Rate my startup - Poplytics - <AUTHOR> http://www.poplytics.com/index.php

<comment><USER2> More of a web app than a startup. It's the sort of thing where this app can be part of a business, but doesn't appear to be a complete scalable business by itself.

You need a professional copy-editor and designer. The design is good for a wireframe, but it doesn't look slick enough to make potential users want to associate themselves with your brand. The copy has a lot of strange capitalizations mid-sentence and doesn't flow smoothly.

The site doesn't explain the value proposition very clearly. "Learn how to increase satisfaction 40%" is a much more concrete explanation of the benefits.

<comment><USER3> Agree on copy and design but SurveyMonkey has done ok with this category (<http://www.crunchbase.com/company/surveymonkey>). Granted they have a 12 year head start.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I service I use daily with very similar functionality is KISSinsights. They are always rolling out new features, and I think if you want to differentiate yourself you are going to have to list the benefits of switching to your service versus the many others. The main question you should be answering for me, in big and bold, is "why should I use your service".

</comment><comment><USER5> Could not get past the lander copy. You seem to capitalize words completely at random.

 _Poplytics makes it easy for you to Receive instant Feedback

Create a Survey, ask your own Questions or use Templates Embed the unobtrusive Widget code Collect Feedback to help you satisfy your customers, readers_

</comment><comment><USER6> Hey there,

A few quick suggestions:

Cut out the text below the green bar. Triple the font size of the 3 steps, and put numbers next to them. Arrange them horizontally, and put screenshots below them. Change the red title to "Poplytics: collect feedback from your users in three steps."

Buy a sexy theme on themeforest. This design just doesn't cut it.

Proofread for capitalization.

Good luck!

</comment><comment><USER7> While much of what you are going to read from me is the same from other users, perhaps my opinion will help in that it's simply an additional opinion.

My first impression is that the design will need to be redone. As someone mentioned, you've got something prototype-worthy, but it will need to be significantly beefed up before it is shown to customers. If you can't do it, get a designer on board.

My second impression is that this is wufoo. I'm not sure exactly what you are offering that Wufoo or Google Docs doesn't already offer besides sharing a widget instead of a link. Have you surveyed customers to determine if they would respond better to a graphical survey (like a widget) versus a link to a survey? I'm not sure a widget would lower the barrier of entry enough for me to increase my desire to fill out a survey.

Finally, I agree you will need a copywriter/editor to clean up the text. Capitalizations are weird or explanations are a bit confusing. Cleaning up the copy will help significantly.

Best of luck!

</comment><comment><USER8> I don't think I understand why people would pay for a tool like this: If I want to collect data from the users of my site, I'm going to write the survey ui myself: matching with the design of my site exactly and feeling seamless is crucial to being able to expect my users to take it.

If I were doing something non-professional, just surveying people I know, or what have you, I'd use a free Google Docs form. It looks _far_ better and is easier to use than survey monkey, automatically is in a place I can deal with the results, and isn't trying to make money from me or my cohorts.

</comment><comment><USER9> I don't know how much you like the name, but I would suggest another name that is easier to remember. At the very least a name that is easier to spell or pronounce.

For me to remember the URL an hour from now, it's going to take a good few minutes to memorize the spelling. I also don't know how to pronounce it, so it makes it much harder for me to tell someone else about your site.

</comment><comment><USER10> There are a lot of better-known tools to do this - you will face tough competition unless you can do something that they don't.

I recommend that you find a specific niche and become really good at that industry/niche. That will help you build out things that others don't have.

</comment><comment><USER11> I hate to say this, but the name... it makes me think of a bad visit to to the doctor involving a rubber glove.

The rest of the concept sounds good, however forcing people to register before they can do anything is a nonstarter - I'd make that the final step.

<comment><USER12> The first thing I thought of was apoptosis. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apoptosis>

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Name :(

like prophylactics, polyps, pap smear, prostate etc.

</comment><comment><USER14> I think the challenge here is remembering this when I next want to create a survey, not something I have any immediate need for.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Access code is: samxbeta

<comment><USER15> Thanks - I was about to e-mail you. So far, my feedback is that you would definitely benefit from some help with your copywriting. In addition to the previously mentioned errors, you need to think a little bit about what your benefit is to your customers. Consider telling a story instead of reciting bullet points - "Company X wondered if their customers liked the new search page design. 15 minutes later, they knew, thanks to Poplytics. 10 minutes after that, the old design was restored." I think you also need to do some research into what sort of needs your customers have, and position your benefit statements to address those needs. For example, you mention satisfying customers. That's probably a real need. But is it the most important one? What about "answering those pesky questions the guy in marketing always asks" or "gather visitor's ideas about how to improve any page on your site?"

Finally, at first blush this does seem similar to KISSinsights. And there may be some overlap with UserVoice and Get Satisfaction. You might want to think about what problems you solve better than those companies.

Best of luck!

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> At first glance this is the exact same thing as KISS Insights. How are you better?</comment>


Hulu's Obituary - <AUTHOR> http://www.gunaxin.com/hulus-obituary/33092 <comment><USER2> Overblown. It will likely move to a freemium model. Everyone made fun of Hulu before it launched, but it ended up being quite good - there's no reason to think they don't understand the impact of making it pay-only.

[http://gizmodo.com/5387909/hulus-glorious-free-days-are- offi...](http://gizmodo.com/5387909/hulus-glorious-free-days-are-officially- numbered)

 _Don't worry, Hulu's mission has always been to help people find and enjoy the world's premium, professionally produced content. We continue to believe that the ad-supported, free service is the one that resonates most with the largest group of users and any possible new business models would serve to complement our existing offering.

Thanks,

Betina Chan-Martin

Hulu_

<comment><USER3> I agree that this is much ado about nothing. I would expect that the pay version would remove the ads, or offer content sooner (eliminate the 1 day delay for most TV shows).

<comment><USER4> Or allow greater back catalog access. "want to watch that whole season you missed?" it would compete directly with Netflix and Amazon on demand that way.

<comment><USER5> Or to allow streaming to set top boxes. If they want to compete with netflix that'd be a great way to do it. What makes so great netflix (beyond selection and the ability to drop down to a dvd in the mail) is the ability to easily stream to a tv. Relaxing on the couch is a way better watching experience than in the chair in front of the computer I sit in all day.

<comment><USER3> Check out PlayOn (<http://www.themediamall.com/playon/>) if you want to stream Hulu to an XBox, PS3, etc. I use it and it works like a charm!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Hulu is competing against torrents and DVRs. Their entire value add is convenience. That makes me doubt the viability of a subscription model.

Other ways hulu could make money:

\- allow viewers to purchase music played in the show (or even just related music)

\- link to the products that have been not so subtly placed in the show. In all likelihood, seeing James Bond use an awesome new gadget will prompt a few people to click a link to see more of it.

\- per show fees for things like HBO and showtime shows that cost extra already.

\- sell dvds of the TV shows. If I can watch 4 episodes of Sons of Anarchy and am brain dead enough to like it, I might buy the first season on DVD.

Hell, I'd actually consider some of these "content" more than "advertisements".

<comment><USER7> Don't underestimate how much convenience is worth to people. Netflix's value add over Blockbuster was convenience, Amazon's entire business model is "convenience". I can get people to come to my house, take all my laundry, and return it after it's been cleaned.

People value convenience in different ways, for sure, but I suspect there are a ton of people who would value the sort of convenience that Hulu can technically offer. I'm one of them, but I'm not entirely optimistic about how good their execution will be.

<comment><USER8> Well, actually, that isn't true. Streaming content makes Netflix much cheaper than renting movies (if the content serves your entertainment needs, anyhow).

I agree that convenience is worth something, but so is stable technology that already works. If Hulu was anywhere near the cost of cable, I think most people will stick with cable. They already own the DVRs and they already know how to use it. If Hulu is much cheaper, it has a chance.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Also: Netcraft confirms, BSD is dying. That is to say, I'll believe it when they turn out the lights. Until then, headline hyperbole ftw, or something.

I don't know if anyone else noticed, but one of the things they're expecting to make available with their pay model is stuff like HBO's series (Entourage was specifically mentioned, which, while not my cup of tea, implies that more of their catalog will also be available). Hopefully, that would mean Showtime's series, too. This is something I, and a lot of other people, would happily pay for.

As others have mentioned, people are moving away from the cable/satellite model, and getting their teevee from the internet in increasing numbers. Hulu is incredibly well-positioned to make a stupid amount of money off that phenomenon, provided they aren't unmitigated idiots about it. (Say, putting all their content behind the pay wall, or charging subscription fees that are a substantial fraction of the typical cable/satellite monthly bill.)

</comment><comment><USER10> For me to consider paying for Hulu the following would have to happen at minimum...

1\. Content in HD

2\. No commercials

3\. ~ $10 - $15 per month

<comment><USER11> Why no commercials? People pay for cable TV and almost every channel has them (save premium movie channels).

<comment><USER12> That might be true, but those people are frankly stupid.

<comment><USER13> Ha, that seems a little strong. I know lots of intelligent people who purchase cable.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> One thing, if they start charging for service, they better not try to go the cable way and charge for service but still air commercials on their content because most tv channels now offer free viewing of episodes of most of their shows on their website with similar viewing experience to hulu (except for linux users).

</comment><comment><USER15> God forbid someone would _charge money_ for a valuable service! Blasphemy!

This is my all-time number one gripe about the Internet. Users too often feel entitled to getting things for free.

<comment><USER16> They can and will get things for free because information goods' prices tend towards the marginal price, which is 0, not the cost of production. Or at least that's my understanding of Varian and Shapiro's "Information Rules".

<comment><USER17> There are few examples of truly getting content for free. Time is far more scarce for many of us than money is. The only times I even consider stealing content is when nobody is willing to take my money for it.

Of the top of my head, I downloaded Star Trek for my dad a couple months after it came out. He was bedridden and I wanted to see it with him. I would have delightedly paid the cost of taking a family to the theater--$30 to $50--to stream it online. Naturally, that wasn't possible so I spent an hour downloading it.

It's just seldom as easy as point and click and watch. I had to download 2 or 3 crappy cam versions first.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I just recently dropped my $80/mo satellite bill and switched to Netflix+Roku for the TV and Hulu and Netflix streaming on the computers. If Hulu really does start charging it needs to be a very low fee, I'm not interested in paying any more for entertainment than I already am.

<comment><USER17> +1. Got a Samsung BR a few months back that does Netflix and Pandora streaming. I've used the Netflix Watch Now since it came out a few years ago but I watch far more now than I ever had before. Contrary to conventional belief, their selection is really rather good. It of course wasn't always this way. But when they inked a deal with Starz that helped a lot. It also has always carried a lot of TV-On-DVD selections.

We use cable far less than before. I get free basic cable from my Association. The absolute only reason I haven't canceled is the HD content. Netflix BR selection is still sparse and there is no streaming HD.

When the day comes that I can stream HD, i'll be canceling my cable. Doesn't even have to be 1080. I'll settle for 720. And I'd be happy to pay $20-30 a month. It would be cheaper than Cable and I could use it away from home. Sign me up.</comment></comment>


Voxel.css: 3D Pixel Rendering with CSS - <AUTHOR> http://voxelcss.com/ <comment><USER2> Very cool idea! I wonder what the performance would be for a smallish "world" using this.</comment>


The search for a nearby second Earth - <AUTHOR> http://seedmagazine.com/content/print/the_long_shot/ <comment><USER2> this must be some definition of the word "nearby" that i was previously unaware of.

<comment><USER3> In light years Alpha Centauri is right next door, just down the street, within spitting distance...nearby.</comment></comment>


FSF Covid-19 Response Team at Free Software Directory - <AUTHOR> https://directory.fsf.org/wiki/Free_Software_Directory:COVID-19_Response_Team <comment><AUTHOR> > Summary: An incident response team dedicated work on medical software > relevant to COVID-19, and COVID-19 3D printing files.</comment>


Ask HN: What would you do with a Raspberry Pi? - <AUTHOR>

The Raspberry Pi device is aimed at kids who need to look beneath the gaming layer and start learning to code.  However, I'm interested in potential applications that a low-cost, low-powered SOC board could do.
So, playing to its strengths I thought of these two scenarios.
Turn any TV into a smart one - with a HDMI 1080P video outlet and using your telly remote (CEC) to control it, it seems an ideal candidate.  Most TV's also have a USB port so it could be powered over that.
Remote displays.  Now Apple have started to bundle Airplay mirroring, could be a cheap wireless display where cables cannot reach.  Perhaps a cheap Nagios status dashboard for sysadmins.
I don't think it's powerful enough to drive an MS Kinect.
Does anyone else care to share ideas? <comment><USER2> I managed to order a couple - my plan for them is to use them in a couple of data loggers I'm currently using Arduinos for, but would like to integrate video storage along with the logged data - I've also got a couple of these on the way too: [http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ite...](http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=200674582974) for the same reason.

</comment><comment><USER3> Minimal case, plug pack, rollup waterproof keyboard, distro that boots straight to Lisp (CL, DrScheme, whatever) ... and you have a modern equivalent of a C64 for teaching kids to code.

<comment><USER4> Why would you need a C64 equivalent to teach anyone to code?

IMO, cost (not counting 3rd world countries) is not the inhibiting factor of why kids don't code. It's motivation. At no point in history has it been easier to learn to code than it is now.

The attraction of Pi isn't in attracting people to learn programming. Simply put, it's an affordable computer in a small form factor that runs Linux.</comment></comment>


Product. Conversion. Scale - <AUTHOR> http://www.stubbleblog.com/index.php/2011/09/product-conversion-scale/

<comment><USER2> Remember that Tony's doing this stuff in <http://Lift.do> out of Obvious. He's to polite to mention it in the post, so i figured i'd mention it here.

</comment><comment><USER3> Like the idea of focus on a single core progression for a startup. Very much like the list of Gotchas and Edge Cases. My favorite:

>5\. Getting Test Users. I often hear people rationalize a PR push as the only way they can get enough users to test product market fit. ... The solution isn't PR, it's go to some events and make some friends in that market.

"Go to some events, make some friends."

</comment><comment><USER4> This is the single best _concise_ description of the steps to grow a startup. Nice job, Tony.

Only one thing to add. As my co-founder put it...

"The one thing missing is to get basic validation before coding via mockups. I think that's super key especially for devs who are looking for any excuse to avoid taking to potential customers and to get on with coding."

<comment><USER5> That's a good point. I wish there was a little bit more talk in lean about validating before coding. I don't think Customer Development and MVP covers the range of things people do here.

<comment><USER6> This book: <http://www.runningleanhq.com/> called Running Lean is a concise how-to for Lean Srartups. I think it is the only book that gives you real specifics.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This title should be changed to "Lean Startup Distilled". Direct and to the point about being Lean.

<comment><USER5> I'm glad you got that. I cut out a part about how this approach explains why Lean is called Lean. It doesn't mean cheap, it means spend your money and time efficiently.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Another clear, incisive article from Tony. Everyone's subscribed to him already, right?

<comment><USER5> Thanks Ben!</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Is this even possible? - <AUTHOR>

Every morning about 6 am, Hawaii  time, the internet seems to slow way down. Is it possible that because it is 9 am on the West Coast and 12 pm on the East Coast that there is a surge of use on those coasts that slows it down? <comment><USER2> It's possible, but you'd need to measure it somehow. If your hunch is correct, then the effect should not show up on weekends and holidays. One low-impact way to measure it might be to write a little script that pings a few specific hosts every minute or 5 minutes and tracks the reply time. Run it for a few weeks and graph the results.

I remember years back working for an electricity generator and wondering why we had a spike every evening between 5 and 6 - sure, I thought, with people leaving work consumption should be down? turns out that electric kettles and domestic televisions draw more current in the aggregate than office equipment.

</comment><comment><USER3> It's not completely impossible in theory (lots of people all doing something at once could have an effect on common infrastructure), but since nobody else seems to have ever noticed the phenomenon — even those for whom the effects would be occurring locally rather than diluted by distance — it doesn't appear to be the case. Maybe your ISP takes the time to do maintenance and diagnostics. That seems more likely.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Thanks I'll do more checking.</comment>


The world's most liveable cities - <AUTHOR> http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2016/08/daily-chart-14 <comment><USER2> > Ten of these cities are in western Europe, notably Paris, which has suffered > multiple terrorist attacks.

This seems incredibly misguided and really makes me question the entire ranking. It's one thing for the populace to irrationally fear terrorist attacks, it's another thing to codify that fear into an actual ranking without considering the vanishingly small chance of being affected.

The likelihood of you being a victim of a terrorist attack in any western city is negligible. It should simply not be a factor in considering where to live, full stop. The ranking doesn't include the percentage chance of an air conditioner falling on you, so it shouldn't consider terrorism.

<comment><USER3> On the flip side, while the actual _risk_ we all agree is low, that's not the same as the human fear of it.

Even if illogical, given two otherwise equal cities, which is more "livable": the one with a stable and open atmosphere, or the one with scared citizens, under a state of emergency, where the country at large is implementing knee- jerk responses against the "others" who are related to this attack (referencing the current burkini bans rolling across France).

<comment><USER2> That's a good point that I hadn't considered.

It would be much better if they directly measured the impact of this on cities though, particularly because the reaction to terrorist attacks is vastly different (see the difference in German and French reactions, for example). In fact, it could then penalize heavy-handed responses even when there _hasn 't_ been a terrorist attack. For example, the US maintains some draconian security measures and a police state mentality even though there haven't been any recent terror attacks (does every single MTA rider really need to be constantly reminded to watch suspicious packages?).

For that matter, I'm confident that you're quite safe from terrorism in Dubai. But the ranking should really include the dramatic security apparatus/environment which is in place to maintain that safety.

<comment><USER4> Almost per definition, most of the damage done is the public reaction. In that sense, the US is affected much more than countries who have been targeted much more recently.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I used to live in Melbourne and now live in Tokyo. I really enjoyed my time in Melbourne, but I don't see how the two can be seen as comparable in crime or public transport.

Tokyo's rail system is fantastic and cheap. I can get to basically anywhere within the city in a very short amount of time. I used to have trouble with train delays and cancellations in Melbourne, and the timetable was more a rough estimate than anything that could be counted on. Don't know if it's changed that much since I left ten years ago.

And to me, safety at night is quite different. I feel safe going out here; whether it was true or not I can not say the same about my time in Melbourne.

<comment><USER6> I imagine there's a certain level of crime/transport where there's almost no distinction between the two. The truth is Melbourne is a safe modern western city, which is to say practically 0 or min() as far as cities go.

I've only moved to Melbourne 2 years ago.

I understand the transport thing compared to Tokyo, but again, I imagine there a level where the scale tops out. Melbournians love to bitch about their transport, and the train capacity isn't keeping up with the growth in the burbs, but live within the inside of the tram network and you're basically set and timetable-less. Plus we do have the free tram zone and all night transport now.

Of course, I tell people there are two Melbournes. Zone 1: transport everywhere, compact walking city. Zone 2: suburban sprawl, connected by single train lines into the city and free ways.

Live in Zone 1 and you generally don't go to Zone 2. Live in Zone 2, and thank god you don't have a Sydney commute our house prices :p

<comment><USER7> I'm not sure I agree about the crime or at least it doesn't match my experience

I think part of the issue might be what crime brings up in your mind.

AFAICT in pretty much any "western" city (Paris, London, Brussels, Hamburg, NYC, LA, SF) the odds of having something stolen are extremely high. In SF if you leave something visible in your car overnight my experience is the odds are greater than 1 in 2 that the next morning you'll find your car window has been bashed in and the item/items stolen. In Paris if you look away from your purse stuff will be stolen. In Brussels if you sit at a bench and put your bag under the bench someone will reach under from the other side and steal your bag.

So far in Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, Singapore that doesn't seem to be the case.

So while the odds of me getting hurt in one city vs another might be low the odds of me experiencing theft seem much higher in some of those top cities than others.

I'd be curious to know how Australia's and Canada's cities do along that dimension. Can you leave your laptop at a Starbucks unattended for an 10-60 mins and not have it stolen?

<comment><USER8> Your SF example is absurd. Half the cars with stuff in them at night are _not_ broken into. My experience in Bernal Heights is not like you describe. I agree about Tokyo. On the other hand, here in Maui, where I live now, I had a pair of flip-flops stolen during a 20 minute beach walk.

<comment><USER7> Maybe Bernal Heights is different but you walk down 18th next to Dolores park and often see the piles of glass every 3-4 parking spots. Same on Folsom in SOMA. Same on 11th. Same on Franklin. The same is also bad in LA but SF seems worse.

But hey, you don't have to take my word for it

[http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/04/san- fran...](http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/04/san-francisco- crime-policy/479880/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> It's very easy to recognize a bogus livable cities ranking: if it doesn't include a single Swiss city in its Top 10, like the list above, look elsewhere. Economist Intelligence Unit, a body that compiled the list above tend to be heavily skewed towards Anglo-Saxon countries and doesn't get any money for its lists as far as I know. This means that they can be very much like Monocle and just include in the list the cities they themselves like (Monocle constantly puts Copenhagen very highly in their lists). Fine for them, as long as they don't sell the list for hard currency.

There _is_ a company though that sells their livable cities rankings for hard currency, and this company is Mercer. Mercer has its own very systematic methodology fo measuring livability and because of that multinational companies use Mercer's lists to come up with salaries they pay for the same job description in different countries. Mercer's list ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercer_Quality_of_Living_Surve...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercer_Quality_of_Living_Survey)) for several years in a row is topped with Vienna and only contains less that a third of non-European cities in its top 30, which absolutely correctly reflects the relatively low quality of life anywhere in the world outside of developed parts of Europe.

<comment><USER10> "It's very easy to recognize a bogus livable cities ranking: if it doesn't include a single Swiss city in its Top 10, like the list above, look elsewhere."

Zurich and Geneva ranked 10 and 12 last year. To not put those cities in the top 10 seems reasonable. Being small and expensive usually reflects badly in rankings.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Can't say for other cities, but Vancouver is quite liveable if you gathered your wealth elsewhere. The median household salary is 22nd Canada wide in 2010[1]. The housing price is world renowned.

I wonder if there's a list for world's most liveable cities for young people. Where technologies are rapidly being adopted by both the community and policy makers, knowledgeable government, less presence of established powers/influencers who prevent progress.

And how hard to create such a city from scratch?

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Median_household_incom...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Median_household_income_of_cities_in_Canada)

<comment><USER12> Agreed. Vancouver is only "liveable" if you are extremely established. Wages are pathetic. Its a city full of investors and not much else. It isn't a place for anyone young who doesn't have a steady trust income.

On the other hand, much of what makes Vancouver liveable has little to do with the city and more to do with the province and country. Get out of Vancouver, to Squamish, Chilliwack or even to Bowen and you can afford to work.

<comment><USER13> Hmmm, lots of not-extremely-established people call Vancouver their home. I really wonder how many people here are basing their opinions just on trendy news pieces on Vancouver's housing. Pretty disappointing.

<comment><USER11> For sure. If they've been living here for some years. The housing crisis wasn't this bad until maybe last 5 years. But it has prevented not only young talents coming to the city, but also small-middle businesses flourishing. As the list is published yearly, shouldn't it reflect up-to-date situations? And Vancouver's renting market is going frenzy at the moment[1], is there a single option left for young people to live here with peace of mind?

[1] [http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/vancouver- ren...](http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/vancouver-rental- market-bidding-war-1.3680027)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Well... I moved out of Stockholm because living in a big city means dealing with lots of things that will just steal your lifetime. The commutes were horrible, and housing was expensive. I now live outside a town of 120.000 people with big forrests nearby, and a 17 minute commute to work. Our house cost one million SEK less than our 60m2 apartment.

I couldn't imagine living in a big city anymore. Just moving from a big city gave me more than an hour less commutes, 200m to a big forrest (as in I could easily walk a day in any direction without crossing a road worth being called a road) and a 1500m2 garden where my dog and child can enjoy themselves.

Sure, my salary is a bit less, but so are my costs. My loans are lower and cheaper, I pay much less for transportation and counting my commute I work one hour less per day.

</comment><comment><USER15> Acquiring wealth is certainly a crucial attribute on making a city "livable", and it's completely left out here.

Just because ISIS mentions a cities name, does not really mean it makes the city less livable. This article isn't Economist worthy.

<comment><USER16> The more you know about any particular subject, you start to realize that the Economist is not all that great and it really makes you question what they know about things you might not know a lot about.

<comment><USER17> The Economist is following mainstream journalism in general, then.

<comment><USER18> sadly yes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> From the survey's website:

> The latest findings of The Economist Intelligence Unit's Global Liveability > Ranking – which provides scores for lifestyle challenges in 140 cities > worldwide

140 cities is nothing when it comes to deciding "World's most liveable cities" \- it's not even one city per country!

</comment><comment><USER20> Being from Harare, it's good to know that 1) We were worth a survey 2) We have overtaken Lagos, Algiers and Tripoli.

Though i think both are lies. Things are tough in Harare, but who knows, I haven't been to the other 3.

<comment><USER21> The worst stable city is usually better than the best of the unstable. All the other 3 there is low level civil war going on.

In Harare - if you do not cross zanu-pf you at least could try to make a living.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> The liveable cities lists are never accurate. It's extremely subjective. People have very different priorities when it comes to what city is 'ideal' for them. You have to visit them to know for sure - A big part of it is that people in different countries tend to have vastly different mentalities (sometimes it's hard to put your finger on it) but it can affect the whole experience of living in a particular city.

From that list, I've been to Melbourne, Perth and Vienna; Melbourne and Perth were fine but they are nowhere near my favourite cities to live.

I will agree that Vienna is really nice though - It's clean, orderly, has a good culture, people are very friendly, food is great, it's affordable (especially accommodation) and public utilities are great.

<comment><USER23> I completely agree. Being able to escape the city and get to the mountains is important for me, but that sort of thing is never taken into account. Cost of living is often given as a reason, yet they usually fail to factor in the level of wages.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Since the main audience in HN are techies. I think if we put tech jobs and startups as part of the equation, those rankings will change dramatically.

<comment><USER25> As a techie in Melbourne I can tell you I stand by my city being a great place to live and work for techies.

<comment><USER26> Which companies in Melbourne do you think are the most interesting, from a hacker point of view?

I know REA have a good engineering focus but there must be others

<comment><USER27> Carsales.com.au is mostly a PHP shop, if that floats your boat. REA is a ruby shop.

There are plenty of other smaller companies doing interesting work there, however!

Source: was living there 12 months ago

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Melbourne's really liveable - if you own a house already. If you don't then you can look forward to renting for the rest of your life.

<comment><USER29> It is nice here (as a visitor anyway) but I checked house prices and it is not that bad depending where you want to live. Personally I like visiting cities but would not want to live in them: for Melbourne, if I had to live here, I would buy in Olinda and drive to the office. Then again I would never go 5 days a week to the office, more likely I would plan all meetings in one day and work from home the rest.

<comment><USER30> Olinda is way too far out to make it into the city with any regularity.

After living in various locations all over Melbourne, I now have being within 10 mins walk of public transport as a MUST. (Now I have 2 tram stops almost on my doorstep)

<comment><USER31> Ah someone from my area - I commute into south bank everyday from Ferntree Gully. I actually don't mind the train trip in. It's a bit further to a train station from Olinda though (assuming that was how you travelled in).

<comment><USER30> There's a suprising number of tech people out in FG/UFG/Belgrave. At friend's parties out that way there is always a significant number of people in IT.

In any case, my point was more about the importance of being close to public transport: Ferntree Gully has a train station, while Olinda does not.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> It'd be nice to re-calculate this chart with a sixth dimension added: median income divided by cost-of-living.

<comment><USER33> That does not help at all unfortunately because cost of living is just too different for different types of people. Eg: families vs single developers in their twenties.

<comment><USER32> How is a family a "type of person"? Cost-of-living is per-capita.

<comment><USER33> Because two single programmers behave completely different than two programmers that happen to be married and have children. Different taxation, different activities, different emphasis of what is important and what is not.

I cannot stress enough how different my life was when I was single vs a married family man.

<comment><USER32> Why do people constantly group "married" and "has children" into one change, and then assume that it's being single that's the strange case? A two-income household containing two roommates vs. a married couple vs. an unmarried couple in a stable relationship don't look all that different economically. Adding children is what causes all the rebudgeting and tax-breaks and lifestyle changes. You can get away with just doing cost-of-living analysis once for "median parent" and once for "median non-parent" without just getting noise.

<comment><USER33> I just compared two cases. There are many more.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> I can vouch for Vienna. It's an amazing city and it's getting more international by the day. It's very affordable still and has a great public transport system and airport.

Main downside are the Austrians there ;) But at 40% foreign born population that is changing :D

<comment><USER18> I live in Graz and prefer it over Vienna... though doubtless a portion of that preference is enabled by the fact that Vienna exists :-)

<comment><USER33> Oh Graz is awesome and even with it being such a tiny place it's still reachable for international people.

I think the problem that Graz has is that Austria is too small of a country to support multiple large cities and Vienna overshadows it. Switzerland has a similar problem but there is no city on the size of Vienna that would absorb everything.

<comment><USER34> Not only that, what often gets overlooked is that Vienna is the second largest German speaking metro area in the world actually.

Graz is nice to visit though (also great tech schools in Styria in general) and it's pretty close too so that's cool :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> > Kiev, the only European city in the bottom ten, performs better for health > care and education but has a low stability score due to Ukraine's ongoing > conflict with Russia.

What? What is "low stability"?

<comment><USER36> Risk of war with Russia.

<comment><USER37> Can anyone in Kiev confirm whether this is what local people feel, or is this just the way the west sees it?

<comment><USER38> I just returned from Kiev. There is a certain degree of uncertainty that local people feel, but it's mostly related to weak local economy rather than the war. It surprises me that The Economist rated the city so low -- as long as you stay in its central part it's a very nice European city -- beautiful, clean, with lots of cafes and restaurants and decent public transit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Relevant for the HN crowd - Vienna at #2 in this list will likely also get much more interesting very soon as our new "Trudeau" just negotiated a substantial startup initiative.

</comment><comment><USER39> Toronto and Vancouver both suffer from the same problem as SV. Housing is out of control and if you are a person below 25, it really hard to lay any routes and save some money at the same time. Toronto is an amazing city for young people (I enjoy it more than SF), but when it comes to Tech jobs, salaries are lagging, especially at the entry level.

</comment><comment><USER40> I live in Melbourne. Seems quite livable. It's fairly big at about 50 miles across depending on how you measure it.

<comment><USER41> Can I measure it in miles?

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> About the economist intelligence unit "We are outspoken in our views. Unlike our sister company, The Economist newspaper, much of our work is bespoke for clients and remains confidential. But we share the same fierce passion for independence and integrity. Clients work with us because we are not afraid to tell them what we really think. We never pander to internal agendas or work to buttress some preconceived strategy. We have no vested interest in any specific recommendation—we do not undertake follow-on work to help clients to implement strategies or plan M&A. We just analyse the facts and present our conclusions. We believe that our clients execute better strategies as a result.

</comment><comment><USER42> This is a confusing metric. If I compare two cities at the top of the list I know well and have spent much time in, Vancouver and Calgary, to other cities I know well, I have a difficult time explaining to myself why those are among the most livable cities in the world. Vancouver is a lovely city, if you have money. Calgary appeals to my mountain West upbringing, but it has most of the downsides of mountain West cities in the US, which are not insignificant.

Those cities are not unlivable by any means but "most livable" seems like a stretch. Obviously their measures are quite different than what some people might assume.

<comment><USER43> Yeah, "livable" is inherently tied to some kind of value system. It's kind of a useless metric unless they explain in detail their values. "Safety" and "environment" mean totally different things to totally different people. This would be much more interesting if they took, say, three different value systems and did three rankings.

<comment><USER44> > _It 's kind of a useless metric unless they explain in detail their values_

It's a pity that the Economist didn't put a link right there in the first paragraph about that!

<comment><USER45> Yea they did but they also put it behind a link that requires registration.

Besides, the metric value changes depending on who you are and what kind of income you can generate based on the job you can obtain and what you value the most. This is why I never like articles claim to know what's best for everyone.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> Happy to see Adelaide in there. It is a wonderful city.

Objectively I imagine Adelaide is actually the better city, for public transport and costs and such.

But Melbourne is just way more interesting. A much richer history, density and diversity of structures and services.

</comment><comment><USER47> It's kinda interestig to read see this type of comparison, but it doesn't really give a good picture for the families living there or someone looking to shift into that city.

According to the footnote in chart, it only measures stablility, infrastructure, education, health care and environment. Is this in the context of a average family with an average income for that city? It's pretty vague.

I grew up in the southern part of suburban Melbourne before shifting to Europe. It was quite a livable city for me, but to get started and to establish yourself in Melbourne is very difficult.

</comment><comment><USER48> I'm surprised Hamburg is the highest rated German city. I haven't spent much time in the country, so maybe some natives can educate me. Köln, Stuttgart, Dresden, and München were far more enjoyable.

<comment><USER49> I'm really surprised that Berlin isn't mentioned. Admittedly, I haven't spent much time in other German cities, but Berlin should be the best in cost of living and also in startups.

</comment></comment><comment><USER50> Economist is my favourite source of news but this ranking is completely BS.

<comment><USER51> Nah, Melbourne ranked #1 seems spot on :-D

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> I'm surprised Calgary didn't suffer in these rankings from its weakening economy and rising crime rate. I mean, things are still pretty good, but they're worse now than a year ago.

<comment><USER53> Calgary's average December temperature is −6.8 °C. That's a challenge compared to Melbourne or even Vancouver.

</comment></comment><comment><USER54> Don't know other cities but Istanbul definitely deserves its place in less liveable list.

</comment><comment><USER55> Where can one get the full list? I downloaded the article and it doesn't have it...

<comment><USER56> Looks like you'll have to pay for it. The best I could find was this.

[http://pages.eiu.com/rs/783-XMC-194/images/Liveability_Augus...](http://pages.eiu.com/rs/783-XMC-194/images/Liveability_August2016.pdf?mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiWWpOaE5URmhOV0U0TURZMSIsInQiOiJxQ0NHQlIxdXptVmx2QVFCdCtuWHFCV1Vyb2xqRTdnWXBqalpCZFhYYUE2aFZhdXZIb0FzVVE2SWd4M0I5bXA2TjJyTm14azBwTEJKcjJSWFdnSUVvTWNDN1lZZjNZNW8yajdvMVhEb1lnVT0ifQ%3D%3D)

<comment><USER55> Yeah, same here, sucks, interested about the situation in Bay Area from a more 'impartial' point of view.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER57> I find it odd they drop Sydney out of the top 10 due to terrorist threats but keep Toronto and Hamburg.

<comment><USER58> What terrorist activity has occurred in Toronto?

<comment><USER57> Few attempts I guess. I just figured in terms of being a target.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER59> I came across a credit score email online when I was in need for an increase of my score after having issues with lexington law and bieng ripped 3 times trying to get my credit fixed. firstname.lastname@example.com helped me increase my score instantly . they were fast. I can always recommend people with any type of credit issues to them they can increase your score fast.Trust me you will be thankfull for my referraly

</comment><comment><USER60> I don't get how a city like Melbourne can score as highly as it does considering the state of LGBT laws in that country. Surely this has to be taken into consideration.

<comment><USER61> Because the laws are behind what the population thinks I'd suggest. Laws are not always an accurate indication of what the majority of people currently think, although in general this is probably true.</comment></comment>


Why cant Blochchains use a single "Block"? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> This is essentially the same as asking why can't a country only use one person as its president. The idea of blockchain is removing the central authority by letting everyone has a chance to be the authority for a short period of time. If a person stays in authority for too long, the person may be corrupted and threat the entire chain. Therefore we limit her power by only allowing her to govern one block. And switch to a next person for the next block.

</comment><comment><USER3> @billconan is right. Another reason is that it's a lot easier to access individual transactions if you can separate them somehow. A block acts like a page in a physical ledger and makes it easier to find a specific transaction to separate it from those that came before and after it.</comment>


Luck and the entrepreneur, part 1: The four kinds of luck - <AUTHOR> http://blog.pmarca.com/2007/08/luck-and-the-en.html

<comment><USER2> Many intangible things are as important as they are difficult to discuss. An invisible ingredient in success. "You make your own luck".

PG in "Hardest Lessons" described some of it here:

 _"If you lack commitment, you'll just find that for some mysterious reason good things happen to your competitors but not to you. If you lack commitment, it will seem to you that you're unlucky."_

I've had a hell of a time trying to convey this kind of stuff to other people. I've even doubted whether it's possible to convince someone who doesn't "get it". I love Andreesen's post myself, but I fear it's still to abstract to forward to the people I would like to convince.

<comment><USER3> Habit is more important in a successful endeavor than "luck."

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I like pmarca. Luck is not why he is who he is. Here I thought I had about luck few days ago: [http://www.entrepreneur2be.com/2007/07/20/what-luck- really-i...](http://www.entrepreneur2be.com/2007/07/20/what-luck-really-is/)

</comment><comment><USER5> I always appreciate it when folks admit that their success is not completely due to their personal greatness. Humility's one of those signs of 'good people' I really believe in.

</comment><comment><USER6> Another consideration is to creatively use Astrology -- language of stars and psyche to explain the mysteries of one's own life as opposed to luck. Jung describe this as the first form of psychology. (Visionary Activist Astrology by Caroline Casey <http://www.amazon.com>)

<comment><USER7> Na, I prefer good ole fashion palm reading with a mix of the ouiji board.

<comment><USER6> I agree, pop astrology is NOT what I was suggesting, it's the metaphysical science I open myself up to explore. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astrology>

<comment><USER8> sorry didnt meant to down vote your comment

<comment><USER6> Gotta love it all. ;-D</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Using embedded media previews to get around Twitter's 140 char limit: TwitPNG - <AUTHOR> http://twitpng.mrasm.us/

<comment><AUTHOR> I made a proof-of-concept tool that's basically TwitLonger but renders the excess as an image -- basically, it takes advantage of Twitter's new in-line media previews to "break" the 140-character limit. The images show up as previews in the timeline for people who use the browser interface, thus cluttering up the timeline even more than if they'd just let users tweet longer tweets. Mostly made as a joke, though it turned into something that's almost kinda-useful. Please enjoy.</comment>


Surprisingly, Voat (Reddit Alternative) Runs on IIS (ASP.NET) - <AUTHOR> http://builtwith.com/?https%3a%2f%2fvoat.co

<comment><USER2> Voat is a media aggregator and community platform developed in C# ASP.NET MVC 5. Dependencies and attributions Voat uses SQL server and .NET framework 4.5.

Quoted from: [https://github.com/voat/voat](https://github.com/voat/voat)

<comment><AUTHOR> Woah, cool. Didn't realize it was on GitHub!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> It must be why it keeps crashing.</comment>


Speed Up Your JavaScript - Google Tech Talk with Nicholas C. Zakas - <AUTHOR> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHtdZgou0qU

<comment><USER2> For people developing for newer browsers only (e.g. browser extensions or corporate), I'm curious to know how many of the guidelines still apply. e.g. are forEach/map slow or are the anonymous functions inlined? Also, I'm surprised that he says that setting style properties one at a time is slow; I would have thought that reflow happens lazily (at the next read of a layout property or on the next idle spot on the event loop).

My main takeaway was that HTMLCollections (including the return value of getElementsByTagName, form.elements, etc.) are evil. Looking at the jsdom source, the one thing that really bugs me is that they have to maintain all these live lists on every change.

</comment><comment><USER3> A good complement to JavaScript The Good Parts, it is from 2009 so missed some of the browser optimisations.

</comment><comment><USER4> I thought this talk was a good refresher, especially on reflows. The DocumentFragment is also particularly useful when it comes to performance tweaks.</comment>


Boris Johnson breaks silence to set out leadership platform - <AUTHOR> http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jun/26/boris-johnson-breaks-silence-to-set-out-leadership-platform <comment><USER2> Johnson's statement in full:

[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/26/i-cannot- stress-t...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/26/i-cannot-stress-too- much-that-britain-is-part-of-europe--and-alw/)

</comment><comment><USER3> I truly wonder whether the population of London will ever forgive Johnson for his part in the referendum.

It may will prove significant in elections and referendums to come.

<comment><USER4> Britain has never really considered itself part of Europe, they've historically taken amusement in the irony of how they refer to "Europe" and "the continent" to refer to not the UK, as though they're not part of it. They don't learn the languages of Europe more than what's needed for a vacation, at best. They didn't join the EEC, which certainly looked a lot like they wanted to use their pound sterling more than to help the community. And now of course Brexit, which makes no sense at all from a rational perspective.

The argument of doing what's best for everyone is just not something that resonates in their politics, much in the same way that's it's not a mainstream value in the USA either. Rather it's about "what's in it for me". Those are not the values of the majority in continental Europe thankfully, asking the question of what's best for everyone resonates stronger.

<comment><USER5> I don't think it's quite true that there's a big divide between the social democracy of the continent versus the individualism of the UK. Both regions are significantly more committed to social democracy than the US, where universal healthcare is still massively controversial. And a very similar strain of nationalistic tribalism is gaining currency on both sides of the Channel. The British don't have any sort of monopoly on Euroskepticism and traditional ethnocentrism.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> In other words "you'll be able to have your cake and eat it, too". A whole bunch of bold promises this man can't possibly have a credible plan for being able to keep. The EU is going to be less than interested in accommodating all these lofty promises.

We're in a volatile time in the developed world. Economic liberalization has brought about a great deal of progress in the past 30 years. Yet, for a bunch of reasons -- globalization, automation, immigration, reduction of discrimination -- the social contract with the majority middle class has broken down. Where once there was a time that if you were born certain shades of skin color in certain countries, some level of economic superiority was your birthright, it's pretty clear that those days are numbered.

I personally think all of these forces of change are ultimately good things. The old system was immoral in a number of ways. However, I can also empathize with the very real loss of societal standing, even though the plight of the majority middle class is _still_ better today than those they feel are gaining prestige at their expense. It's no surprise that this is manifesting as a rogue wave of discontent against the elites and the power structures they control.

The saddest part is that, both in Britain and America, sleazy opportunists are successfully selling the notion that the genie can be put back in the bottle, that the way forwards is by moving backward. This would require re-oppressing the groups of people that rather invisibly propped up the prosperity of the majority in the past, and the opportunists and their supporters are becoming more bold in acknowledging this intention.

The other insurgent movement, embodied by Corbyn and Sanders, respectively, is calling for an explicitly egalitarian social contract, largely embracing multiculturalism (although less so pan-nationalism). It's interesting that there seems to be a very deep young-old divide between this approach and the reactionary approach. Even more so given that the youth hasn't even had the chance to experience the broad-based prosperity in their adult lives that the previous generation seems to have squandered.

On both sides of the Atlantic, the status quo neoliberal politicians have clearly been inept at addressing the concerns of the future, even as they've been largely effective at producing apparent macroeconomic progress. But the disconnect couldn't be more apparent for the average citizens outside the economic and political capitols. Up till now, the traditional elites been able to stay at the helm, bickering about the same old shit that used to motivate voters, but we're beginning to see the stranglehold of the duopoly falter. I think what lies beyond is basically a tri-partite battle for the future between nationalist protectionism, democratic socialism, and neoliberalism.

What's frightening is that it's far from clear that we'll end up with forward- looking governance. It seems like the interim will be chaotic at the very least, even if we avoid the slide into some kind of new fascism.</comment>


Dmarc Analyser Aquired by Mimecast - <AUTHOR> https://www.dmarcanalyzer.com/mimecast-announces-acquisition-of-dmarc-analyzer/ <comment><USER2> Would be interesting how much they paid.</comment>


People Strongly Against GMOs Had Shakier Understanding of Food Science - happy-go-lucky https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2019/01/26/687852367/people-strongly-against-gmos-had-shakier-understanding-of-food-science-study-fin <comment><USER2> First time I heard the term GMO I thought it was a joke, I mean just about every major crop and animal and we eat has been genetically modified by us quite extensively. Its normally referred to with a more harmless sounding name though, domestication.

I understand being skeptical and wanting proper over site and testing but it seems to be an irrational fear of how the organism is modified but not if its modified. Guys in labs coats bad, guys in overalls good.

The truth is there is a continuum of techniques we use to modify organisms genomes from selective breeding, to marker assisted breeding, to mutagenisis to targeted gene insertion. What health reason would drive us to ban one while allowing another?

<comment><USER3> It's genetically modified through artificial and natural selection in sense of naturally occuring mutations in response to environment change.

It's very different from what people will do in laboratory.

Natural process is quite slow and gives you enough time to drop adverse crop.

Both can't be same.

<comment><USER4> > _It 's very different from what people will do in laboratory._

It's really the same process, with but with noise removed. Genes are genes, they do not carry metadata that say they were introduced in a lab. "Natural" vs "artificial" is a kind of magical thinking one would hope humanity would cure itself of by now. Hell, if you want to see true masters of targeted genetic modification, look no further than viruses.

> _Natural process is quite slow and gives you enough time to drop adverse > crop._

"Artificial" process can notice and drop "adverse" crop faster. Also, the way all organisms live and reproduce, genes not fit for the environment they're in will get dropped over time. Living things have an energy economy in them; enabling one feature usually means taking away from others.

This really deserves an Abstruse Goose reference:

[https://abstrusegoose.com/215](https://abstrusegoose.com/215)

<comment><USER5> >It's really the same process, with but with noise removed

If it is "the same process", then how are we able to make a distinction between domestication and biolistics or crispr?

Even disregarding the literal human action part, the most notable difference is that the latter allows for genes to be moved between organisms even if the two organisms would not have done so even if given millions of years without human interaction. (Ex: Spider genes in goats).

I feel this defense of GMO's is weak, as is the defense of "It's the same food chemically." as some other's may claim. If it were actually the same outcome, then it would be useless as a technique.

<comment><USER4> > _Even disregarding the literal human action part, the most notable > difference is that the latter allows for genes to be moved between organisms > even if the two organisms would not have done so even if given millions of > years without human interaction. (Ex: Spider genes in goats)._

There are really no such things as "spider genes" or "goat genes" or "fish genes", there are only genes. Some sequences are found in one species and not the other, but they do not carry a tag that says where they came from. It's akin to copying functions between programs. You may say you copied over the implementation of e.g. incremental search from Vim, but that doesn't suddenly taint your program with "unnatural vimness" (license considerations notwithstanding).

> _I feel this defense of GMO 's is weak, as is the defense of "It's the same > food chemically." as some other's may claim. If it were actually the same > outcome, then it would be useless as a technique._

It's more akin this: quicksort and random sort give the exact same outcome in the end, but one of those processes is vastly more efficient at achieving the goal.

<comment><USER5> You're conflating general descriptions of algorithms with implementations of said algorithms. I disagree; an implementation of an algorithm CAN very much so be tied to one particular program. If you ignore function call side-effects entirely (cache states, timing delays, modified globals, etc.), then you would be able to transplant functions from one program to another freely. Essentially, to make functions that are fitting to quickly transplant into other programs (in libraries or not), it actually takes intentional design to make sure their side-effects are limited in scope and predictable.

I think this is revealing of an implicit assumption that we disagree on. I do not accept this idea that genes, in a sense, are like functional-programming functions. Considering the fact that there exist genes that express only in the presence of other genes or specific environmental factors, its very likely that genes DO have side-effects in our metaphor of genes as functions.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> There's nothing inherently wrong with manipulating genes in farming. However, there are a bunch of misguided economics and motives that are problematic that lead to abuse of land at a very large scale.

Monocultures are a problem and having more drought or pest resistant crops is not a solution to industrial scale farming turning perfectly good farm land into desert.

Why is it that out of gazillions of species, most fish that we eat are on of just four species. Likewise, why do we have to rely on just a handful of crops for most of our grains and vegetables? This basically arises from the notion that with the technologies available to us mid last century, those were the easiest ones to industrialize. We fertilized and plowed land at an industrial scale, we dealt with pests using pesticides, and used GMO to make sure that our crops and nothing else would grow on the land.

Organic farming is a bit of a romantic ideal. It's basically an expensive way of small scale farming using our per-industrial technology to farm the good old way. The produce however, can be delicious; which (along with all the ecological feel good vibes) is why it is popular. Additionally, people are rediscovering foods that just haven't been in scope for mass production.

However, it's high tech cousin of sustainable farming by using land more smartly and using technology to monitor and restore soil in a data driven way is not naive. It works, it scales, and can be highly competitive and you get much of the same benefits as with organic farming. There is a lot of innovation in this space. Essentially, you can reverse much of the effects of destructive farming practices of the last centuries and create soil that produces high yield crops without relying on fertilizers, GMO, or pesticides. Turns out nature is pretty awesome when you guide it a little. Many farmers are discovering that they don't need to buy a lot of things from large corporations to grow stuff. If you manage the land right, you don't need fertilizers, pesticides, or indeed GMO.

</comment><comment><USER7> >GMOs are widely considered safe by scientists,...

(Irish university scientists) willingness to buy GM baby food? (41.4% would buy; 45% would not; 13.6% not sure)

 _" 4\. Willingness of scientists to buy GM food : Respondents were asked how willing they would be to buy certain types of genetically engineered food if they were at the same price as similar non-GM products. The axiom that those buying food would do so to consume it was drawn. These results are shown in Table II. Of the respondents 60.4 per cent would buy genetically modified food items if they were the same price as non-GM food with the notable exception of baby food (41.4 percent would buy; 45percent would not; 13.6 percent not sure). T-tests carried out showed that when the means were compared, the drop in willingness to buy GM baby food was statistically significant (p < 0.01). This drop is an interesting insight into risk analysis of the scientist."_

"Genetically modified food issues: Attitudes of Irish university scientists - Shane H. Morris Catherine C. Adley" (2000)

[http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/00070700010362040](http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/00070700010362040)

</comment><comment><USER8> That doesn't make GMOs good.

A lot of GMOs are designed so that you can dump herbicides and pesticides on them. That is a problem.

<comment><USER9> +1 there is a weed killer that can only be used with specific GMO. The weed killer can not be in drinking water but is allowed in Zucchini, lettuce, etc. Avoid GMOs and avoid the weed killer.

<comment><USER10> Avoid the GMO and _eat a different weed killer_. FTFY.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I always felt people who were against GMOs believed in the right thing for the wrong reason. The problem is not directly from consuming a genetically modified piece of corn, that seems fine. The problem instead is all of the baggage associated with growing 1000s of corn plants that are genetically identical. Pesticide overuse, soil degradation, etc.

<comment><USER4> I feel the exact opposite - that people believe the wrong thing (there's a problem with GMOs) for the right reason (business practices of companies). Note that the business practices people mind are not tied to GMOs, and affect all "natural" agriculture the same.

<comment><USER12> I don't think that's true, otherwise what's the benefit of GMOs if business practices stay the same?

I can already think of a counter example: GMO plants are often more resistant to herbicides which makes it more profitable to overuse herbicides.

Whether this is good or bad doesn't matter. Your argument is based around the fact that business practices don't change.

<comment><USER4> > _I don 't think that's true, otherwise what's the benefit of GMOs if > business practices stay the same?_

Increased yields, increased disease resistance, decreased maintenance (e.g. pesticide use).

> _GMO plants are often more resistant to herbicides which makes it more > profitable to overuse herbicides._

 _Why_ are GMO plants made more resistant to herbicides? In order to enable more efficient utilization of them. For instance, AFAIK Roundup is less toxic than most other stuff people spray on plants, and it _replaces_ the use of that other stuff.

<comment><USER11> Round up is toxic. The active ingredient is the only ingredient that is tested for toxicity - it only makes up ~30% of the mixture. The other chemicals in the solution that help the active ingredient bind to organic matter is most definitely toxic, but conveniently ignored in toxicity studies. Tao Orion has a really great perspective changing book on this: Beyond the War on Invasive Species

[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25782048-beyond-the- war-...](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25782048-beyond-the-war-on- invasive-species)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> [https://twitter.com/nntaleb/status/987700101090086912](https://twitter.com/nntaleb/status/987700101090086912)

<comment><USER14> People take educated risks all the time, we do not calculate (and sometimes can't) every possible outcome of actions, saying we should stand still to avoid anything going wrong is just regressive at best. If you follow that train of thought you should use no modern medicine, the complexity of a living being is too high. We should and can take heavily educated guesses to improve our state of being.

<comment><USER15> In highly complex systems, educated guesses are no better than random picks. You just have to be aware what kind of system you're dealing with, and be prepared to deal with the consequences. Also, keep in mind time horizons – very important.

<comment><USER4> That's nonsense. Regardless of complexity of the system, a single bit of knowledge in your educated guess cuts the space of possible choices in half. Even a few bits of knowledge can let you avoid dangers that random selection will reliably hit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> There's a lot happening in this industry and even I group "GM" in with unripe hemp-thistle-core "ripen on the shelf" tomatoes. GM wasn't introduced for better tasting healthier produce. GM is used to product more resilient longer shelf live produce.

Don't be surprised when pseudoscience believing corporate-cynical customers don't trust the newest food tech, when it was only developed to increase corporate profits in the first place.

Maybe people just want what they think is 'natural' with the understanding that breeding is different than Genetic Modification. One works with the tools nature created the other is playing God.

<comment><USER4> > _Don 't be surprised when pseudoscience believing corporate-cynical > customers don't trust the newest food tech, when it was only developed to > increase corporate profits in the first place._

I'm not surprised, because this topic has exactly zero to do with science, health, or truth. It's all about trust issues. About abuse on one end used by the other side to fertilize the public perception with bullshit.

Alas, I wish people complaining about "chemicals" in food and "ripen on the shelf" tomatoes and stuff would realize how big a logistic hurdle it is to feed 7 billion people. All those inventions developed to make food live longer on the shelf (and in trucks) is part of what enables you and me to be a programmer, instead of a farmer.

> _Maybe people just want what they think is 'natural' with the understanding > that breeding is different than Genetic Modification. One works with the > tools nature created the other is playing God._

By those standards almost no technology should be allowable. Floods are the tools nature created; putting up dams is playing God. Lightning is the tool nature created, electrical generators is playing God.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> The original promise of GMOs was food products healthier for the environment utilizing less pesticides. The real world application of GMOs fails to deliver on this promise, utilizing greater quantities of pesticides placing us in a worse situation than we were before they were developed. GMOs have typically resorted to exploitive and predatory business practices which fostered negative implications for the farming industry as a whole.

<comment><USER4> > _The real world application of GMOs fails to deliver on this promise, > utilizing greater quantities of pesticides_

AFAIK the whole point of pesticide-resistance GMOs is precisely to use _less_ pesticide, and of a _less toxic_ kind, than in case of regular farming.

> _GMOs have typically resorted to exploitive and predatory business practices > which fostered negative implications for the farming industry as a whole._

s/GMOs/GMO-employing companies/, which is essentially large agricultural companies.

Alas, if I'm to believe the HN thread from couple of days ago[0], the main issues people blame on GMOs don't exist (lack of genetic diversity), or aren't really a property of GMOs in the first place (lack of "seed saving") - <AUTHOR> (including IP protection) apply to "normal" or even "organic" farming as well.

\--

[0] - [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18923957](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18923957)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> The only thing I have ever found really objectionable about GMOs is the so- called Terminator Gene, a way to prevent plant reproduction by making seeds sterile. Monsanto has promised not to use the technique, but its existence is still frightening; not merely from an "IP-protection" perspective, but from possible military or terroristic use as well.

<comment><USER19> By its nature, a terminator gene does not spread very well. Even if the gene manages to cross pollinate to other plants (which it probably will), it still won't go viral because the infected plants would be (relatively) sterile.

What is more scary is some of the mosquito killing genes that are being developed. Those are actually being designed to spread throughout entire species of Mosquitos, despite making them infertile. This is a far more difficult problem that a simple terminator gene.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Curious how people would react to the article if author revealed corporate backing

</comment><comment><USER21> I often wonder, is it the case that strongly held views are correlated with poor understanding of the topic? I mean there is the Dunning Kruger effect, but if I understand correctly that shows a correlation between belief of ability and actual ability (though, not a linear function ;-) ). What I'm interested in is the estimate of certainty. Do people with less knowledge tend to have higher levels of certainty about their opinions in that area? In my experience it is true, but I'm not aware of studies that show this.

<comment><USER4> In this case, I feel it's more about narrative lending its strength to beliefs. The narrative of most anti-GMO voices out there is that of evil megacorps playing god, the way "everyone knows" stereotypical evil megacorps would do. It's simple to understand, easy to argue (megacorps are mostly indifferent, which means they do evilish things from time to time), forms a nice feedback loop where diminished trust lends more credence to it, which further diminishes trust. It doesn't matter whether or not it's _true_. Getting to truth means digging into details - trying to understand both biology and economics, both genes and trade treaties. This is a messy process, not many care to even begin to do it.

The same essentially applies to anti-vaxxers too.</comment></comment>


Watch Paul Graham write his latest essay - <AUTHOR> http://etherpad.com/ep/pad/slider/foundervisa <comment><USER2> As a lawyer, I was both fascinated and horrified by the replay.

Imagine a company routinely using EtherPad (really cool, BTW) to create documents -- in the process saving thousands if not millions of interim drafts.

Now imagine the company getting into a lawsuit. Some subset of N documents -- and of all interim-draft snapshots of those N documents that are still in existence -- will have to be screened for possible disclosure to the other side. (There are tools for partially automating this, but lawyers and paralegals will still have to individually look at many documents / drafts.)

In PG's case, there were 2,886 such snapshot drafts for just one document.

Makes me shudder just to think about the legal expense.

<comment><USER2> Another goodie comes to mind:

Imagine that in a lawsuit, PG were to have his deposition taken by the other side's lawyers. The lawyer representing PG or his company would almost certainly insist on prepping him beforehand by reviewing with him, page by page, each of the documents the other side might ask him about. (Failure to prep a witness for deposition can result in the other side's playing a video for the jury, consisting of damaging sound bites harvested from the witness's testimony.)

The lawyer's prep of PG will likely include at least a glance at, and perhaps a discussion of, each of the EtherPad snapshot drafts for each of the documents in 'the PG collection.'

Imagine what a time sink that could turn into.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> This feels like a weird middle ground between voyeurism and watching a master at work.

<comment><USER3> Or a different way to learn some writing skills? At least if you're a terrible writer like me.

But is that still a feature made available only to PG?

<comment><USER4> They could easily release it for everyone, and they probably will at some point, but right now they're busy working on the version that lives inside companies' firewalls:

<http://etherpad.com/ep/about/pricing-eepnet>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> It would be cool if we could see PG (and other good programmers) code with Etherpad. Watching a sophisticate peice of code "evolve" from the first line/function would be fascinating.

</comment><comment><USER6> I liked the evolution of persuasion: it would be easy, just use Erdos numbers ... detailed explanation ... to finally, just hiding the details entirely.

The accelerated replay is a good default. My attention span would require some kind of commentary track if it was less than 200% sped up.

<comment><AUTHOR> _I liked the evolution of persuasion: it would be easy, just use Erdos numbers ... detailed explanation ... to finally, just hiding the details entirely._

The best writing advice I ever received was this: When you are writing for a general audience, any time you find yourself agonizing over the correct way to word a certain detail, delete it entirely.

Extra details scare off casual readers and anyone truly interested in your idea can approach you for a further explanation. On top of that, it's nearly impossible to anticipate how details need to be described to get through to any one individual. If you let that individual come to you first, then you can tailor your response to the way they form their question.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I saw a lot of thoughts getting deleted and never re-appearing again, but I was too slow to grok the significance of his choice to remove them. It occurs to me a person could do some sort of git style display. Anything that's over 5 seconds old is revision 1, and if you edit that later, you see the old crossed out, and the new highlighted. (this would be a mode that could be turned on/off as desired, as it could be distracting) Such a mode would allow a window into the thought processes of the writer, both for the voyeurs, and for the writer himself.

</comment><comment><USER8> I wouldn't mind seeing ehterpad work in real time...just to see how much time it takes him to come up with the stuff/changes

<comment><USER9> agree, if you've got this far, why not show it real time, as an option maybe

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This can give you an idea how essays are written by famous writers!

</comment><comment><USER11> So now I'm curious PG, what's your Ronco number?

<comment><USER4> 1\. Ron has invested in several YC-funded startups.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> [web 2.0 derivative mindset]

We could have a new site just dedicated to PG etherpad submissions!

[/web 2.0 derivative mindset]

</comment><comment><USER13> Fascinating. However, don't think you are seeing the complete creation of an essay from its spark to completion. The first sentence appears (to me at least) considered and calculated. I'm sure much more thought has gone into the essay than the animation would suggest.

<comment><USER4> I start when I think of the first sentence. After that, as you can see, it's two steps forward and one step back.

<comment><USER14> I've worked as a writer, and am currently in the process of writing a novel (the first I actually think someone would pay a penny to read) so I was actually about to comment that it does look like the complete process.

I'm sure a video of me writing would appear very similar. It can take me a long while to think of that first sentence, sometimes even a few days, but once I've got it in my head it usually comes out onto the page near-completed. Frequently I hit the first key and don't stop until 200 words later. However, it's once you get past what's sitting in the buffer in your brain that things drastically slow down.

As a slight aside, not knowing your personal history or the grades you got in high school, it's quite rare to see someone with a clear and (what appears to be) a natural writing talent coming from a programming background. From what I've seen, programming has a propensity to decrease literacy skills. It's especially impressive that it wasn't your standard five-paragraph essay, some people manage to succeed at those and fail at anything a hint more complex.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> What this needs is a chunk model - to be able to see what was written in one chunk, from the first insert up to the next delete, then to the next insert, etc. You'd be able to see more clearly the purpose of every keystroke and wouldn't miss the small word changes, while also not having to press "next" 60 times to see a sentence unfold.

Oh yeah, by the way, cool idea.</comment>


Ivanka and Don Jr.'S Fight to Succeed Their Father - <AUTHOR> https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/10/trump-dynasty/596674/ <comment><USER2> It's a stark contrast from the Obama's who worked hard to ensure their children led normal childlike lives

</comment><comment><USER3> You mean like, which one is trying to convince the other one to do it?</comment>


I made an E-book compiling the best of r/personalfinance - <AUTHOR> https://blog.bankonjuno.com/50-greatest-reddit-personal-finance-hacks/ <comment><USER2> You've taken a bunch of other people's copyrighted work, formatted it as a PDF, and then ask for money for it... on your company's website? That's so weird. I get maybe dipping into Reddit to have a couple of blog posts that show up in search results, with the goal of getting people to click through to your products or whatever, but actually asking for money for the e-book is a new one.

My main takeaway is that if I walked into a Juno Bank branch, the teller would be happy to give me a pen to fill out the application, but would first ask "need a pen? name your price." The pen would then have a Chase logo on it, since they got it from the bank across the street.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi, Ankit here. You can choose to not pay for it as well.

If you read the blog carefully, we have mentioned it very clearly- "(Pro Tip: Type in '$0' in the price bar below and you can have the magazine for free. At Juno, we'll never charge fees )"

<comment><USER3> You cannot take Harry Potter bookes 1–7, put them together as an ePub, and put it on your website for sale with an option to put $0. You cannot even put them for free on your website. Why? Because it is copyrighted. Reddit comments are copyrighted too. Without authors' permission, what you are doing is illegal.

EDIT:

Those posting content on Reddit retain the rights to their content. They give Reddit a license to do certain things to their content, but this license is solely to Reddit, not the general public.

If you want to do what you do legally, you have to ask for permission of every single person whose content you have included in your ebook. Depending on the jurisdiction, you probably can legally compile a list of links to interesting content and publish that, but certainly not the contents themselves.

Now I am questioning whether this kind of disregard for copyright goes further than the ebook. For example, does your software use GPL code without complying with GPL?

<comment><USER4> In your example, you could just add one extra page which critiques the entire series and that would fall under fair use. You could literally put "After reading these books it's shit and the writer is a hack". Totally fair game.

<comment><USER5> Fair use is not that simple, and the original authors would most likely win a suit against such a "critique".

Typically the defense of fair use would apply to a work that excerpts from a larger work. Copying the original work in whole is going to be very hard to justify.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Although this is excellent, never substitute someone else's tips for your own financial literacy.

Example: Many sites will have lists of best credit cards to have. Often they don't take into account your personal circumstances.

For some, Bank of America likely has the best Credit Card available if you are a Platinum Honors tier member (>$100k combined across all accounts). With this tier, their Premium Rewards card gives me 2.62% cashback on every single purchase. I get 5.25% casback on Gas using their Cash Rewards card.

<comment><USER7> Don't many of those sites also receive an affiliate commission?

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I actually bought this book and then realized it was literally copy-pasted list of posts with zero commentary, context or value-add. The money was inconsequential and was refunded but I find it weird that the company would do this. Even more bizarre that the employees are defending it on HN. Their understanding of copyright law, ethics and plain decent behavior seems severely lacking. Banks are supposed to be super conservative when it comes to correct behavior because money, law and the feds but....

I would rather trust Comcast than these folks for banking....okay maybe not but you get the gist.

</comment><comment><USER9> Do you have permission from the reddit users to include their content in your book?

<comment><AUTHOR> We have attributed each post to its user by linking it to the original thread :)

<comment><USER5> You're skirting the question every time it's asked.

The question is whether you have obtained permission from each individual whose original work you have copied.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Waiting for someone to compile an E-book with the best investment advice from /r/wallstreetbets

<comment><USER11> Buy High, Sell Low

Do you need epub or pdf?

<comment><USER12> Actually it would be more like: "Fuck you retard. Open Robinhood, type in random letters and buy until you max out your CCs/"

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Can not fill the Captcha showed because it is embedded in a too small frame.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi, Ankit here. Try once again perhaps? Might be a one time error.

<comment><USER13> it was fine on the 2nd try. I downloaded the ebook.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Why are you even giving people the option of paying for this?

<comment><USER15> I can't respond for the OP of course, but I can tell you this: he put work in it.

He did the job of two fine respectable professions: the editor and the designer. That's worth something, even when he didn't write the content.

<comment><USER7> Did he have the permission of either Reddit or the author of those comments?

<comment><USER7> It would seem it's not necessary:

"By submitting user content to reddit, you grant us a royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive, unrestricted, worldwide license to reproduce, prepare derivative works, distribute copies, perform, or publicly display your user content in any medium and for any purpose, including commercial purposes, and _to authorize others to do so_. (emphasis mine)

<comment><USER16> > _of either Reddit_

they'd need at least.

<comment><USER7> True. After re-reading it, it's clear that I can't take content, but Reddit could authorize me to; Reddit's permission is still necessary.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> IP theft issues notwithstanding, how many of these 50 great tips assume that the reader is American?</comment>


Shopify is Down along with tens of thousands of stores - <AUTHOR> Was just working on my store and lo and behold Shopify is down right when I was about to post things live. Funny, I was using Shopify instead of rolling my own so I wouldn't have to worry about things like this... maybe it's the universe telling me something :). <comment><AUTHOR> Back up it seems, for me anyway.</comment>


OS/Forth (1998) - <AUTHOR> http://www.forth.org/svfig/osf.html

<comment><USER2> The triad diagram with the OS between the user, the hardware, and the software is especially informative.

          H    S
           \  /
            OS
            |
            U

Why is OS there in the diagram? The OS is just software! Make a compiler target and programming environment the OS!

This has been done before. Symbolics Lisp machines demonstrate many of the technical advantages of this level of integration. Unfortunately, they also show the disadvantageous economics of special-purpose hardware. Most Smalltalk environments have a _very good_ abstraction of the underlying hardware, which is the way one can have this level of integration without the special hardware trap. In fact, you can mostly just treat the VM like it's the CPU. That triad diagram should really be:

        Hardware
           |
        Software
           |
          User

<comment><USER3> What it really should, and does, look like is:

        Hardware
           |
          OS
           |
        Software
           |
          User

Your OS is there to provide protection between programs and provide an interface to system resources. The OS is "software", I suppose, but it /is/ fundamentally different than, say, your web browser, in that OS code runs in kernel mode and your web browser runs in user mode. That's a huge difference in access to system resources, etc.

<comment><USER2> _Your OS is there to provide protection between programs and provide an interface to system resources._

Why can't the _language_ provide those?

 _fundamentally different than, say, your web browser, in that OS code runs in kernel mode and your web browser runs in user mode_

Having Kernel/User modes is just one way of providing security. There is nothing really _fundamental_ about it. It just so happens that machines are mostly organized this way. One could do away with the kernel mode distinction with a mechanism like capabilities and arguably wind up with _better_ security.

<comment><USER4> > Why can't the language provide those?

It can. But when it does, it stops getting called a language, and starts getting called an OS that only supports one language.

Or it gets called programming the bare metal.

<comment><USER2> _It can. But when it does, it stops getting called a language, and starts getting called an OS that only supports one language._

You're either not familiar with some of the technologies I'm discussing, or you're not getting the point I'm trying to make.

Smalltalk started out as an OS, and even back then, it was fully capable of supporting any number of languages running on top of it.

 _Or it gets called programming the bare metal._

My point is that this is just a fixed idea without a fundamental basis. That's just _how it has been_ as opposed to how it has to be. Basically, it's that way because the field settled in on a particular way of doing things that fit the limited hardware of the time.

Also, there's no reason why a VM, JIT or otherwise even has to be involved. Haiku/BeOS is another such creature. It's highly responsive, even on ancient hardware, and it's highly compact. (Entire OS + apps in well under 200M.)

The OS is a set of abstractions. A High Level Language is another. There's no universal reason why the latter can't subsume the former.

<comment><USER4> > The OS is a set of abstractions. A High Level Language is another. There's > no universal reason why the latter can't subsume the former.

And it has. When this happened, the result was dubbed an OS.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Interesting that Bill Gates said, "Microsoft is rewriting all its' application offerings to use an advanced HTML interface and no longer the current windows based system," in 1998.

Why are we still not there, 11 years later? Coincidentally, I just wrote a blog post about this last night:

<http://shoptalkapp.com/blog/2009/10/15/the-real-web-os>

</comment><comment><USER6> Article from 1998. (I hate it when a post doesn't show date/time at top of article).

</comment><comment><USER7> So what ever happened to these ideas and Forth?</comment>


Pokemon Go's beacon used to facilitate armed robbery - <AUTHOR> https://www.facebook.com/OFallon-Missouri-Police-Department-180316078675503/?fref=nf <comment><AUTHOR> This is the direct URL:

[https://www.facebook.com/180316078675503/photos/a.2621240171...](https://www.facebook.com/180316078675503/photos/a.262124017161375.70607.180316078675503/1272368709470229/?type=3&theater)

"UPDATE INFORMATION BELOW-This morning at approximately 2 am we responded to the report of an Armed Robbery near the intersection of Highway K and Feise Road. We were able to locate four suspects occupying a black BMW a short time later and recover a handgun. These suspects are suspected of multiple Armed Robberies both in St. Louis and St. Charles Counties. It is believed these suspects targeted their victims through the Pokemon Go smart phone application.

Many of you have heard of Pokemon Go, but for those that have not, it is a type of Geo Caching game where you find and capture Pokemon characters at various locations. If you use this app (or other similar type apps) or have children that do we ask you to please use caution when alerting strangers of your future location.

 __Many of you have asked how the app was used to rob victims, the way we believe it was used is you can add a beacon to a pokestop to lure more players. Apparently they were using the app to locate ppl standing around in the middle of a parking lot or whatever other location they were in. __"</comment>


Examples of Websites Using HTML5 - <AUTHOR> http://webdesignledger.com/inspiration/35-inspiring-examples-of-websites-using-html5

<comment><USER2> <http://twitter.com/html5douche> occasionally posts some cool html5 linkage when he's not busy fist-pumping in CAPS LOCK.</comment>


Over 100 long-lost Doctor Who episodes found by dedicated fans in Ethiopia - <AUTHOR> http://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/106-doctor-who-episodes-uncovered-2343474

<comment><USER2> It's a 2nd hand account of a "my friend told me" anecdote published in newspapers which have, at best, an accidental relationship with the truth. I'm not saying it isn't true but given the messengers I'd be astonished it it was.

</comment><comment><USER3> This has been cycling around at Bleeding Cool for months. Their latest update explains how the still unsubstantiated rumour got out of control

[http://www.bleedingcool.com/2013/10/06/video-sky-news-get- in...](http://www.bleedingcool.com/2013/10/06/video-sky-news-get-in-on-the- doctor-who-missing-episodes-rumour-too/)

</comment><comment><USER4> Doctor Who Online is reporting that lost episodes indeed were found. "Not as many as 100".

[https://twitter.com/DrWhoOnline/status/386850513909600256](https://twitter.com/DrWhoOnline/status/386850513909600256) [https://twitter.com/DrWhoOnline/status/386850763349041152](https://twitter.com/DrWhoOnline/status/386850763349041152) [https://twitter.com/DrWhoOnline/status/386851026038296577](https://twitter.com/DrWhoOnline/status/386851026038296577) [https://twitter.com/DrWhoOnline/status/386863277134721025](https://twitter.com/DrWhoOnline/status/386863277134721025)

</comment><comment><USER5> [http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment- arts-24448063](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-24448063) bbc reporting on it now. "BBC Worldwide is expected to confirm the find at a press conference in London later this week."

</comment><comment><USER6> they would have never been lost if sane copyright laws had allowed people to safe their cultural media.

<comment><USER7> How widespread were home VCRs in the UK in the 60s?

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm assuming they were sold to Ethiopia for the reusable tape, not to air the show. Then again ETV (the ethiopian state-run TV station) does air random stuff every once in a while.

<comment><USER9> That's a rather uninformed comment. Dr. Who was actually extremely popular in Ethiopia so this news doesn't surprise me one bit.

<comment><USER8> You are absolutely correct - I have no idea what ETV was like in the 70s, 80s and early 90s. Was it less government controlled during the Derg? Or is this post-1991 era?

<comment><USER9> Fair question. ETV was certainly more controlled during the Derg regime since it was an openly totalitarian government. That's not to say that this current regime doesn't have a tight grip on ETV although it sounds like you're already well aware of that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> A friend of an "expert" says so. Meanwhile, BBC does not say anything. Hum...</comment>