gl.uniform2f(mouseCoordLocation, mouse.x, mouse.y);

With Haxe macros it becomes:

      program.mouseCoord = mouse;

Best of all it works with autocomplete! Checkout shaderblox by Sunjammer to try it for your self - it's quite experimental so in this project I'm using a fork with a few of the bugs patched [https://github.com/haxiomic/shaderblox](https://github.com/haxiomic/shaderblox) .It also supports fairly rudimentary shader inheritance which is terribly useful if you're not a fan of the rigidity of shader languages like glsl.

Alternatively, Ncannasse is working on a haxe-based shader langauge, hxsl which when ready will be my language of choice - not least because we'll be able to target glsl, AGAL and hlsl, maybe even Cg with a single codebase

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> That's awesome. I didn't know something like Haxe existing for a long time.

</comment><comment><USER4> Looks amazing. I like how people are adopting Haxe and making all this cool stuff. Awesome work, thanks for sharing.</comment>


Helvetica and New York subways - <AUTHOR> http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703858404576214492061190946.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEFTTopOpinion

<comment><USER2> This is what a designer's true work is! Solve a problem - bring clarity and form to chaos. While the problem "too simple" was a UX thing.

World of designers need more examples like this, especially in web and User Interface designs - where they think "Photoshop Magic" or "detailed icon sets" are the key and not solving the problem.

</comment><comment><USER3> Particularly up in the Bronx, there are still the wonderful serifed mosaics that the author mentions only in passing, and that to me speak more on the enduring New York: <http://www.flickr.com/photos/70323761@N00/192331109>

</comment><comment><USER4> Very nice article, good overview of the planning and design process.

</comment><comment><USER5> There something ironic about the web page using Arial as main font.

<comment><USER6> If you're not a designer, this will clue you in to the joke: <http://www.specialops.co.nz/blog/arial-vs-helvetica/>

<comment><USER7> The nice comparison chart there shows that, for the purposes of signage, the difference is _academic_. The sign for the G train set in Arial or Helvetica will make no difference for riders. Or "Exit" in Arial or Helvetica... no perceptible difference.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> here's the original article the book this is a review of is an expansion of: [http://www.aiga.org/content.cfm/the-mostly-true-story-of- hel...](http://www.aiga.org/content.cfm/the-mostly-true-story-of-helvetica- and-the-new-york-city-subway)

</comment><comment><USER9> The unpainted art-deco shiny metal sides of NY subways is probably more iconic/emblematic.</comment>


Make your site Mobile: Run a Nexus S or Xoom tablet right on your PC. - <AUTHOR> http://buildcontext.com/blog/2011/android-browser-emulator-windows-7-nexus-s-xoom-tablet

<comment><USER2> For anyone that didn't figure it out from the title, you run the official Android emulator and select 3.0. Not a big surprise.</comment>


Tesla CEO Elon Musk's Peculiar Conduct Rattles Wall Street - <AUTHOR> https://www.thestar.com/business/tech_news/2018/05/04/tesla-ceo-elon-musks-peculiar-conduct-rattle-wall-street.html <comment><USER2> After I heard about this, I couldn't help but think about Zuckerberg saying these responses during his hearing.

</comment><comment> a-fried-egg Musk is an engineer. I see no issue with what he said.</comment>


The Only Thing That Can Stop This Asteroid is Your Liberal Arts Degree - <AUTHOR> http://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/the-only-thing-that-can-stop-this-asteroid-is-your-liberal-arts-degree

<comment><USER2> Odd this should turn up the day that Andrew Delbanco is on the Diane Rehm show.

<comment><AUTHOR> Huh, don't recognize either names. Coincidence!</comment></comment>


IoT needs APIs, and APIs need ecosystems - <AUTHOR> http://diginomica.com/2015/12/18/the-iot-needs-apis-and-apis-need-ecosystems-says-anypresence/ <comment><USER2> More than that, "IoT" needs a reason to exist which is more compelling than "microprocessors are now cheap enough to embed everywhere".</comment>


California cops use decoy to catch whoever is shooting at Apple and Google buses - <AUTHOR> https://finance.yahoo.com/news/california-cops-using-decoy-bus-232719647.html <comment> murph-almighty Doesn't putting that on blast defeat the purpose of doing this?

<comment><USER2> Putting under covers inside the bus does little to stop this. If the person keeps things random then it'll be difficult to catch them. Pellet guns can be made damn silent.

It's more than likely a scare tactic to get the person to stop doing it.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Initial release of Octopass to manage linux users with GitHub org/team - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/linyows/octopass <comment><USER2> The title might suggest to someone that this is a project produced by Github. Since it isn't, it might be worth editing the title.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's right. I tried to fix it now, is it ok?

<comment><USER2> Awesome. I didn't want to read the rants that were likely when people skimmed the link.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Looks useful for managing account on GitHub.

</comment><comment><USER4> looks awesome!</comment>


Markdown-in-js: inline Markdown for React and JSX - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/threepointone/markdown-in-js <comment><USER2> This is a great illustration why using random babel plugins you find on the internet is super dangerous.

This works because it _assumes_ you have named your local identifier either `markdown` or `md` and are using that. If you want to use something else you need to specify a custom pragma: [https://github.com/threepointone/markdown- in-js#pragma](https://github.com/threepointone/markdown-in-js#pragma). And that feature didn't exist until 6 hours ago.

Why is this dangerous? Let's imagine you use `markdown` and you chug along for another 5 months on this project and you need to use `mdown` in some file, or maybe a coworker uses `mdown` because why not? So it doesn't work. And you're confused. And you spend hours trying to figure out why your app is broke.

People need to realize that by using a bunch AST transforms you are creating your own one-off language, and one that has no _visual indicator_ that this is different in any way. It's just a tagged template literal, right? Stick to babel plugins for official language features that at least have a chance of becoming part of JavaScript. This thing is going to stop working as soon as the developer loses interest, and then you're going to be stuck with your Frankenstein language no one can understand.

<comment><USER3> Here's a PR that fixes this issue - [https://github.com/threepointone/markdown-in- js/pull/2](https://github.com/threepointone/markdown-in-js/pull/2)

<comment><USER2> Note that local identifiers (such as vars) mask the import identifier so it will be easy to create a false positive.

<comment><USER4> It seems like you're looking to find something to complain about. Yes, you generally have to be careful about variable collisions. That is in no way specific to this module and, frankly, is something any competent programmer should be aware of.

<comment><USER2> It is specific to this project, in that it will rewrite your code to mean something other than what you intended it to mean.

I'm not being critical of this project, I'm being critical of the all too common practice these days of installing a dozen or more Babel plugins to fix every problem that exists, and thus creating your own one-off language that will be unreadable in 6 months.

Babel has become the new hammer in front-end development. Everything looks like a nail.

<comment><USER4> I really don't see where you're getting that from. How on earth does it "rewrite your code to mean something other than what you intended it to mean?" I explicitly included the "markdown" identifier. What on earth could I have meant otherwise?

How is:

       import markdown from 'markdown-in-js';

       const MyMarkdown = markdown`#Headline`;

any less clear than:

       import markdown from 'markdown-function-tool';

       const MyMarkdown = markdown('#Headline');

It's totally explicit and actually allows compile-time validation. I really don't understand your objection.

This will not be "unreadable in 6 months" any more than JSX or GraphQL are. Since I have plenty of projects that are over 6 months old using those techniques, I'm quite confident they work fine. It's not like there's any magic or implicit references going on.

<comment><USER2> Because if you do:

       import markdown from 'markdown-in-js';

       var markdown = function() { }

       var foo = markdown` #Header ... `;

It will incorrectly rewrite this template literal. And while they could potentially fill this hole, it doesn't change the fact this is unreadable code; there's nothing from the code that signifies it will be converted into some function calls the way that JSX or GraphQL at least have some visual signifiers.

JSX and GraphQL, I'm not a fan of either, but are at least real projects with standards texts written for. This is _not_ a criticism of this project, but the practice of installing a bunch of AST transforms to save you a couple of keystrokes creates code that reads as 1 thing, but compiles to something much different.

If you don't recognize how changing your code to mean something different based on an AST is essentially creating a one-off language, I don't know how to help you.

<comment><USER4> > It will incorrectly rewrite this template literal.

That is a bug and should be fixed.

I'm not sure what visual signifiers that GraphQL has which this doesn't.

It's a fairly clear pattern of what's going on. I really don't see what is "unreadable" about it.

<comment><USER2> It's a leaky abstraction. The point is to make your code do something other than what you described it as doing (because it will do it "better"). That's what makes it unreadable; hiding behavior from code decreases readability.

I'm not that familiar with GraphQL, but as far as I can tell it doesn't depend on AST transforms. It seems to be a DSL that uses tagged templates. There's nothing wrong with DSLs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Hi folks, author here. I wrote this for myself for a docs site I'm building, and didn't want to ship a markdown parser to the browser. It's mostly for aesthetics, without sacrificing performance. Custom components for primitives are a nice addition, especially for styling.

I don't know whether it's a good idea, but I like it so far.

<comment><USER6> I'm pretty happy to see it... IMHO, this is actually a great value add for React, as when typing longer text, I'd rather use MD more often than not... I wish that common markdown was closer to gfm, but to each their own. Still a nice thing to have.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Maybe a stupid Q - i assume there is a good reason - most likely related to syntax clash…

Why is this not a component?

as in:

<Markdown> Text </Markdown>

<comment><USER8> Looks like it's advertised as "zero-overhead", i.e. it gets compiled by Babel at build time. Not sure it would make a big difference for most apps though.

I think more importantly it allows you to use JSX inside of your Markdown, and use custom React components in place of normal HTML elements that Markdown would normally emit.

I like the idea of a <Markdown> component though.

<comment><USER9> i am not really into this stuff, but would this be a good use for [http://webcomponents.org](http://webcomponents.org)?

<comment><USER10> It would not be hard to create a web component that translates markdown at runtime; there are probably a few in there already. But that's a very different use-case than transpilation.

Personally, I don't see much need for handling this at compile-time, but it is what it is, and runtime rendering is a different thing entirely.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I'm all for pushing the boundaries of syntax with Babel, but frankly this looks horrible. Is there an appealing reason to use this? I could see it being interesting to render Markdown (like from a CMS) at runtime, but at compile time there's not much benefit over JSX right?

<comment><USER12> It could be very useful for docs sites, blogs, coding books. Anything where ease-of-authoring is the highest priority. You could maintain it in markdown but also inject your custom components for examples or bits of interactivity.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Slightly related, I wrote some basic JS a while back to convert a page full of markdown into HTML client side, without locking up the client:

Original - [http://coffeespace.org.uk/loader- orig.js](http://coffeespace.org.uk/loader-orig.js) Minified - [http://coffeespace.org.uk/loader.js](http://coffeespace.org.uk/loader.js)

Why? I don't know, it seemed like a great idea at the time to get my clients doing all the heavy lifting. Page download times are typically less than all other pages given how rich the content is.

</comment><comment><USER14> I made something similar: [https://www.npmjs.com/package/markdown-to- jsx](https://www.npmjs.com/package/markdown-to-jsx)

</comment><comment><USER15> Is there a demo?</comment>


Which replacement for Heroku in east coast US? - <AUTHOR> Hi everyone,
we're using Heroku and honestly, it's a constant mess. We're bumping into Heroku's 1 GB RAM per dyno limit many times per day and when we had serious database performance issues, the Heroku support just denied the problem for a few days before moving us to a new instance, which magically fixed all the issues.
I know that Heroku offers instances with more RAM, but 14 GB at $500 just seems ridiculous to me.
In Germany, I'd just use two managed hetzner.de servers, but I need something with low latency to the area around Boston, US.
In detail, I need:
1 PostgreSQL DB with ~16 GB storage and 4 GB RAM cache
1-2 Core i7 Quad-Cores with 32 GB RAM for Ruby on Rails hosting with Nginx proxy
I'm only interested in managed services, where they'll do the OS updates and reboots on their own, without me having to get up at night. And it should be less than $700 per month for the DB and the RoR hosting.
Can you suggest any provider? <comment><USER2> Hmm, I'm curious to see how you're reaching the 1GB limit per dyno. How many web workers do you have per dyno?

I worked on a pretty heavy monolithic rails app that was able to run 3-4 unicorn workers per heroku 512mb dyno.

I'd highly suggest you use newrelic and try to analyze how much memory each worker is consuming and how that exceeds the total dyno 1GB limit. Make sure you look at the peak consumption per worker in new relic. Otherwise you might run into a problem where workers are killed after exceeding the total dyno memory limit. You want to tweak the number of unicorn workers based on their total memory consumption at peak times, and find the optimal number of workers that can fit in a 1GB heroku dyno.

Having said that, heroku does get expensive as you scale up. You'd be better off managing your own servers, but that requires a good chunk of time to setup properly.

A few things I did in order to bring the slug size down for heroku dynos was to move all assets to AWS s3/cloudfront. Minify all CSS and JS, use carrierwave gem to upload to s3 bucket, and serve with cloudfront. Getting all of your static assets out of your slug will greatly reduce memory usage.

Also, I want to point out that you can setup your own database with AWS, and just point it in your env vars for heroku. You don't have to buy all the services from heroku and get charged extra $$.</comment>


Javascript Cryptography Considered Harmful - <AUTHOR> http://www.matasano.com/articles/javascript-cryptography

<comment><USER2> Yes, delivering JS crypto over the pipes is dangerous. But surely, bundling the code as a browser extension (such that you download and install it once and from then on it's loading everything locally) mitigates most of the issues apart from the memory clearing and perhaps timing?

This is how Cryptocat ([https://crypto.cat/](https://crypto.cat/)) does it.</comment>


Isis Casalduc, a Miss Universe Puerto Rico 2002 turned indie hacker - <AUTHOR> https://getmakerlog.com/stories/from-miss-universe-to-indie-hacker-with-isis-casalduc <comment><USER2> This is great! Though I'm not entirely sure why she's loitering around on the Google MTV campus in those pictures captioned San Francisco :/

<comment><USER3> > This is great! Though I'm not entirely sure why she's loitering around on > the Google MTV campus in those pictures captioned San Francisco :/

PR? I mean San Francisco evokes the thought of people's image of Silicon Valley (perhaps more so than the vast homeless situation and the vast economic divide that actually afflicts it) way more than if you say Mountain View, or Palo Alto for most people not in tech or in California for that matter. And quite frankly that's who this story appeals to: non-tech people.

I've seen plenty of very attractive woman (of all races) who joined SCCA sanctioned racing events via their school's Engineering program with a bunch of nerdy t-shirts. I heard one yell 'Leeroooooooooy Jenkins' in the pits at an autocross/drifting event back in 2005!

I also used to go to the 24-hour marathon Hackathons at CU Boulder and saw the same thing. Lots of them were from out state and country teams, too.

After 2013 or so the Bitcoin 'Blockchain' Industry got inundated by finance and bank brain-drains and it wasn't uncommon to see very attractive woman from the banking Industry get in the space.

How much they actually knew of the underlying tech, rather than some tired line about 'disrupting the financial products Industry' is another matter, but to be fair that's the case with most males, too. And these weren't just booth babes handing out schwag, but were actual employees. I still remember turning down the lone programmer at her booth handing me a 21 shirt because she couldn't/wouldn't tell me what tech they were working on at the Bitcoin Job Faire in Sunnyvale in 2015. I saw her later after Blaji's 'BUIDL' talk after the hackathon and we had a laugh about it.

But this really a fluff non-story, but welcomed given the depressing amount of news this year so far, and while I'm not saying tech is a 50/50 equal ratio of male-female. I'm not really buying the narrative of this being some unicorn either. I guess the notable thing being she still spent most of her Life, and likely lots of her family's money, in that pageant circuit and can now try and make it back programming?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I love stories about people who got into tech along an uncommon path.

</comment><comment><USER5> >I also happen to be quite geeky and nerdy. Which is probably something most people don't expect when they think of a beauty queen.

It's 2020. There are now lots of attractive women who are geeky and nerdy. Just look at the cosplay industry. Or, ahem, Twitch.

It's not the 90s or early 2000s anymore. There's nothing exceptional or noteworthy about a beauty queen or lingerie model or whoever who likes anime, or board games, or manga, or programming, or gaming on a desktop.

People (of both genders) used to be looked down on for liking these things, but that hasn't been the case for over a decade. They're cool now.

<comment><USER6> I'd say its still exceptional and noteworthy. When you think "beauty queen" is a word you associate with them "anime" or "programming?"

Norms and culture are certainly shifting but there still exists a lot of prejudice against nerd culture AND gatekeeping within nerd culture.

Anecdotally I know a few women who have switched into tech in the last few years. They all talk about how they never even knew it was a viable path for someone like them. (And "someone like them" means "normal" young woman.)

<comment> cadence- There aren't that many beauty queens out there. So anything they do outside of being a beauty queen will seem exceptional.

<comment><USER7> Exactly this. The number of exceptionally beautiful people (using whatever standard of beauty your culture defines) is limited in nearly every field except for acting. It's just not common, regardless of industry.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> cadence- I think words like "geeky" and "nerdy" lost their true meaning in the last decade. It's now more about image and fashion. Anybody who writes a simple website is now called geeky or nerdy.

It's especially abused to describe pretty girls, since many guys figured out that calling a girl nerdy or geeky increases their chances of getting in her pants.

</comment><comment><USER8> She was never Miss Universe. She won the national Puerto Rico Miss Universe contest, and in the international Miss Universe competition she won two minor prices. (most photogenic and best dress) She's also not that exceptionally looking, guess her geekness shows.

<comment><USER9> > She's also not that exceptionally looking, guess her geekness shows.

At this point I'm not even sure if it's an American thing (ugly nerds vs popular cheerleaders) or just plain sexist (a woman can't be both attractive and smart).

<comment><USER8> Of course people can be both very attractive and very smart, but statistics. Both are uncorrelated, and thereby having both properties is very rare.

<comment><USER9> I agree, that's fair. But "her geekness shows" means something completely different.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


YouTube Moves API Discussions/Support To Stack Overflow From Google Groups  - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2012/09/14/youtube-moves-api-discussions-and-support-to-stack-overflow-ditches-google-groups/

<comment><USER2> Well google's guava library[1] has been on stackoverflow.com for a while and they encourage users to post question in stackoverflow rather than posing it to the google group[2].

"To get help on a specific question or problem, post a question to Stack Overflow with the tag "guava". We monitor these questions using this RSS feed.)"

1\. <https://code.google.com/p/guava-libraries/> 2\. <https://groups.google.com/group/guava-discuss/>

<comment><USER3> App Engine as well:

<https://groups.google.com/group/google-appengine/>

[https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/google-a...](https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/google- appengine/sEffmCyAKx0)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> is there any kind of financial agreement behind this kind of thing? are google paying something to stack overflow to compensate for the extra load, or are s.o. happy to have the extra traffic / eyeballs? maybe they are going to be a sponsor or whatever it is that gets an icon displayed? and if it's "free" is there discussion beforehand, or it is just assumed that s.o. will handle things?

not trying to imply anything, just curious how shifts like this, which could be significant in terms of extra load, are arranged.

</comment><comment><USER5> Android, Google Maps API are in Stack Overflow too.

Google Groups is not really suited for discussions involving code.

Glad Google realizes that.

</comment><comment><USER6> The headline is a tad inaccurate considering "discussions" don't really take place on Stack Overflow. In fact, I'd say that's one of the main motivators for a change like this; A more structured Q/A instead of wading through mounds of discussions.

</comment><comment><USER7> I know this hardly spurs discussion, but god I hate google groups.

<comment><USER8> Then why post it? It's not in the commenting spirit of Hacker News.</comment></comment>


Google Buzz is brilliant, Facebook just lost half its value - <AUTHOR> http://calacanis.com/2010/02/10/breaking-google-buzz-is-brilliant-facebook-just-lost-half-its-value/ <comment><USER3> God I feel like I'm being trolled here, but I'll bite.

Let's assume Google Buzz is undeniably better than Facebook.

Let's also assume no one is really invested in the 90% of Facebook functionality that Google Buzz doesn't address.

Hell, let's assume any user who tries Google Buzz will instantly declare eternal allegiance to Larry and Sergey and immediately delete their Facebook account.

Even with all those dramatically dubious flamebait claims, how the hell is Google going to get everyone to try Buzz. Since when do better products automatically win in the tech marketplace? If Calacanis is going for pageviews then I say well-played, but if he actually believes this tripe then he's dumber than he is arrogant.

<comment><USER4> Look at the sick amount on activity on this thread.... and this is day one of Buzz.

<http://bit.ly/daBl66>

100+ people like it. ~200 comments from quality people.

This is game over for Facebook for everyone who doesn't play Farmville.

I've never seen pickup like that, and that is with just 2,000 followers.

I have 25k followers on my fanpage on Facebook and 5k on my normal facebook page.

in fact, i've never seen pickup like that on my blog with 250k uniques a month.

the only thing close to that i've seen is Twitter, but those responses are limited to the 90k followers i have and 140 characters each.

Also, it's not just this thread... scoble is having the same experience: more activity than ever.

it's a targeted network: people you've spoken to + 100% reach for your comments with that network since they HAVE TO go to their inbox.

this really is unprecedented: the reach of email with the power of social networking.

<comment><USER3> _Look at the sick amount on activity on this thread.... and this is day one of Buzz._

Right. The day when every bored geek in the valley gives it a spin.

Mark my words, a year from today Facebook will be in no weaker position than it is today, and Buzz may or may not be relevant, but it certainly won't be dwarfing Facebook—not by a long shot. If you disagree name your metrics, and I'll do a writeup a year from today and whore it up here on Hacker News.

Typically I don't consider you to be as much of a koolaid-drinker as Scoble, but man you really went off the deep-end this time.

<comment><USER4> you're comparing me to scoble?!?!?! i think i'm going to go jump off a bridge.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> i wish there was a way to send calacanis a virtual slap in the face for this one. So wrong.

To answer his questions:

1\. Have you used Google Buzz? Yes, I think I'm perceived as a target user. Tried it, quit it. 2\. How is Google Buzz better than Facebook? It's not. 3\. What advantages does Google Buzz have over Facebook? That it lives in Gmail, but that's still not compelling. 4\. What advantages does Facebook have over Google? My friends/social graph algorithms/news feed 5\. Did you see this coming? Sure, why wouldn't Google try this. They have 20,000 employees. This maybe took 5 weeks and 3 dev guys to hack up. 6\. What do you attribute Google's recent string of AMAZING products including: Chrome, Android, Nexus One and Buzz? Nexus One has a nice screen resolution. That's about the only good thing.

<comment><USER6> I dunno, I feel like you're being a bit overly critical here. In my mind, Buzz isn't competing with Facebook, it's competing with Twitter. Buzz is Twitter for the masses. And personally, I know that due to Gmail integration, I'm going to be using it - unlike Twitter or Facebook.

People seem to _want_ Buzz to fail for some reason. I feel like people saw Wave, decided "Oh, Google failed, they can't possibly make a new product right", and are now trying to pin that on Buzz too.

Anyway, I'm using it, as are a bunch of my friends. People are already using it in my social friend graph, and enthusiastically, too - which is much more than could be said for Wave. I'm not saying it's going to be a huge success, but I think it's silly to just brush it off as crap so quickly.

<comment><USER7> > I know that due to Gmail integration, I'm going to be using it - <USER2> > Twitter or Facebook.

Funny - due to gmail integration, I'll never use it.

It feels to me like an issue of kool-aid. If you accept the assertion that everyone uses gmail, and that everyone loves the gmail interface, and that people keep gmail open all day (or at least check it fairly often), then Google Buzz seems like a great idea - a social network tied into all the services you use every day.

It breaks down when you start breaking those assertions. If you're not in Gmail every day (e.g. if you use an IMAP client), or if you don't like the interface (but you have to use it, e.g. Google Apps), or if you don't use gmail at all, then Google Buzz becomes a huge hassle to use.

I'd love to love Buzz, because I like awesome things, but it seems to me that the Buzz team just assumes everyone loves Gmail as much as Google does, and that's not going to pan out. They might think Buzz will be a draw to Gmail, but in reality Gmail will be a barrier to Buzz.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> It's the users. Facebook's value isn't going to vary any unless there is some migration from Facebook to Buzz.

What exactly does Buzz offer that Facebook doesn't? What kind of recognition will it have?

This is all very interesting, but it's _far_ too early for this kind of hyperbole.

<comment><USER9> _Facebook's value isn't going to vary any unless there is some migration from Facebook to Buzz._

It has been done before. Do you remember Prodigy? CompuServe? AOL? MySpace?

For that matter, how often do you use the search engines Excite, Lycos, AltaVista, or whatever Microsoft's search engine was before Bing?

Users go where the user experience is pleasant. Advertisers look for click- throughs, and try to estimate eyeball-minutes for the major sites, and Google has a fair chance of beating Facebook with Buzz. Not overnight, but steadily. Many of my Facebook friends haven't seen the Google Buzz roll-out yet, but they have seen the new Facebook homepage roll-out, and they don't like it.

AFTER EDIT: And it occurs to me that Calacanis's main statement, that Facebook lost value, is hard to test while Facebook is not publicly traded. But Google's value is easy to track in the stock market. If this move looks stupid to Google investors, their behavior will show that.

<comment><USER10> The cost of leaving facebook is higher than it was for leaving any of those other platforms. People have their social graphs well-established on Facebook now. Not a bad guess at their desired graph, as Buzz provides, but a graph they've shaped themselves over the course of a year or more.

Me-too or even evolutionary won't cut it for draining Facebook of its users. It's got to provide signficantly more value immediately upon signing up. So far, it doesn't.

<comment><USER11> I think you have to think of this utility in terms of how the two social graphs are different.

The Facebook social graph is established by people you meet in person and who decide later to send you a friend invite, or people you knew at some point who saw your picture on someone else's friends list. The strength of the connection is determined by Facebook based on how often you interact with or stalk that person.

The Gmail social graph is people you actually communicate with, and is more dynamic in the sense that you probably communicate with more people on a day- to-day basis then you interact/stalk with on Fb.

The question is, which of these makes for a more relevant following system, and for what kind of user?

Perhaps one way to think of it is that people who are all about sharing pictures will prefer Fb, but those who are all about sharing ideas will prefer Buzz. Which target demographic has more income?

<comment><USER12> That's an interesting way of looking at it, but you're still talking about "preference" of one over the other. Unless there's a new tool out there that can integrate everything for me, (even if I prefer FB/Buzz/Twitter/etc.) I'll still probably use all of them for those precise separate reasons.

I think it'd be interesting to see how many NEW social network users Buzz will bring in, just because of the simple fact that it makes setting up a brand new network easy as pie (vs FB and having to build up to a nice little community of friends).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I've tried Buzz, and it doesn't look like anything special to me. Google are going to need to do more work if they're hoping to take on the likes of Facebook with this.

</comment><comment><USER14> Is Calacanis really this much of an idiot?

<comment><USER15> apparently, yes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Perhaps Buzz will prove to have enduring value, but so far my experience is like this: I'm 'following' people I never followed, some of whom I don't even know but who I apparently emailed at some point; and they're clogging up my Google Reader feeds to boot. It sure seems like Google doesn't understand social behavior very well...

I may be wrong about Buzz, but my first impression was not good.

</comment><comment><USER17> I think Buzz's most fatal flaw is that it relies to heavily on Gmail. Anybody who hasn't used gmail until now will probably not start using Buzz.

Another thing (but that's very imho) is that Google applications still look and feel like Excel. They are certainly very good, but also feel like work.

</comment><comment><USER18> Facebook has lock-in. I don't think most Facebook users jump from app to app that quickly.

<comment><USER19> myspace also had lock in.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> When you're trying to displace a competitor that has a complete hold on the market, it's not enough to have something with a few added features (mathematically expressed as x + 1), you need to have a revolutionary product (x^2).

</comment><comment><USER21> Currently the only advantage Google Buzz has over Facebook is it lives in Gmail.

<comment><USER22> and integrates nicely with Reader.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Why the hell does anyone still read anything that this guy writes. More often than not he's full of shit. Why risk your time trying to figure out which is the case for any single piece of his writing.

<comment><USER12> It spurs interesting debate when someone puts a strong stake in the ground. I mean, look at this thread :)

<comment><USER23> He's just following the formula for getting attention. 1. Watch for some news trend 2. Write an inflammatory post 3. Get more followers on Twitter

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Am I the only one who saw the URL and didn't bother to read the article?

</comment><comment><USER25> I use "Flock" to handle all of my Gmail and social networking needs.as well as for a host of other net trolling and data mining tasks...can get a bit cluttered though So why do I want to learn all the new BUZZ particulars ..imho google's a day late and a buck short.... who am I kidding I'll try it when I get bored w/ FLOCK...

</comment><comment><USER26> I hate FaceBook. It's like living in a college dorm. Without the intellectual bits.</comment>


Ask HN: Basic corporate presence website? - <AUTHOR> What's a simple choice for someone who's technical in non-web areas but doesn't want to learn CSS and the rest of it, and certainly not about visual design, to make a minimal corporate presence website that looks "legit."  Presumably some CMS and templates with graphics?  Doesn't have to be completely free... <comment><USER2> Wix, Weebly, Squarespace if you want simple and quick to get going.

If you want to get a little more technical you could find a host (i.e. DigitalOcean, Linode, etc) and install WordPress on a minimal VPS. Either find a free theme or pay for a premium theme.

<comment><USER3> If you want a no-fuss Wordpress install, I'd look at using [http://oasis.sandstorm.io](http://oasis.sandstorm.io) \- There are some caveats but it's pretty straight forward and easy. You can always migrate away if it doesn't work for you. The upside is that its a lot more secure than managing your own server / wordpress install.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> www.wix.com

also, might search under bootstrap themes. you can get someone pretty cheap on upwork.com to modify the theme for you. $20-$40 range..</comment>


Intel Xe GPU - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Xe <comment><AUTHOR> More details in this article: [https://www.tomshardware.com/news/intel-xe- graphics-all-we-k...](https://www.tomshardware.com/news/intel-xe-graphics-all- we-know)

TLDR: Intel plan to release a new GPU this year, possibly competing on the desktop space</comment>


The 100x Engineer - <AUTHOR> http://100x.engineering <comment><USER2> Worth reading. This is not some sort of claim of "wow I am Jeff Dean the 100x engineer". Rather it is a discussion of the myths of 10x engineers, and how to actually think about contributing productivity at a high level.

</comment><comment><USER3> As a Sidenote:

      Microsoft Applications: "[...] and 0.5 defect per KLOC  [...] in released product (Moore 1992)."

It might just be me, but I somehow have the feeling that hasn't been true for a loooong time.

Edit: Also, I somehow have the feeling that the quote about defects per KLOC isn't really helping.

From what I see regularly, the business side of things is almost never interested in the "0 defects per .5 MLOC" of the last part, especially if you're considering what the implications must be for the amount of time it takes to produce that level of quality (even more so if you assume some form of waterfall development, as it's attributed to 1990).

I really like what the author is saying after that (because he focuses on much more important factors) but that only makes this specific quote seem more misplaced to me.

</comment><comment><USER4> Is the author implying that he himself is a "100x Engineer"?

<comment><USER5> No, he's just outlining some desiderata for effective organizational behavior for engineers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I couldn't take the article seriously due to the absolute idiocy of the term '100x Engineer.'

<comment><USER7> When a term seems silly to me I replace it with cauliflower and proceed. After all, language is all arbitrary.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: More examples of positive news in the world today? - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20190111-seven-reasons-why-the-world-is-improving is one example. <comment><USER2> I love my job and I'm happy with my life right now and my garden is producing giant tomatoes which I'm about to pair with some delicious bacon, lettuce and mayo on some sourdough while I sit in the porch with the fan on. So there's that.

</comment><comment><USER3> [https://www.notdepressing.com/](https://www.notdepressing.com/) and filter for positive/science

</comment><comment><USER4> [https://www.iheart.com/content/2019-08-22-eight-year-old- tak...](https://www.iheart.com/content/2019-08-22-eight-year-old-takes- parents-car-on-86-mph-joyride-on-the-autobahn/)

Probably more specific than you want, the story of an eight year old who took his parent's car for a spin. He eventually felt uncomfortable, pulled over, put on his flashers, _and put out a safety triangle_.

My man, my little driver man.

</comment><comment><USER5> Self promotion here. I run a facebook page for "positive stories, humanity and love".

[https://www.facebook.com/PositiveStoriesHumanityLove](https://www.facebook.com/PositiveStoriesHumanityLove)

</comment><comment><USER6> I visit this site when I have had enough of mainstream media,[https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/](https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/)

</comment><comment><USER7> Max Roser at Oxford is doing some good work with "Our World in Data".

</comment><comment><USER8> Reddit's upliftingnews subreddit usually has some feel good stories.</comment>


Nicaragua Congress approves ocean-to-ocean canal plan - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-22899744 <comment><USER2> This is a big deal as it continues the global investments by China, which should not be scary, but viewed as the global infrastructure investments that the US used to make, but is being pushed aside. I also think this says a lot about the progressive states being developed in Central & South America (Argentina, Nicaragua, Venezuela) and how they have prospered after having been less of a focus of US foreign policy post 9/11

This is likely to be much larger than the Panama Canal, which may be unable to hold the larger tanker ships that are becoming the norm in global shipping, so it really may be a necessity.</comment>