Paris Will Create the City's Largest Gardens Around the Eiffel Tower - <AUTHOR> https://www.citylab.com/design/2019/05/eiffel-tower-garden-paris-metro-design-history-car-free/589993/ <comment><USER2> I'm continually impressed by the efforts of Parisian politicians to improve their cityscape. (Aside from this, see their removal of motor traffic along the Seine [1] and tightening restrictions on polluting cars [2].) It speaks very well to their fiscal management too that they're able to fund the project through ticket sales, and don't need to levy any new taxes or bonds.

Being a North American resident, it really makes me wonder what it would take to build political will for these types of projects on this side of the ocean. In San Francisco, closing even one part of one street to auto traffic is something that seems to be impossible — even for projects that _should_ be relatively uncontentious like closing some of the highways through Golden Gate Park, making the most pedestrian heavy parts of famous streets like Haight, Castro, or Lombard pedestrian-only, or taking private cars off Market Street. And quite sadly, SF is considered to be a walking-friendly city relative to others on the continent.

It's nice that someone is acting as a guiding light for the rest of the world, especially when it's a city of Paris' fame/importance.

\---

[1] [https://www.citylab.com/solutions/2016/09/paris-seine-car- pe...](https://www.citylab.com/solutions/2016/09/paris-seine-car-pedestrians- quay-ban/501788/)

[2] [https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2016/05/paris-is- bann...](https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2016/05/paris-is-banning-cars- built-before-1997/484895/)

<comment><USER3> London is so much more well kept than Paris for some reason. I went to Paris last year and the city was terrifyingly dirty, with layers of dirt struck on the walls of beautiful buildings, darkened by it. Stuff under construction was also mismanaged and often just poorly done. Scaffolding was very poorly done all around the city. After midnight I felt quite unsafe even in good neighbourhoods. I feel like London as a city is way better kept than Paris

<comment><USER4> "Terrifyingly dirty"? The simple way they clean the gutters with the fountains on the corners is amazing to me as an American.

Layers of dirt on beautiful buildings? They're several hundred years old.

Felt quite unsafe even in good neighborhoods? I spent all last week there, on foot, at all hours alone and never once felt unsafe. It occurs to me now that maybe that's my male privilege so apologies if that's not the case for you but Paris is the greatest city in the world as far as I'm concerned.

<comment><USER5> > "Terrifyingly dirty"? The simple way they clean the gutters with the > fountains on the corners is amazing to me as an American.

As a Parisian, I can sadly attest that the city is currently disgustingly dirty, that it has been getting worse and worse in the five years since I moved there and that London is indeed a lot cleaner.

Paris suffers from a lot of incivilities, very lax policing, the current mayor puting cleanliness as a non priority and extremely poor supervision of the existing cleaning crews.

It has become such a pain point for Parisian that cleanliness is likely to be the main issue of next year electoral campaign.

<comment><USER6> I will never forget when I visited Paris as a tourist and in the green patches of grass in front of the Eiffel tower where everyone sets down their blankets and takes selfies is littered with Heineken bottle caps and cigarette butts, it was so uniformly covered in the things that I took a picture of it to remind me. I sort of got that Heineken and smokes are super popular there (at least amongst the touristy areas) but still.

May be the non-touristy areas are also considered dirty by you, but I'm an American, where we treat public places like shit but make sure interiors and the entrances near parking is pretty and the rest of the fucking street is trash since no one other than me apparently walk it. To me, the "grime" I see seems normal if not a little nicer than any city in Ohio.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> There is something to be said about the democratic process that brought us to this: the Paris administrative division is home to a little over 2 million people, but the city doesn't really end at its administrative borders (75 in this [0] map. The city border stopped tracking the city growth 150 years ago [1].

Most of the people who live in Paris proper enjoy the metro, multiple bike sharing and electrical scooter options, those who can't afford to live within city borders (which outnumber the Parisians 5-to-1) are forced to use the RER (light railway) or private cars.

The effects of the policies that reduce private traffic in the city proper extend far beyond the administrative borders, and the 2016 decision to ban cars from parts of the Seine banks has increased traffic dramatically outside of Paris, but damaging only people who don't vote for the mayor of Paris.

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm all for a reduction in private vehicle use, but I think that a solution can only be found by integrating the whole region in a single administrative division and eliminating this notion of first and second class citizens of Paris.

[0] [https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f0/Paris_uu...](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f0/Paris_uu_ua_jms.png)

[1] [https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1b/Paris_Hi...](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1b/Paris_Historical_Population.png)

<comment><USER8> > RER (light railway)

RER is heavy rail - Ligne A's trunk shifts 50k pax/hour each direction. With, among other efforts, the extended Ligne E and Ligne 14, there are serious network upgrades on the way to meet the challenge.

Indeed the only people angry at how Paris is taking back public space from cars are those who insist on taking a personal car into Paris, which is puzzling stubbornness where there are so many other options.

I live in Courbevoie, outside Paris and cycle there daily - I couldn't be happier and I don't feel second class at all. Placemaking is the future: cities are living places, not car sinks.

<comment><USER9> Considering the traffic jams we have around Paris, I'd say the people who take their personal car don't have a choice, with poor/no public transportation on their commute.

<comment><USER10> Well if you believe this: [https://www.paris.fr/actualites/a-paris- seuls-22-des-conduct...](https://www.paris.fr/actualites/a-paris-seuls-22-des- conducteurs-ont-reellement-besoin-d-un-vehicule-3876)

Then most people who drive in Paris 1. don't need to ( _according to those drivers asked_ , 72% didn't really "need" to drive) 2. are not poor people (64% CSP+) 3. aren't driving for work (20% were professionals - that's mostly an answer to the sibling comment to yours though) 4. drive within Paris rather than from the periphery (50%)

Now, that study was made by the city of Paris so maybe it's biased, but I'm pretty sure there is some truth in it.

<comment><USER9> The study was also done on a small number of people (1127) on a very small area right in the middle of Paris and is 4 years old; of the people studied half of them were delivery drivers, reducing further the amount of data.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This looks like a great idea. I think we deperately need to green our cities as much as we can. We need to make them as healthy and pleasant places to live as we can. I hope this is part of a trend.

One of the things that struck me when I visited Paris was what felt like a lack of green spaces that you could actually enjoy. I find London much more pleasant because there are so many more parks you could go to cool off.

I enjoyed my visit to Paris, but I didn't particulalry like most of the city itself, it was clogged with traffic and was stifflingly hot. I can understand why so many Parisians try to get away from the city during the summer. Most of it certainly didn't feel particularly "romantic".

One park we went to had "keep off the grass" signs everywhere, so everyone was crammed into one strip of grass. It wasn't like the off-limit parts were particulalry special or anything, just grass with a few poorly tended flower, it just seemed to be an attitude of "look but don't touch". It was hot, dry and dusty. The London parks on the other hand are much more inviting to me, often less formal, geared towards people actually spending time in them, having a picnic/BBQ or playing games. And with the congestion charging, the traffic does seem to have improved a lot.

Of couse, not being a Parisian I might have just missed all the hidden parks, but we tried hard to find pleasant places, but struggled.

<comment><USER12> > Of couse, not being a Parisian I might have just missed all the hidden parks

Probably not that much, you can pick it up through google maps: Paris has large parks & forests outside the city (boulogne, vincennes, meudon, …) but only a few very small parks within city limits (the largest green space is the Père-Lachaise cemetery), nothing like Regent's or Hyde's.

It's really flagrant using the satellite view at about the same zoom level (using the scale), it's as if london had no major park closer to city center than Hampstead (though both boulogne and vincennes are quite a bit larger than Hampstead, they're on the same scale as Richmond Park).

<comment><USER10> > _only a few very small parks within city limits (the largest green space is > the Père-Lachaise cemetery)_

It might be a detail, but the two large parks (Boulogne and Vincennes) are within the city limits.

Also I don't know London very well, but from Google Maps I see almost no greenery in the center, while Paris' parks are maybe smaller but much more evenly distributed throughout the city.

<comment><USER13> > I don't know London very well, but from Google Maps I see almost no greenery > in the center

Are you joking?

Regent's, Hyde, Kensington, Green, St James, Battersea, Burgess, Kennington, Coram's, Russel Square, Lincoln's Inn...

Look at all the green areas on the map.

[https://firstname.lastname@example.com,-0.1466301,14z](https://email@example.com,-0.1466301,14z)

<comment><USER10> You have to compare at the same scale though:

Paris: [https://email@example.com,2.3306852,14z](https://firstname.lastname@example.com,2.3306852,14z) / [https://email@example.com,2.3322563,12.75z](https://firstname.lastname@example.com,2.3322563,12.75z)

London: [https://email@example.com,-0.1466301,14z](https://email@example.com,-0.1466301,14z) / [https://firstname.lastname@example.com,-0.1436204,12.75z](https://email@example.com,-0.1436204,12.75z)

The parks in London just look larger and fewer, not very evenly distributed, to me.

<comment><USER13> London has over three times the green space of Paris.

[http://www.worldcitiescultureforum.com/data/of-public- green-...](http://www.worldcitiescultureforum.com/data/of-public-green-space- parks-and-gardens)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> From the last paragraph in the article "But perhaps the most striking element of the tower makeover is how it fits into a bigger story: the ongoing campaign to reclaim Paris from private motor vehicles" for some reason this randomly reminded me of a quote from Steve Jobs about the Segway when it launched predicting they would 'build cities around it' (ref: [http://www.cnn.com/2001/TECH/ptech/12/03/scooter.unveiling/T...](http://www.cnn.com/2001/TECH/ptech/12/03/scooter.unveiling/This) ) Large cities starting to ban cars in the city center might finally be that opportunity for Segway like devices to really flourish (not to mention powered and unpowered scooters, bicycles, skateboards, etc).

<comment><USER15> The Segway was the Apple Newton of it's time - the right idea but too early for all the pieces to be in place. I feel that all the dockless scooters and bikes that are becoming so popular (despite their controversy) have a good chance of remaking a lot of cities.

<comment><USER12> > The Segway was the Apple Newton of it's time - the right idea but too early > for all the pieces to be in place.

Not that great an idea though, because of its width low on the ground it's quite hostile to sharing space with others, much more so than a bike or a scooter.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Bit of a tip for anyone thinking of visiting Paris who is sad they won't get to go in Notre Dame, head up the hill from Montmartre to the Basillica Sacré- Cœur. While it's not as old or as well known, it was far more interesting to me. However that might just be because I've been to endless cathedrals/abbeys in the UK and so ND was just more of the same.

Sacré-Cœur is well worth the walk, and benefits from being up the hill, away from the traffic, and surrounded by greenery. Montmartre is definitely one of the nicer parts of Paris. I could have happily skipped most of the rest of the city, but MM was worth a wonder round.

<comment><USER16> Agreed - stayed in Montmartre last year and the area around Sacre-Coeur is a gem.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I wish them luck. The Eiffel Tower is quite a place to visit, and it's true that the road traffic in the area diminishes it. Paris has some very nice gardens already, but in such a built-up city it's surely a benefit if they can create one more. And while there always seems to be a great party atmosphere in the good viewing spots for the light show, making them less concrete and more park seems likely to improve that too.

Sadly, the area has also been diminished in recent years by all the security around the tower itself. While understandable given actual violence that has occurred there in the past, and even with efficient and professional security staff doing the checks, it can still feel like going into some sort of secure facility more than enjoying a world-famous landmark these days. If the redesign could also reduce the visual impact of the security measures, that would be a bonus.

<comment><USER18> You really don't find being pat down by a security officer of your own gender to contribute to a sense of romance and idealism??

<comment><USER17> I have never personally had a problem with the security staff at any visitor attraction in Paris. They have always been perfectly polite and professional, and the screening was generally far less intrusive and much quicker than the security theatre we see all too often elsewhere.

I just find it regrettable that the whole area around the base of the tower looks like a fortress these days. If they can move away from that feeling as part of this project, perhaps relocating essential access control measures underground as much as possible, that would be a pleasant improvement.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I love those plans. The Eiffel Tower is so splendid that I never realized until reading this article that I felt uneasy with the surrounding area. Bad feng shui or whatever. This brings the Tower's environment into better harmony with the structure itself.

</comment><comment><USER16> I visited Paris last year and had a lovely time. I think I'll definitely want to go back to visit this. It look s splendid

</comment><comment><USER20> Hopefully this park will be full of plants and grass rather than gravel like the other parks in Paris.

<comment><USER11> I don't know why you've been downvoted, but that is a spot on description. I found parks in Paris to be dusty and dry, and frankly not particularly pleasant.

Compared to having a picnic in London, Paris' parks seemed really not designed for enjoyment, they seemed to be more about walking around and looking.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> It's been a couple years, but when I was in Paris last, the area around the Eifel Tower was swarmed with pickpockets, people trying to sign you up for scammy petitions, and furtive junk souvenir sellers. Combined with the heavy paramilitary police presence, swaggering around with submachineguns, it wasn't very inviting.

<comment><USER6> This is literally any tourist attraction in any city. I agree it sucks but it comes with the terrain.

<comment><USER21> Out of cities I've been, Paris was far and away the worst. I don't see this in Berlin, or Amsterdam, or Boston, or Washington. It's the kind of scene I'd expect in the Caribbean.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> ITT: any comment criticising Paris getting downvoted.

<comment><USER22> I am french, I lived in Paris for 2 years, it was in the center and I never want to live there again.

<comment><USER11> I don't blame you. Not that I ever want to live in London, but central Paris just wasn't somewhere I'd ever even consider living in.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Aka "security".

</comment><comment><USER24> they should put up fruit and berry trees

</comment><comment><USER25> Paris actually used to be beautiful, now it is bland and boring without soul. Why did people rave about its beauty in the 1800s and early 1900s? Perhaps you'd be able to answer that question yourself if you looked up all the gorgeous buildings that used to exist in Paris and around the Eiffel Tower that are now nonexistent.

<comment><USER26> An often under reported fact about paris is that it lies in one of the ugliest regions of France. The 100 km radius around Paris is so stunningly depressing that Parisians end up going weekend trips to Normandy. "Au royaume des aveugles, le roi est borgne", as they say

<comment><USER27> It's "Au royaume des aveugles, les borgnes sont rois.".</comment></comment></comment>


To Get Boeing 737 Max Flying, Global Consensus Will Be Hard - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/23/business/boeing-737-max-faa-regulation.html <comment><USER2> At least half of the public wont even know they are on a max. Boeing still makes the 777 which is the safest aircraft of all time. With only one real crash at london due to an engine problem (not Boeing) and an intentional crash Malaysia 370. MCAS is frequently confused with a flight augmentation system which isn't true. It's designed to counteract a confused pilot and if you look at the history of the 737 NG some of the few crashes not from the vertical stabilizer issue are from disorientation leading to a stall. Now granted Boeing made serious mistakes in the implementation of MCAS (1 AoA sensor and not checking for disagreement is a cardinal rule they broke) but I believe that the plane will go on to be quite successful because this was a serious learning moment.

<comment><USER3> >MCAS is frequently confused with a flight augmentation system which isn't true. This is demonstrably false. MCAS is a system in the same vein as the MD-11's LSAS. In other words, a hack to ensure the the "piloting experience" of the MAX stays as similar as possible to that of the 737 NG, despite the fact the NG doesn't suffer from directional pitch instability at high AoA.

>It's designed to counteract a confused pilot and if you look at the history of the 737 NG some of the few crashes not from the vertical stabilizer issue are from disorientation leading to a stall.

If pilots are so prone to stalling in an aircraft with no pitch instability near critical AoA, it seems disingenuous to try to pitch the MAX with MCAS as being "more safe" when the possibility exists that MCAS may need to be disabled in flight; thereby resulting in the same pilot, in what is touted as "the same piloting experience" as the NG, yet with the spectre of pitch instability at high AoA, exacerbated by a tendency to pitch up even more if power is added on at landing speeds if a go-around is required; that wasn't there before. It is less-than-or-equal in terms of safety.

Will it be an effective plane? Yes. Will dealing with MCAS be seared into pilots' minds? Yes.

Let's not misrepresent the machine though. It has issues. Issues that are at the center of a regulatory and business clusterf*ck that never should have happened. The poor engineering and business decisions created a plane with potentially lethal failure modes, that were unsuccessfully communicated to customer (airline) and operator(pilot) alike.

The MAX may be able to operate for the rest of it's relevant operational lifetime, but it will never be a success. It'll be memorial to the height to which greed, and contempt for the law, and hubris were elevated in the process of designing this plane.

At the risk of waxing poetic:

The MAX will be as the Crow that caws at midnight. A somber reminder of the banal parts of human nature against which we must remain ever vigilant, lest they take the reins again in humanity's struggle to push ourselves passed the limits that bind us.

<comment><USER2> "MCAS is frequently confused with a flight augmentation system which isn't true. This is demonstrably false. MCAS is a system in the same vein as the MD-11's LSAS. In other words, a hack to ensure the the "piloting experience" of the MAX stays as similar as possible to that of the 737 NG, despite the fact the NG doesn't suffer from directional pitch instability at high AoA."

\- This is false because MCAS only activates during stall conditions and is the exact reason why this issue went undiscovered for so long. If it was the system that you say it is, then it would have been constantly making the 2.5-degree adjustments to the horizontal stabilizer all the time! The fact is that it requires an AoA sensor to report an attack angle greater than 25 degrees while airspeed drops below 200 knots. That Aircurrent article was the worst thing for Boeing because it made so many people misinformed. It somehow convinced people that the engine thrust is misaligned making it into some sort of harrier-jet hybrid that's "unstable". Completely false. Look at how many different engines and engine placements have been used throughout the history of flight that didn't require any augmentation system and then tell me that argument still has validity.

<comment><USER3> >This is false because MCAS only activates during stall conditions and is the exact reason why this issue went undiscovered for so long. If it was the system that you say it is, then it would have been constantly making the 2.5-degree adjustments to the horizontal stabilizer all the time!

"All the time" is a funny way of spelling "when the AoA sensor indicates an AoA near or greater than critical."

Also, the problem took so long to be discovered because Trim has become increasingly automated, relegating any system that modifies it to a second or third order concern for pilots generally. The system wasn't documented explicitly in training materials, and yes, what malfunctions did happen generally happened in less critical phases of flight, and we're quickly recovered from.

>The fact is that it requires an AoA sensor to report an attack angle greater than 25 degrees

...Okay, you didn't even look at the Flight Data Recorder of either crash did you? The same data that shows MCAS happily driving 300+ people into the lithosphere at 300+ knots?

MCAS activates regardless of speed. The key input is AoA, flap setting, and whether the autopilot is on, and altitude > 450 AGL if I recall correctly. Furthermore, it ramps up over sequential activations. I'm open to entertaining some possibility that you just didn't look it up, but your arguments are straying into areas if incorrectness that seem to indicate your sources may need to be reevaluated.

I implore you to do some more thorough research.

Search terms: ET302 FDR data ET302 prelim report Lion Air 610 FDR data MCAS Flight Control Systems.

I understand Aviation isn't the lightest topic of research, but that's also why it's so important to make sure you're reasoning from the right information. Flying is complicated. Not inaccessibly so, but definitely beyond normal intuition at times.

<comment><USER2> "Also, the problem took so long to be discovered because Trim has become increasingly automated, relegating any system that modifies it to a second or third order concern for pilots generally."

> "The problem with automated runaway trim is that trim is automated and > pilots don't notice" \- your argument in a nutshell

"The fact is that it requires an AoA sensor to REPORT an attack angle greater than 25 degrees"

> Who said the report needed to be accurate?</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN - what skillset pays the most in tech? - <AUTHOR>

For example all things being equal, a PHP dev gets paid less than dot net or Java.  Is there any specific skillset that pays more than the rest? Either because it is hard to learn, or there aren't enough people to do it etc <comment><USER2> Unique technical skills. For example when Google decided that they wanted to built V8 (JS JIT) they couldn't just entire anyone who's read some JIT book one time, they need someone with genuine expertise, publication history and leadership in the field. There are only like 50 people max in the world who could do that. They also needed a GC for that JIT, so they need another expert in that field. Those people get the big bucks.

The guy who runs the self-driving car project at Google earns tons, and he's not just someone who picked it up as he went along. He picked something, became and expert when few others did, so when Google wanted to hire him, he could argue that if you don't hire me there are only like five other people you could even ask to do this, so he could negotiate for a very high salary.

So you need to become a genuine expert in something, with a publication history to back it up.

</comment><comment><USER3> Probably Cobol and maintaining legacy banking mainframe systems because it would cost more to bring them up to date.</comment>


AV1 Released - <AUTHOR> https://aomedia.org/av1-features/get-started/ <comment><USER2> So, in case people wonder what is happening, wrt to the timeline of the AV1 codec, here is some info.

This is final version of the bitstream and the specification of the codec. It will not change anymore (until AV1.1 or AV2).

There are not much features changes since the "release" that was announced before NAB (early April), but now everything should be clean and checked (checking that the spec actually matches the reference decoder, decoder model, profiles, ...), and a few bugfixes went in already.

Now, in a couple of weeks, you should have MP4 and MKV mappings finalized (yes, that means the files you've seen so far are invalid). And then it will be available to everyone (if you can encode it, of course).

<comment><USER3> > if you can encode it, of course

And here lies a really big issue I have with modern codec standardisation and development - it will be unfortunately many years to come until we see sufficient optimisations to make at a minimum realtime encode and decode of AV1 feasible. Ten years ago when Moore's law was actually a thing this can- kicking may have been acceptable but now I sincerely believe codec development needs to be more iterative, and to consider hardware optimisations (in particular, having even a HDL variant as part of reference codec) from the initial outset.

VVC I suspect will repeat history in many ways, by virtue of how these codec standards bodies operate.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Direct link to 1.0.0 spec (PDF): [https://github.com/AOMediaCodec/av1-spec/releases/download/v...](https://github.com/AOMediaCodec/av1-spec/releases/download/v1.0.0/av1-spec-v1.0.0.pdf)

Unofficial working copy (HTML): [https://aomediacodec.github.io/av1-spec/](https://aomediacodec.github.io/av1-spec/)

Source (of spec): [https://github.com/AOMediaCodec/av1-spec/tree/v1.0.0](https://github.com/AOMediaCodec/av1-spec/tree/v1.0.0)

AV1 is a video codec developed by a consortium of companies, broadly descending from Google's VP9 while incorporating significant enhancements from Cisco and Xiph.Org. The participant companies are numerous and include big chipmakers and content delivery networks, banding together to perpetuate a royalty-free video codec that mounts a competition against MPEG's efforts, whose rules don't exclude techniques that are patented.

This is news because previous for previous codecs in this bloodline, like VP8 and VP9, the bitstream has never been frozen [1][2]. This wishiwashiness didn't preclude hardware implementations, and certainly not software implementations, but was very much a departure of the orthodox, old-hat practice in the standard-speccing space. With AV1, they're trying an approach that competes more directly with the MPEG specs, by having a bitstream that's not a moving target and is more formal than just a document embarrassingly marked as draft [2].

[1] [http://blog.webmproject.org/2010/06/future-of- vp8-bitstream....](http://blog.webmproject.org/2010/06/future-of- vp8-bitstream.html) [2] [https://www.webmproject.org/vp9/#draft-vp9-bitstream- and-dec...](https://www.webmproject.org/vp9/#draft-vp9-bitstream-and-decoding- process-specification)

<comment><USER5> No. VP8 and VP9 bitstreams are frozen and stayed frozen when they decided to freeze it (they made that sure with automatic tests in libvpx that calculated the bitstream checksum) otherwise old VP8/VP9 files would stop playing. The difference is only with the approach as with VP8 and VP9 the "reference" decoder is the specification, which is not what many people like for various reasons (for example there were some errors in the implementation, which needed to be implemented by everyone because of that).

The first link you posted about VP8 just writes that they'll create an experimental branch (back in 2010) where incompatible bitstream changes can go in. Guess what eventually happened with those changes? VP9

The second link is the link to the unfinished VP9 specification, however with VP9 they still had that "reference" decoder code is the specification approach. As VP9 started to gain traction, the demand for the specification became greater, so they post-hoc started writing one but as you can see, they never finished it. Still this doesn't mean the bitstream isn't frozen.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Since this is just a link to a source tree and I wondered myself what it was, I'll add that AV1 is an open, royalty-free video codec:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AV1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AV1)

Opus is the audio equivalent.

<comment><USER7> We've updated the link from [https://aomedia.googlesource.com/aom/+/v1.0.0](https://aomedia.googlesource.com/aom/+/v1.0.0) to the official page, but we're happy to update it again if someone can suggest better.

<comment><USER2> Why is it marked as dupe?

<comment><USER8> I just did that, because it looks like this story had significant discussion recently: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16697415](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16697415). (And [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16796127](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16796127) also.)

Sorry, I didn't see these comments or I'd have said so sooner!

<comment><AUTHOR> It's not a dupe. The previous release was a marketing fluff. Now people can actually start encoding video without having to worry about having to do everything over. That is a big deal. The previous announcement was a complete non-event.

Incidentally, Bunny's NeTV2 [1] might be a convenient platform for a hardware accelerated codec.

[1] [https://www.crowdsupply.com/alphamax/netv2](https://www.crowdsupply.com/alphamax/netv2)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> AV1 has lightfield encoding support, which should allow for impressive mobile VR content once hardware decoders are available! Annex D of the spec has more information: [https://github.com/AOMediaCodec/av1-spec/blob/master/annex.d...](https://github.com/AOMediaCodec/av1-spec/blob/master/annex.d.large.scale.tile.md)

The general technique was described back in 2000: [https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/838165/](https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/838165/)

</comment><comment><USER10> The title should be: "AV1 Released (for real this time)"

Previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16796127](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16796127)

<comment><USER2> Previous discussion is not the same as this one. This is the actual release.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17399250](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17399250)

<comment><AUTHOR> Which for some reasons isn't marked a dupe.... sigh

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> How slow is libaom right now?

</comment><comment><USER13> Any hardware vendors announced timelines on hardware codec support yet?</comment>


Bits of Empathy – talk about loneliness, relationships, family, and career - <AUTHOR> https://bitsofempathy.co/ <comment><AUTHOR> Hey folks,

It took me a couple days but I put together [https://bitsofempathy.co](https://bitsofempathy.co) to create a space for talking about things like loneliness, relationships, family, and career. It's less about giving advice and more about showing empathy. Surprisingly, that might just be what we need in order to solve our own problems. Hope this can help someone. Would be grateful for any feedback as well.</comment>


Swift: Uncharted Territory – Swift Intro and Internals [video + slides] - <AUTHOR> http://www.realm.io/2014/06/17/swift-unchartered-territory-swift-intro-and-internals/

<comment><USER2> Hi, speaker here. Let me know if you have any questions.

The video starts off with the basics but gets into some pretty obscure, and interesting, internals on how things work.</comment>


Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rinderkennzeichnungs-_und_Rindfleischetikettierungs%C3%BCberwachungsaufgaben%C3%BCbertragungsgesetz <comment><USER2> > The German justice ministry welcomed an increase as of November 7, 2017 in > the Twitter 140-character limit to 280 characters, since tweeting about the > law had previously required abbreviations.

The Wikipedia source is broken, but it seems to be true[1].

[1] [https://finance.yahoo.com/news/german-officials-celebrate- do...](https://finance.yahoo.com/news/german-officials-celebrate-doubled- twitter-142904753.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> You managed to screw up the HN mobile view with that title

So its important for that much at least</comment>


I am a modder. Valve, charging for mods is a bad idea. Very bad - <AUTHOR> https://steamcommunity.com/app/72850/discussions/0/611704730313709437/

<comment><USER2> I remember working on dumb mods for HL1 and Doom.

I miss how easy it used to be--much simpler.</comment>


Python Arduino Serial Port Text Communication (Send:PDE; Receive:PySerial) - <AUTHOR> http://blog.stavi.sh/python-arduino-serial-port-text-communication

<comment><USER2> This is more exhaustive of Arduino + python: <http://www.arduino.cc/playground/Interfacing/Python>

</comment><comment><USER3> PySerial (and it's close cousin PyParallel) are pretty cool. couple of months ago, i wrote a trivial program to interface HD44780 board using PyParallel. available here: [ <http://github.com/anupamk/hd44780.git> ]

</comment><comment><USER4> You can do some pretty cool things with PySerial. For example, we wrote a module to implement the USB I/O 24's (an IO board) API in Python which uses PySerial. There is also a RelayBoard module which sits on top of that one. We wrote this while working on an automation (namely opening doors) project in our lab (NLON Labs). The aforementioned module can be found here: <http://code.google.com/p/python-usbio24/>

</comment><comment><USER5> Awww posterous is breaking for me:

        Uh oh, we had an error.

Something to do with the DoS attack they were under?

</comment><comment><USER6> python + arduino = crazy upvotes</comment>


SMS-hosted Bitcoin Wallet - <AUTHOR> http://www.txtbitcoin.com/ <comment><USER2> From a security point of view I think using SMS as a way of initiating bitcoin transactions is a really bad idea. It would be interesting to have some more details about how this OTP scheme works. Also, the OTP sign up page is served over plain http.

</comment><comment><USER3> Coinbase (a YC-backed company) also recently announced SMS support. [https://coinbase.com/sms_service](https://coinbase.com/sms_service)

</comment><comment><USER4> Is it free or am I missing the price somewhere?</comment>


Ask HN: Creating Business Processes? - <AUTHOR> When a company is young, everything seems chaotic.  As the company grows, it needs some type of business process to start to tame the chaos.<p>I am new to the topic of business processes, and I am curious what resources have helped you most when you first started learning about them and how to create them? <comment><USER2> A good free tool I've used is draw.io. comes without the bloat of MS Visio. As for learning how to model business process, BPMN is always thrown around as the standard but I've just used whatever visual representation is clearest for your audience.

<comment><AUTHOR> I have used the draw.io plugin in Confluence.

Do you have an books you would recommend on the subject?

<comment><USER2> I found 'The Basics of Process Mapping' by Robert Damelio quite useful when starting out.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I have some tools I have customized from experience around the Malcolm Baldrige criteria (Linkage of Process, etc).

Ping me and I'll gladly share.</comment>


Decisions Without Data are Guesses - <AUTHOR> http://20bits.com/2008/04/05/decisions-without-data/

<comment><USER2> Rough summary of the argument: When you need to make a decision, use the data you have available to make the one most consistent with achieving your goal. Also, the plural of anecdote is not data.

...however...

He misses the fact that it can be very hard to gather a sufficient sample of data for a complex set of variables. If you are designing a web site there are literally hundreds of choices to make. You can't reasonably expect to test all of your decisions before making them, or else you will be paralyzed by delay.

This leaves you with a second option of mocking up a couple of choices and see which ones are liked best, leaving you potentially with the best of a bad bunch.

Or, my preference, option three: Pick a couple of design champions who will tear any design to shreds and make you really justify your choices in terms of work flow and user interaction.

Generally you can assume that you _aren't_ stupid, and you can figure out the right choices to make, however you won't always notice you need to do so unless you are being forced to justify your decisions by a grumpy critic.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hrm, do you think my article was too long?

Anyhow, yes, you can make arbitrarily complex measurements.

The point was more human than technical: some data is better than none, even if it's not fine-grained. It results in fewer pointless arguments and better decisions overall.

<comment><USER3> _some data is better than none, even if it's not fine-grained._

Not necessarily. If the features of your small data sample are unrepresentative or poorly analyzed, you run the risk of distorting your priors and making a poorer decision than that expected by chance alone.

We can chew the fat on this one for a very, very long time :-)

<comment><AUTHOR> Ok, you're right. I'm a mathematician by training so these technical concerns don't escape me.

Still, I tried to keep my point constrained to those situations where you don't run into decisions not easily resolved in the manner I described.

Sure, if you're wading into a new market, old models or assumptions might be incorrect. Or if you need to make a decision now and don't have time to gather data your intuition and savvy are going to be instrumental.

But for most day-to-day, pedestrian decisions around software, web development, and business there's plenty of data that will tell you whether you should zig or zag.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This article presents a very narrow view of decision-making that only applies in certain situations.

Being able to make good decisions based on conflicting or incomplete information is critically important.

<comment><AUTHOR> Fleurs,

It was intended to be a small point. The psychology and effectiveness of decision-making strategies could fill up books (and they have).

The scenario I had in mind is one where you have some limited set of options, a consensus is necessary, and the overhead of measuring the effectiveness of the alternatives isn't too high.

In those situations you're going to argue until someone gives in, someone higher up tells you to knock it off and makes a decision for you, or you decide to see which alternative actually does best.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I agree that data-driven decisions are less common than they should be. However, there is such a thing as over-dependence on data, and this piece might be toying with the line. You don't have enough resources to test every little thing - sometimes you have to use your intuition and move on.

<comment><AUTHOR> aneesh,

I understand that, actually, and left it out of the blog post only for brevity's sake.

When I make decisions about my websites and other projects I have in mind a picture of my audience and what they're doing. This sort of experience is the basis for most intuition. Some people are really, really good at it, too.

The right kind of experiences can be data, too, but there are two dangers: (1) not being wiling to change your mind and (2) acting off too little experience.

I just expect that any "expert" whose intuition I'm supposed to trust will be able to justify their opinion when push comes to shove.

<comment><USER3> _I just expect that any "expert" whose intuition I'm supposed to trust will be able to justify their opinion when push comes to shove._

Don't expect them to justify it solely on your terms, however. If you're breaking into a new market or operating under asymmetric information pressure with significant uncertainty -- or even just regular old data starvation -- appealing to similar but difficult-to-quantify means of supporting one's intuition may be crucial.

It would be better for all concerned if the person making a claim could always articulate their reasoning _in toto_ , but under the pressures of time, you may occasionally need to rely upon a person's track record, and trust them. Because their track record under similar conditions is a prior -- that, too, is data.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence -- but people with an extraordinary track record can sometimes be trusted to make extraordinary judgments with ordinary data.</comment></comment></comment>


Canonical's cloud-in-a-box: The Ubuntu Orange Box - <AUTHOR> http://www.zdnet.com/canonicals-cloud-in-a-box-the-ubuntu-orange-box-7000029575/

<comment><USER2> Looks pretty reasonable for the price. Shows how overpriced OEM hardware can be if ubuntu is shipping it for 12k</comment>


SimRefinery Recovered - <AUTHOR> https://obscuritory.com/sim/simrefinery-recovered/ <comment><USER2> For those who wondered like me who this software was built for, the answer is in the full article:

> _The operators at the refinery sometimes had trouble getting a big picture > for what was happening at the plant beyond their particular area of focus. > "The whole goal if this was to teach operators that they are part of a > bigger system," Skidmore said. "Their concern at the time was that operators > tended to be very focused on their one plant, and their one thing they do, > and so [they] weren't keeping in mind that what they do affected other parts > of the plant. So they wanted a training tool that allowed operators to > manipulate inputs and outputs of the various pieces of the refinery process > to see how they impact."_

> _The non-technical staff at the Richmond refinery needed to know how it > worked too. The people in human resources and accounting weren't chemical > engineers, but it would help their work to see how the different areas of > the plant were networked together, how one department affected another > department._

[https://obscuritory.com/sim/when-simcity-got- serious/](https://obscuritory.com/sim/when-simcity-got-serious/)

<comment><USER3> We urgently need OfficeSim version of this.

<comment><USER4> It already exists and it's fabulous: [https://pippinbarr.github.io/itisasifyouweredoingwork/](https://pippinbarr.github.io/itisasifyouweredoingwork/)

<comment><USER5> I've never been so simultaneously entertained and annoyed in my life.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Interesting! The game reminds me a bit of another industrial simulation game called "Oakflat", a nuclear power plant operations simulator for MS-DOS (and later Windows).

The DOS version can be played on archive.org, but I'm not sure if it's possible to get the Windows version anymore.

[https://archive.org/details/msdos_Oakflat_Nuclear_Power_Plan...](https://archive.org/details/msdos_Oakflat_Nuclear_Power_Plant_Simulator_The_1992)

<comment><USER7> To drift further off, there was also a container shipping simulation called Ports of Call.

[https://archive.org/details/PortsOfCall](https://archive.org/details/PortsOfCall)

<comment><USER8> Wow, I have been looking for that for about a decade. I played it a few times at a friend's house as a child and was mesmerised.

<comment><USER9> I used to play that a ton as a teenager on my Amiga 500, but it just is not as much fun on an emulator, rose tinted glasses.

<comment><USER10> Yeah for some reason PoC was such a fun game!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> There's still a huge pursuit around this in most of manufacturing. Operational engineering groups are pushing for high fidelity digital twins to test out process control code before it hits the physical plant. The merge between simulation games and simulations gets even more blurred now that some software companies are replicating the entire plant in a 3d "game engine" and using VR goggles for immersion for operator training

<comment><USER12> A company I used to work for built a large sim for an Australian mining company, using a commercial game engine and a large 'igloo' type structure as the interaction environment. This was chosen over VR because it was believed to be easier to have groups of trainees in the same environment. The trainees were equipped with physical 'torches' that were geometrically paired with the virtual environment so you could actually shine a pointer on objects.

The main training tasks were spatial orientation in the large 3D maze that was the mine, as well as hazard recognition and safety /;emergency training. E.g. knowing which way to go if an explosion occurred and how to avoid being crushed by the large vehicles that moved through the mine.

The main unexpected development cost turned out to be the high degree of customisation required of the virtual assets, in particular the signage. Every tunnel and shaft had individual location and safety info on signs, and these had to be correct or the training value was lost.

<comment><USER11> The high-fidelity replication is much easier for things like industrial control systems (ICS)because all that needs to be replicated is the operator interfaces. Those interfaces are usually intentionally bland and typically dated - meaning really simple, standardized graphical assets

I can imagine a complete mine recreation would be a huge development effort - especially with how huge they get. Is that something that like a camera drone could scan? i guess it could get the topology figured out with some special software, but could it get the signs and landmarks too? Can drones fly effectively in a mine?

<comment><USER12> > but could it get the signs and landmarks too?

IIRC the customers supplied the primary graphics content for the signs digitally from their own files; the underestimated development cost was finding and editing the appropriate instances of the signpost objects. The corridor rock walls were a generic texture. There were also lots of physical 'emergency exit this way' indicators (e.g. arrow shapes that could be felt by touch in darkness) on railings. These were instanced as well, but the direction had to be checked.

> Can drones fly effectively in a mine?

No idea but think lots of corridors with short Line Of Sight. Probably easier now to use Lidar or similar.

[Edit] Also, some of the signs were dynamic, e.g. "Checked by X on date Y" and needed to be updated in a scenario-specific way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I wonder if it supports negative oil prices.

<comment><USER14> Where's the disaster menu?

<comment><USER15> Interestingly enough, in the article it does confirm that Chevron encouraged new users of the system to change certain input values to produce explosions andnl disasters right as they were first learning how to play, so that they could learn what does what in real life.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> While on the subject of old games, does anyone have access to a working version of "Vogon Poetry"? This was a shoot-em-up game bundled with Sidekick Plus.

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/business/1988/03/21/s...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/business/1988/03/21/software- firm-offers-new-version-of-sidekick- program/fc1ee721-f3ec-4a8b-985e-567f4cd8b936/)

<comment><USER17> Saw that you've been looking for this for a few years, so I decided to take a crack at it. I was able to get it working.

I obtained disk images for SideKick plus from [https://winworldpc.com/product/sidekick/plus](https://winworldpc.com/product/sidekick/plus). Using 86Box as an emulator (Window-only, unfortunately. PCem or DosBox might work OK as Windows alternatives), I then:

1\. Installed MS-DOS

2\. Installed SideKick Plus

3\. Ran 'install' from 'c:\skplus'

4\. Added a new configuration with Vogon Poetry enabled. Called it 'skplus2.com'.

5\. Ran 'skplus2.com'

6\. Hit ctrl-alt

7\. Selected 'Vogon Poetry'

I've put together an preconfigured 86Box installation that you can just unzip and run. To actually start the game, run 86Box.exe, then 'cd c:\skplus', then 'skplus2' (note the '2'). Then press ctrl-alt once or twice.

Video demonstration: [https://1drv.ms/v/s!AvBLRLPXTc9ihVPL0VMtzexUmw8k?e=cVtKxj](https://1drv.ms/v/s!AvBLRLPXTc9ihVPL0VMtzexUmw8k?e=cVtKxj)

Preconfigured 86Box installation: [https://jmn.link/sidekick-vogon- poetry.zip](https://jmn.link/sidekick-vogon-poetry.zip)

<comment><USER18> This is really excellent, what a nice thing to do. Also interesting for others of us; I'd not heard of 86box before

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Did Maxis just lose the game? Why didn't the company have a copy of their own game.

<comment><USER20> It's was a niche project for a client that didn't want it developed further.

Not nearly as outrageous as the BBC taping over their archives to save buying new tapes. They have a page listing all the justifications, some of which are quite weak:

[https://www.bbc.co.uk/archive/bbc-archives--wiped-missing- an...](https://www.bbc.co.uk/archive/bbc-archives--wiped-missing-and- lost/z4nkvk7)

<comment><USER21> I remember reading a certain company (not my current employer)'s data retention policy issued by their legal department. It had a schedule for destroying all business records. Product source code was in there as a business record – to be destroyed N years after end of support. Made me want to cry. I hope they don't actually do what their legal department tells them to.

<comment><USER22> If hypothetically, someone were to take a copy of that code just before the business destroyed it, they could do almost whatever they liked with it, because the original business wouldn't be able to prove it was stolen from them.

<comment><USER21> Let me use Microsoft as an example. (And, I'd rather not identify the company in question, but I can say that it wasn't Microsoft – I have absolutely zero information on what Microsoft's data retention policies might be.)

Suppose Microsoft's policy was to destroy all copies of the Windows 3.0 source code. Having followed that policy, they have no copies left. Now suppose an ex-Microsoft employee has a copy of the Windows 3.0 source code in their possession, and decides to distribute it. You really think that Microsoft couldn't prove in court that said source code is in fact the Windows 3.0 source code, even if they no longer possessed any copies of it themselves?

<comment><USER23> > I'd rather not identify the company in question, but I can say that it > wasn't Microsoft – I have absolutely zero information on what Microsoft's > data retention policies might be.

While earlier things may have been lost, Microsoft operates a Microsoft museum. Anything they have today is pretty likely to be intentionally preserved.

<comment><USER24> It's been fifteen years since I've last darkened MSFT's doorsteps, but they had an internal server that had everything back to DOS 2.0, IIRC. Now, _source code_ I cannot say with any real knowledge, but the bits were (and I'm guessing, still are) there.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Didn't take long but LGR has just released a video of him playing it - [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZ6Cqn5rTfs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZ6Cqn5rTfs)

</comment><comment><USER26> Great work! Is there a place I can checkout for good quality non spammy "business simulation" games?

<comment><USER27> I'll refer one that I don't see mentioned very often, that is my favorite business simulation game: Capitalism / Capitalism Lab (latest version). It has been around for about 25 years, the author keeps working on the concept.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism_(video_game)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism_\(video_game\))

[https://www.capitalismlab.com/](https://www.capitalismlab.com/)

<comment><USER28> This is a really amazing sim, and I'm surprised how under-the-radar it is. It's kind of Dwarf-Fortress-esque in how it has this slightly antiquated presentation, but hiding behind it is an incredibly deep sim, where the author keeps on adding new features.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Clinging through to the Archive.org link...

Not sure if it's nostalgia, but the Maxis logo still looks really good. It doesn't scream 1992.

</comment><comment><USER30> Some of the best strategic sims: Sim City -> Theme Hospital -> Game Dev Tycoon -> Kerbal Space Program -> Factorio

<comment><USER31> Factorio has genuinely taught me lessons about software design.

\- learn where in your stack it's worth optimizing vs just let it chug along inefficiently. \- Unintuitively, often a simple, inefficient, unmaintainable automation slapped together is better than something well-written, especially in the domain of ML/data munging \- feedback is essential. When I started, I didn't spend much time in the plots windows. This is your QA dash. Pushed me heavily into using integrated CI pipelines \- don't be afraid of rewrites. But do have ample tests. \- CSP rocks

It's even pushed me from a "pythonic" dynamic style to writing much more golang and python that feels a bit like go.

<comment><USER32> CSP?

<comment><USER31> Communicating Sequential Processing. It's a multithreading/processing model which as the name suggests, leans more on communication, less on sharing memory.

It's not as efficient for some types of computing, like doing tons of operations on the same buffer, but it scales horizontally very nicely.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> This is so cool that someone recovered it. Reminds me of all the crazy burned CDs I have with random software from the days of yore.

Here's the previous discussion where it was shown / talked about but thought to be lost:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23236132](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23236132)

<comment><USER34> > all the crazy burned CDs I have

lucky you, mine all became unreadable with time. I didn't know/think of refreshing them periodically on newer cds, and now they're gone for. most of the games wouldn't run on modern hardware anyway, but a lot of first gen digital photos are lost in there.

<comment><USER35> Yeah, CD/DVD media degrades over time, often on the time span of a decade they become unreadable. They are a bad choice for long term storage.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> A weird error happens if I try to run the embedded javascript dosbox emulator on iOS Mobile Safari. It launches the PKSFX INSTALL.EXE but most (but not all) files fail to extract with a CRC error. Emulation bug or a flaw in Mobile Safari's javascript engine? It seems strange that it can interpret the entire pksfx x86 code without crashing while still yielding corrupted CRCs? If there are bitflips or miscalculations you would think the interpreted x86 cpu would crash long before even printing the pksfx banner. On a different computer, unzip -t validates the INSTALL.EXE zip contents.

<comment><USER37> I bet the installer is using the storage JS API or something related but the pksfx x86 code does not and such API is buggy or limited on Safari mobile.

<comment><USER36> The only thing I can think of is running out of virtual disk space because the storage JS API quota is filled. But I would assume PKSFX calculates the CRC based on the in-memory decompressed stream, not a read-back copy of what's written. Or it would print some sort of "out of disk space" error, but maybe dosbox does not have that.

So I wonder if there is a sneaky data corruption bug hiding in the iOS version of Safari's JS/JIT engine here..? If the .zip file embedded in the PKSFX INSTALL.EXE was incomplete, then I would think it would fail early with a missing end-of-archive TOC?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> It was litteraly developped by the BS division.

>From 1992 to 1994, a division called Maxis Business Simulations was responsible for making serious professional simulations that looked and played like Maxis games.

[https://obscuritory.com/sim/when-simcity-got- serious/](https://obscuritory.com/sim/when-simcity-got-serious/)

</comment><comment><USER39> What they built feels like the business simulation holy grail where it transcends to being fun as opposed to setting triangle distributions in Arena (example of an old-school business sim software we used at some point to simulate ambulance times).

Now if only there was interest for other types of simulations like: SimClimate, SimSociety, SimPandemic.

</comment><comment><USER40> Awesome!

Now i only need to find out what game i have played.

It was also a Simulation, one person in a house and you were able to buy a tv and something with insurance was also happening.

<comment><USER41> Just a hunch, but was it perhaps Sierra's "Jones in the Fast Lane"?

<comment><USER40> Mh that doesn't look familiar. It also looks quite colorful.

That pc also had ibms ally cat installed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Interesting how some assets are never released to the public.

<comment><USER43> *most

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> Very neat, although I very much wanted the lets-play

<comment><USER45> I was going over some old archives and ran into this old Windows installer called "The Sims Steering Committee Installer.exe" from June 4, 1998, that I'd completely forgotten about.

So I installed it on a virtual machine, and made a "lets-play" demo of an early pre-release version of The Sims that was made for The Sims Steering Committee at EA. It includes the Edith SimAntics visual programming language editor and debugging tools, and has a very early "sketchy" user interface, colored dots above the character's head instead of the signature plumb bob, crude klunky architectural editing and object movement tools, and only a few essential objects (eat, sleep, shit, shower, watch TV, dance), and some cool debugging menus (create any number of instances of Archie Bunker and his friends).

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zC52jE60KjY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zC52jE60KjY)

<comment><USER46> Please upload that to the Internet Archive if you can, would love to see it preserved!

<comment><USER45> I definitely want to, and I'm working on the "if I can" part with some helpful digital archivists/librarians, figuring out how to properly archive and distribute that and any other stuff I can dig up.

The fact that EA recently released the source code for Command and Conquer Tiberian Dawn and Red Alert under GPL3 makes me hopeful that they will be open to releasing more old source code like they did with C&C and SimCity!

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23249964](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23249964)

[https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/20/21265663/ea-command- conqu...](https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/20/21265663/ea-command-conquer- tiberian-dawn-red-alert-open-source-remastered)

Rebecca Heineman has an unreleased version of SimCity for the Apple ][gs that she'd love to see the light of day. And I think SimEarth would be really interesting to release in source code form.

[https://www.uvlist.net/game-239645-SimCity+GS](https://www.uvlist.net/game-239645-SimCity+GS)

[https://www.callapple.org/software/the-long-fabled- simcity-f...](https://www.callapple.org/software/the-long-fabled-simcity-for- the-apple-iigs-exists/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> Wondering about the cheats in this game :)

</comment><comment><USER48> Does it simulate Hubbert peak ? :-)</comment>


Deutsche Computerspiele? - <AUTHOR>

I seldomly play games, but I really loved playing Braid, Word of Goo, and Machinerium.
I also really love learning German. I've been gradually stepping up my consumption of German media, from Sesamstraße and Kleiner Roter Traktor to Raumpatrouille.
Does anyone have any German language games to recommend? Maybe an RPG or something where text plays a role?
Other language-learning recommendations would be welcome, too.
Thanks! <comment><USER2> I think the Gothic games are available in German, as they are made by a German developer. They are good RPG's (1 to 3 that is) and they are quite text heavy. I'm not sure, but I think all the spoken text is also subbed, which I imagine would help you allot.

Viel spaß</comment>


Amazon's Curious Case of the $2,630.52 Used Paperback - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/15/technology/amazon-used-paperback-book-pricing.html <comment><USER2> Money laundering.

<comment><USER3> Absolutely. I'm somewhat surprised that this wasn't brought up as the obvious solution. A small fee to Amazon turns dirty money into clean.</comment></comment>


When Women Wanted Sex Much More Than Men - <AUTHOR> http://www.alternet.org/when-women-wanted-sex-much-more-men

<comment><USER2> There's also an interesting book discussing this called _The Origins of Sex: A History of the First Sexual Revolution_ by ([http://www.amazon.com/Origins- Sex-History-Sexual-Revolution/...](http://www.amazon.com/Origins-Sex-History- Sexual- Revolution/dp/1846144922?ie=UTF8&tag=thstsst-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957)), in which he notes, for example:

 _"Nowadays the idea that one should follow one's conscience when wrestling with ethical problems seems simple and straightforward. Already by 1750 it could be taken for granted: 'that every man should regulate his actions by his own conscience, without any regard to the opinions of the rest of the world, is one of the first precepts of moral prudence,' noted Samuel Johnson. Before 1700, however, it constituted a direct repudiation of conventional thinking about the inherent corruption of humanity and the fallibility of private scruples. To make sincerity the final judge of sinfulness was to bypass the essential duty of informing one's self adequately, of seeking truth and taking responsibility for error. It unjustifiably presumed that individual men and women could judge right and wrong for themselves, without the aid of scripture, laws, or teachers. It even implied that moral norms might be relative._

Men were seen as being better able to control themselves than women.</comment>


Let's fill our cities with taller, wooden buildings - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/03/opinion/wood-buildings-architecture-cities.html <comment><USER2> Maybe I'm missing something, but wouldn't that just make it easier to literally burn down a city? Concrete, glass, and steel might be ugly and carbon-intense but despite having fires they done burn down and spread to whole sections of a city.

<comment><USER3> This relatively new wood composite is supposedly extremely fire resistant</comment></comment>


Show HN: How I launched a product in 10 days - <AUTHOR> https://blog.trumpdicks.com/2017/01/22/Building-a-business-in-10-days/ <comment><AUTHOR> Takeaway #5 - CDN's take a bit to refresh content, so leaving a blank for the link the HN is less desirable than just adding it after the fact. It'll look more put together that way.

</comment><comment><USER2> classy.</comment>


Uber Said to Plan Another $1B in Fund-Raising - <AUTHOR> http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/10/24/business/dealbook/uber-said-to-plan-another-1-billion-in-fund-raising.html?referer= <comment><USER2> Whenever automated transportation becomes feasible, which is on the order of 5-10 years, a good chunk of a multi-trillion dollar market will go to the few players ready to capture it. At this point, Uber is arguably the most promising bet: tons of data, name recognition, long-term vision, talent, and on-point execution. Not to say they can't miss the mark still, but the market size for transportation of people and goods is gigantic, and Uber is dead set on basically being the One to take it all. I can see why it'd be an appealing investment.

<comment><USER3> I've been a loyal Uber user from their second month of existence but if Google offered me the same service for 10% less I would switch. I think this turns into a profitable but lower margin business than people think.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm not sure if this is a bubble that's popping or a valuation steeped in reality because of the value in this industry. If there is this much value in disrupting transportation it can't simply be to shuttle people around instead of using cabs. I'm starting to wonder what kind of business Uber needs to become for this kind of valuation to be justified.

<comment><USER5> How about a fleet of fully automatic-driving cars? That can deliver goods as well as people? Uber is aiming to replace the automobile in your garage. Currently, to establish themselves, they need to displace taxi cabs for those that already don't drive cars. But their intentions have been clear: a fully automated driving fleet, combined with same-day delivery of packages. Their aiming to disrupt not just the taxi industry, but also the automobile industry and the package delivery industry. The package delivery industry might be leveraged in the future to disrupt the online shopping industry.

Do I think they'll succeed? Honestly, no. But I do understand why all this money is being poured into the variety of taxi cab alternatives out there. This is a lot bigger than just the taxi cab industry.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> >Just three months after raising an enormous sum of money from investors, Uber is at it again.

My question is if they raised money 3 months ago, what happen between that time and now for them to raise 1 billion?

<comment><USER7> Perhaps Uber believes they seen the end of cheap money coming soon and they want to build a defensive bank to get them through the lean times. Raising $1B at a $70B valuation is only giving up 1.4% equity so why wouldn't you be raising if you can?

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Got to make those self driving cars!</comment>


Bitching Betty - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitching_Betty <comment><USER2> The #Voice_gender section is particularly interesting.

There's a lot of mythology floating around the ham radio and general EE community about the signal to noise ratio effects on various forms of modulation vs singing voice, such that sopranos have a natural SNR advantage on SSB and AM modulation but deep bass singer/speakers have a natural advantage over FM. Being primarily based on old wives tales I might have it backward and its interesting to contemplate the probably unstudied (at least in public journals?) effect over various cell phone and internet conferencing voice codecs.

There is a huge human factors problem missed in the article where are you trying to get attention or just provide a manufacturer CYA service. The first time an annunciator chimes out low altitude, that might be useful if the crew are not paying attention, but if the pilot and copilot are desperately trying to shout over the loud annunciator while they try to restart the engines its mostly just interfering with doing their job. Which has all kinds of smart phone UI implications, are you trying to bring something to the users attention like a ringtone, or merely be obnoxious (for ad purposes, I suppose?)

</comment><comment><USER3> Huh. I've seen people say this in relation to the Star Citizen alpha, didn't realize it was a real term.

In the words of my loaner Hornet F7C:

        Collision alert: front! Scanning! Collision alert: front!
        Scanning! Scanning! Contact! Collision alert: Left! Contact!
        Scanning! Sca- Contact! Collision alert: Front! Contact!

If you're flying anywhere near another object it just never shuts up. Are real planes that bad?

<comment><USER4> In this (promo) video about her retirement, they say she is rarely heard during flight: [https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yx7-yvXf6f8](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yx7-yvXf6f8)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I wonder if we'll get "cantankerous cortana" or "sassy siri" with smart-phones

</comment><comment><USER6> Or Bossy Betty

</comment><comment><USER7> Oops. Thought this was an article about my ex girlfriend.</comment>


Ask HN: Help I owe over 100k in taxes after signing up for Stripe Atlas - <AUTHOR> I signed up for Stripe Atlast in 2017, and pretty much just forgot about it.
In Canada, if your company don't make any money, you don't file anything, and the company dissolves.
So imagine my surprise at the Rocket Lawyer letter stating I owe 100k+ USD in taxes for a corporate registry that has not turned any revenue to speak of or expenses.
am I going to get extradited over this shit? God damn, I really wish they would've been clear that if you register through Stripe Atlas, you will somehow owe 100k+ in taxes. I thought taxes can only be collected if your company made the money, how can they expect me to pay this?
I'm absolutely freaking out right now. There's no way I can pay this. It's fucking ridiculous that I have to pay taxes just for registering a delware company.
edit: MODS, why did this get flagged? I'm trying to find fucking answers, this is not helping me. <comment><USER3> I work on Stripe Atlas. We've gotten in touch with `browsercoin privately, but I wanted to provide some context for other founders here, since many people get this letter every year. I have to make the obligatory "I am not an accountant and I am not your accountant" disclaimer.

The state of Delaware has something called franchise taxes, which there are two ways to calculate. [https://corp.delaware.gov/frtaxcalc/](https://corp.delaware.gov/frtaxcalc/) Revenue is not a factor under either method; you can think of this more as a renewal fee than an income tax.

If a company does not file their franchise taxes, Delaware will send them a letter demanding taxes. To put a number on that letter, Delaware uses the Authorized Shares Method. This returns a different number than the Assumed Par Value Capital Method.

Since companies are allowed to pick whichever is in their interest when they file their taxes, companies receiving that letter will often not pay the number on it.

Stripe Atlas companies can calculate, file, and pay their Delaware franchise tax through our tax tool. Overwhelmingly, they pay the minimum tax when filing on time: $400. There is a minor additional charge for late filed taxes.

Since we are aware that the state of Delaware sends letters on this matter which are confusing to many founders if those founders fail to file their taxes, we aggressively get in touch with Atlas founders around tax time.

<comment><USER4> I can confirm, Stripe is very proactive in getting in touch around tax time. But I guess many people just forget and pay late fees or get letters such as above.

One question which is not clear for me - is it possible to dissolve a company through Stripe Atlas?

<comment><AUTHOR> How do you define proactive? I didn't get any notifications. I would've appreciated an SMS or even a courtesy call. As somebody who has to manage dozens of email accounts, it's possible that I missed it.

Stripe Atlas does not help you dissolve a company, it's an extra few hundred dollars in fees and more if you hire ppl.

In total, my mistake is going to cost me around 1000 USD, vs 100k. It was wrong for me to assume that Stripe Atlas would explain these potential pitfalls, all of which were not made clear when I signed up.

I think just for future cases, it would be great to explain these hidden costs like on this site:

[https://flagtheory.com/stripe-atlas/](https://flagtheory.com/stripe-atlas/)

Had I been made aware of that site, I wouldn't have done it. The cost and legal exposure to the Land of Lawsuits was a stupid decision.

If you are not American, don't use Stripe Atlas like flagtheory writes on his website....if Patrick didn't promote it I wouldn't have joined Atlas in the first place so obviously he's doing a good job, but really wish that the hidden costs and risks are made clearer to non-Americans.

that is all. I don't hold a grudge against patrick or stripe, in the end, I did not do my own due diligence, and just blindly trusted what was advertised. it's my fault that I'm in this situation and I apologize if I have used strong languages, waking up to fact that you owe 100k in taxes, in an unfamiliar land, can cause panic.

<comment><USER5> You seem to be moving the goalposts in an attempt to remain outraged.

Surely you knew that there was a ~$500/year fee to have a US corporation when you created yours. There are no remaining "pitfalls" or "hidden costs" or "stupid decisions" or "risks" to your situation.

And you knew that when you wrote this comment. Your scary situation went away completely. One would expect you to be relieved. Why are you still behaving like this?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Same thing happened to me last year and I had exactly the same reaction :) It's just the default information the franchise tax board uses to estimate your taxes. When you file to pay your minimum $500 you can update the information to show $0 revenue, and 0 shares issued in the 12 month period which should bring the amount down to the minimum $500. If you have any problems you can call the Delaware tax board and they can walk you through it (that's what I did).

<comment><USER7> or read this: [https://www.cooleygo.com/so-you-owe-thousands-in-delaware- fr...](https://www.cooleygo.com/so-you-owe-thousands-in-delaware-franchise- tax/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Relax :)

This is what you need to know: [https://www.cooleygo.com/so-you-owe-thousands- in-delaware-fr...](https://www.cooleygo.com/so-you-owe-thousands-in-delaware- franchise-tax/)

You should owe $400 ish based on issued shares and assets.

<comment><AUTHOR> thanks, how do i input these changes myself? went on the delaware tax site but the amount is still $80,000. How can I just pay $400 on that website?

<comment><USER9> Here's the page that lets you do it:

[https://icis.corp.delaware.gov/ecorp/logintax.aspx?FilingTyp...](https://icis.corp.delaware.gov/ecorp/logintax.aspx?FilingType=FranchiseTax)

You have to enter the value of your net income and assets, and after you've done that it will update to the ~$400 amount.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> [https://flagtheory.com/stripe-atlas/](https://flagtheory.com/stripe-atlas/)

>Besides the high rate of corporate taxation (one of the highest of all developed economies), the IRS tax code has huge penalties for noncompliance. For instance, if you intentionally disregard filing a bank reporting form (the FBAR), you'll face serious penalties, including jail time, a $50,000 fine

Were you required to file a bank reporting form and didn't over 2 years? (ie $100k ) ??

<comment><AUTHOR> holy shit....this was not explained to me at all.

<comment><USER10> [https://corp.delaware.gov/paytaxes/](https://corp.delaware.gov/paytaxes/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> No way you should owe $100k. Sounds like a scam.

I don't think there is a minimum cost for federal, but Delaware does accumulate fees if you don't dissolve the corporation:

There is a minimum tax of $175 and a minimum filing fee of $50; so there is a minimum Delaware franchise tax and annual report payment total of $225 a year for Delaware domestic corporations. Domestic corporations must file by March 1 or face a $200 penalty, and a 1.5% interest rate on the amount due. Source: [https://www.delawareregisteredagent.com/how-to/file- delaware...](https://www.delawareregisteredagent.com/how-to/file-delaware- corporate-franchise-taxes)

</comment><comment><USER12> Unpopular opinion but I think you should find the services of a lawyer who understands this area of law. If you are concerned about paying $100,000 and being forcibly removed from your country of residence to stand trial in another country... now is the time to get a lawyer, not later.

</comment><comment><USER13> (I work at Stripe.) Hrm, that doesn't sound right...could you email me and we can take a look? firstname.lastname@example.com

</comment><comment><USER14> I was about to make a comment on a stackoverflow question but then I held my self back. The user tried to do something in php, and an error occurred. The sensible thing to do would be to read the error (which states the syntax error by the way). Instead, that person posted the question on SO, using similar language then OP.

Now the sensible thing for you to do would be to contact stripes. Nothing else.

</comment><comment><USER15> It could be helpful to understand that there are multiple governmental entities that could tax the income of a Delaware corporation: (1) Federal Corporation Income taxes -- through the IRS; and (2) State Corporate Income/Franchise Taxes -- through the relevant State agency. (There may be other local taxes such as business license and sales taxes, but that is not relevant here to your franchise tax issue).

You are required to file separate tax returns each year to each entity (so you pay both federal and state taxes). (If you are from Canada, "states" are roughly equivalent to "provinces".)

Since you mentioned "franchise taxes", it looks like you are looking at the State of Delaware's taxes (and not the IRS).

In Delaware, franchise taxes can generally be calculated using two different methods: (1) Authorized Shares Method (number of shares you authorized); and (2) Assumed Par Value Capital Method (generally based on the value of the assets in your company). See [https://corp.delaware.gov/frtaxcalc/](https://corp.delaware.gov/frtaxcalc/).

Most startups have been told to authorize 10 million shares in their incorporation paperwork. In Delaware, if you select the calculation method based on the number of shares, and you authorized 10 million shares, you could be surprised by a very expensive "initial" franchise tax calculation.

Others have already linked to a good article discussing this "surprise" bill: [https://www.cooleygo.com/so-you-owe-thousands-in-delaware- fr...](https://www.cooleygo.com/so-you-owe-thousands-in-delaware-franchise- tax/).

The solution is to look closely at your franchise tax bill and read about the option to calculate your taxes using the Assumed Par Value method.

If you cannot afford a lawyer, contact the State of Delaware Division of Corporations directly to discuss how to use the Assumed Par Value method to calculate your franchise taxes. See [https://corp.delaware.gov/contact/](https://corp.delaware.gov/contact/) (the Franchise Tax contact number is (302) 739-3073 option 3).

Good luck.

</comment><comment><USER16> I don't understand how you could owe taxes on a company that didn't have revenue. Can you explain how you came to owe 100k? Is it some sort of penalty for not remitting forms?

<comment><AUTHOR> its says Franchise Tax Return.

I don't understand why I owe taxes on a company with zero revenue, zero expenditure. I literally just registered with Stripe Atlas thinking it would be cool to own a US corp for future fund raising.

Big fucking mistake.

<comment><USER17> Have you reached out to Stripe about this?

<comment><AUTHOR> yes I did. still no response so I hope making it to the frontpage on HN will invoke some explanation.

How in the fuck is it remotely fair to tax corporations with no employees, no revenue, no investments, no capital, nada, zil, zip!

<comment><USER18> > How in the fuck is it remotely fair to tax corporations with no employees, > no revenue, no investments, no capital, nada, zil, zip!

Having a corporation is a privilege, and many US jurisdictions apply a minimum fee or tax to it (usually, a fee hundred USD annually.)

That's not what you are dealing with, though, which seems likely to be a non- compliance penalty from a state or local taxing authority; you generally _do_ need to file tax paperwork annually, probably both federal and state, for a US-based corporation.

Not sure how Stripe Atlas works, by the actual taxing authority should have sent a very specific documentation of the charges; they should be able to provide you with that documentation if they are set up to accept that on behalf of the corp.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Lots of good advice here, but why aren't you talking to a tax attorney or other legal advisor?

</comment><comment><USER7> just going to leave this here: [https://www.cooleygo.com/so-you-owe-thousands- in-delaware-fr...](https://www.cooleygo.com/so-you-owe-thousands-in-delaware- franchise-tax/)

</comment><comment><USER20> "A franchise tax is not based on income. Rather, the typical franchise tax calculation is based on the net worth of or capital held by the entity".

Did you transfer large amount of money to your business?

<comment><AUTHOR> no. I just signed up on Stripe Atlas, and that was it.

I definitely won't be doing this again as a non-American.

Really wish they would've been more explicit about the true costs of establishing a business in USA

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> seems like you should have done some homework, [https://flagtheory.com/stripe- atlas/](https://flagtheory.com/stripe-atlas/)

<comment><AUTHOR> that site did not exist or I was made aware of when I joined atlas as soon as Patrick M started advertising.

well to anyone who is thinking of using Stripe Atlas and is not American:

        DO NOT FUCKING DO IT.

<comment><USER22> Do you think the penalty here is specific to you not being American? Why would an American who failed to file taxes for their business not have ended up in the same spot as you?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> It could be related to the number of shares you allocated to your corporation when you incorporated. I can't speak more about it, as I'm no expert... but I've heard similar horror stories of Delaware companies... where its critical to pay attention to the number of shares, else you might find yourself screwed.

So like everyone else said.... get a lawyer.

... or fake your death..

<comment><USER24> ... with a lawyer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Does it strike anyone else as weird that the Delaware taxation authority would send a dunning letter via Rocket Lawyer?

</comment><comment><USER26> Sounds like a mistake? Maybe they sent a letter to the wrong customer?

</comment><comment><USER27> Was this note sent to you through your registered agent?

</comment><comment><USER28> Language

</comment><comment><USER29> Relax Max

</comment><comment><USER30> Better call Saul

</comment><comment><USER31> USA is architected to screw you over for trying to get something started legally ;)

The good news is you will be fine. It's just clerical. You won't be extradited and they won't drain your account.

In addition to the other advise, look up free legal hotlines. They're really friendly and can sometimes give you information that isn't easily googleable.

Good luck. The national sport in America is ignoring bills.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> so it seems that I need to hire my own accountant and lawyers according to stripe.....what the fuck is the point of Atlas if you are not American?

waht if I don't pay? are they gonna come after me?

edit: just went to the delaware website, it says to wire them 80,000 USD or else. sent them an email to get clarification.

<comment><USER9> You won't have to wire them $80K. Believe me, I've been running Delaware companies from outside the U.S. for 10 years and it's always fine, even if you file late.

If you don't pay, the company eventually becomes void and you can no longer trade.

They don't come after you for unpaid franchise taxes on a void company - <USER2> for the $400.

<comment><AUTHOR> whew! thanks. yeah yesterday i was in just full out panic mode. i may have behaved aggressively in trying to get attention on this issue.</comment></comment></comment>


Are Humans Still Evolving? - <AUTHOR> http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20091024/hl_time/08599193175700

<comment><USER2> The Framingham study is a good study for what it is about (risk factors for heart disease), but the study is probably inadequate for studying general selection pressure on the whole human population.

<http://norvig.com/experiment-design.html>

The key quotations in the article are

Douglas Ewbank, "Those changes we predict for 2409 could be wiped out by something as simple as a new school-lunch program."

Steve Jones, "Uniquely in the living world, what makes humans what we are is in our minds, in our society, and not in our evolution."

<comment><USER3> Degenerate diseases don't kill you before you can have children.

"Those changes we predict for 2409 could be wiped out by something as simple as a new school-lunch program."

Stupid. African nations have both the highest birth rates and the worst nutrition. If anything, expected good health after reproductive age negatively correlates with fecundity.

"Uniquely in the living world, what makes humans what we are is in our minds, in our society, and not in our evolution."

If Steve Jones knows of some supernatural force that excludes the operation of the human body from physical reality, he should describe that force and submit it to a physics journal. Otherwise, yes, minds are minds, but minds are not magic: they're meat.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> People will look like the people who most have children.

Do you have children? If not, then the people of the future will probably look less like you and more like the people who compounded faster than you did.

<comment><USER3> "The bastard science of eugenics, [Jones] says, will haunt humanity as long as people are tempted to confuse evolution with improvement."

"confuse evolution with improvement" I agree.

"bastard science of eugenics" What an appropriate slur: "bastard". Well, whoever parented that bastard wins this debate ---whatever that debate might be--- when you and the children you didn't have all die. You can go sit in the ground with the Quakers and the Spartans.

<comment><USER4> Shakers? Quakers are the religious group that prefer the warm fuzzy feelings to dogma. Shakers were the celibate sect.

<comment><USER3> Don't need to be celibate to go extinct. Remember Nixon? Hoover? They used to run America from colonial times until... well, know any Quakers?

"Although official Quakerism may not have abided the activities of many of these feminists, the Quaker belief that "in souls there is no sex," and the opportunities provided Quaker women to preach, hold meetings, and write epistles, gave rise to the high percentage of Quakers among the "mothers of feminism," including Angelina and Sarah Grimké, Lucretia Mott, Abby Kelley, Susan B. Anthony, and Alice Paul."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Also, the 2007 paper by Hawks et al indicated that evolution had accelerated over the past 10,000 years.

Dec. 10, 2007 - Researchers discovered genetic evidence that human evolution is speeding up - and has not halted or proceeded at a constant rate, as had been thought - indicating that humans on different continents are becoming increasingly different.

"We used a new genomic technology to show that humans are evolving rapidly, and that the pace of change has accelerated a lot in the last 40,000 years, especially since the end of the Ice Age roughly 10,000 years ago," says research team leader Henry Harpending, a distinguished professor of anthropology at the University of Utah.

Harpending says there are provocative implications from the study, published online Monday, Dec. 10 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences:

"We aren't the same as people even 1,000 or 2,000 years ago," he says, which may explain, for example, part of the difference between Viking invaders and their peaceful Swedish descendants. "The dogma has been these are cultural fluctuations, but almost any Temperament trait you look at is under strong genetic influence."

<http://unews.utah.edu/p/?r=120607-1>

</comment><comment><USER5> There seem to have been some adaptations including central nervous system genes, which may have increased fitness in a hierarchical agricultural society.

For example new versions of serotonin transporters in both Europe and east Asia (such as SLC6A4). There are other neurotransmitter-related changes, also changes in genes that affect brain development. East Asians have a new version of DAB1, a gene involved in the development of the layers of the cerebral cortex, while there is a fairly common new version of NKX2-2 (a brain homeobox gene) in Europeans.

[http://biology.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=get- docume...](http://biology.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=get- document&doi=10.1371%)

[http://www.plosgenetics.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal...](http://www.plosgenetics.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pgen.0030090)

</comment><comment><USER6> I feel stupid now that I noticed there wasn't any cool pictures of arbitrarily human faces evolving 10 generations - or did I miss something?

</comment><comment><USER7> First phrase of just the second sentence:

 _Despite the long-held view that natural selection has ceased to affect humans because almost everybody now lives long enough to have children_

Uh, what? Do people actually think that?

<comment><USER8> Well, A 2006 report on global mortality rates [1] suggests that regardless of country, the average human does reach sexual maturity. It follows that fitness, amongst humans, isn't significantly affected by survival / longevity. After all, if we live to reproduce, then anything that sets in after that event is irrelevant from an evolutionary standpoint.

I could see that reasoning giving rise to the phrasing used in the article.

[1]: <http://www.who.int/whosis/whostat2006_mortality.pdf>

<comment><USER9> _After all, if we live to reproduce, then anything that sets in after that event is irrelevant from an evolutionary standpoint._

I imagine there are some people who reason that way, but they'd be ignoring the obvious survival benefits of having parents (and extended family) to help raise a child.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'm thinking resistance to birth control is going to evolve really fast, probably within a few generations. Or perhaps if there's a gene associated with forgetting to take birth control.

<comment><USER11> Interesting idea, but I think most mutations that would so severely change how a woman responds to hormones would also be debilitating to the point that she wouldn't be able to have children.

<comment><USER12> There are already lots of fertile girls who have adverse reactions to hormonal contraceptives.

<comment><USER11> But then they know the pill doesn't work, and will likely use a different form of birth control. In order for the mutation to spread, it would need to make the pill not work silently. And even that would be difficult, because women should realize the pill is not working because they're still menstruating.

<comment><USER13> women on the pill still menstruate

<comment><USER11> Only if they do the 3 weeks on, 1 week off cycle that is commonly prescribed. Women who continue to take the hormone pills can skip menstruation.

Related to the current discussion, women would quickly realize that their menstrual cycle is not lining up with the week of non-hormone pills.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> You cannot stop evolution, you can only change the fitness criteria.

</comment><comment><USER15> What, no cyber-eyes and metal arms? I'd like to sign up for a different future please!

</comment><comment><USER16> Can someone hook edw519 up with searchyc.com?

It seems all he does is post dups: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=891137></comment>


Show HN: DataDuck ETL – Ruby framework for setting up a Redshift data warehouse - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/DataDuckETL/DataDuck <comment><AUTHOR> Let me know if you have questions about DataDuck. I made DataDuck to get data into Amazon Redshift. Why might you want a data warehouse? Here's some reasons why: [http://dataducketl.com/blog/every-tech-company-needs-a- data-...](http://dataducketl.com/blog/every-tech-company-needs-a-data- warehouse)</comment>


GNU/Linux: Emergency Restart - <AUTHOR> http://nicolasb.com.ar/2009/07/gnulinux-emergency-restart/

<comment><USER2> This can be handy, no doubt. I have a monitor that flips out blinking if you knock the cord, which my cat has seen fit to do a couple of times.

Don't forget the mnemonic - Raising Elephants Is So Utterly Boring.

There are a couple of variations:

REISUO will shutdown rather than reboot.

Some prefer RSEIUB, syncing earlier in the process - aka Rasing Skinny Elephants Is Unusually Bland. You may wish to throw another Sync in there to make RSEISUB.

<comment><USER3> I still prefer the mnemonic "Reboot Even If System Utterly Broken", plus it describes what it does. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> It's usually worth trying to ssh into the machine when X locks up (if you don't want to just reboot). Depending on what caused the problem, this will often still work even when it's unresponsive locally.

<comment><USER5> Or you can press Ctrl-Alt-F1 to get to the console.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Further information about how and what to trigger things with the Magic-Sysrq- Key is documented in $KERNEL/Documentation/sysrq.txt, which you can access for example in Linus' GIT tree at...

[http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux-2.6...](http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux-2.6.git;a=blob_plain;f=Documentation/sysrq.txt;hb=HEAD)

One very useful function, for example, is to force a hard reboot when ssh'ed into a server:

echo b >/proc/sysrq-trigger

</comment><comment><USER7> most easy way of remembering is : BUSIER, only backwards.

</comment><comment><USER8> IIRC the kernel needs to be compiled with the magic sysreq keys enabled, so if this doesn't work for you you will likely need to rebuild your kernel. Or grow a couple extra digits.

<comment><USER9> You don't have to recompile, you can control it through proc (/proc/sys/kernel/sysrq)</comment></comment>