Ohio Was Set to Purge 235,000 Voters. It Was Wrong About 20% - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/14/us/politics/ohio-voter-purge.html <comment><USER2> > She went online and discovered that her name had also been flagged as an > inactive voter. The state was in the process of removing her from its voter > rolls.

> "I voted three times last year," said Ms. Miller.

I am still baffled at the election system in this country. Every state does its own thing. One state uses paper, other uses some machines which can be easily hacked, some use both. Somehow voter ID is controversial, but India, with more people, poverty and issues seems to have managed it. Why can't they issue free IDs and track every voter in a database and call it a day?

> The state of Ohio had released names of 235,000 voters it planned to purge > from voter rolls in September [...] voting rights groups found an > unexplained tranche — around 20,000 people

But that means 200k some thousand should have been purged. If they died, and a death certificate was issued, doesn't some government database know about it and say, "yeah, person is dead purge their voter record". It's 2020 almost, we flew people to the moon, there is a Tesla roadster in Sun's orbit, self driving cars, but somehow managing a few hundred million voter records is an impossible task and I don't understand why.

<comment><USER3> In Germany every person eligible to vote just gets a letter telling you the day of the vote and your voting station (and a list of stuff being voted on, local elections usually coincide with more important ones). At voting day (a Sunday) you go to your polling station with that letter and photo id and after five minutes you have cast your vote and are on your way.

It's dead simple. But it hinges on the state having a database with every citizen's address. As I understand it such an idea would be very unpopular in the US.

<comment><USER4> I mean, that's largely what voter registration is - a database of every citizen's address.

The problem comes in when those addresses change. There's no requirement to inform your old state you left, so millions of inactive voters are left in the database. Generally there's a requirement to register in the new state (drivers license) within 30 days which is often missed, or not required for temporary moves like college students.

These purges do serve a legitimate purpose, but are often used as a political tool to alter turnouts.

<comment><USER3> > There's no requirement to inform your old state you left, so millions of > inactive voters are left in the database

In Germany when you arrive somewhere we know that you are coming from somewhere. So when you register at your new address that usually involves your new city hall informing your old one that you moved.

I guess that doesn't really work if registration isn't universal (in Germany we track you place of residence basically from birth, it's used not just for voting but also for determining where your taxes go, for government communication, to make sure nobody skips out on bills by moving, etc).

<comment><USER5> > (in Germany we track you place of residence basically from birth, it's used > not just for voting but also for determining where your taxes go, for > government communication, to make sure nobody skips out on bills by moving, > etc).

If we tried to institute that kind of system, the political party which currently is all against voter id would be up in arms too.

<comment><USER6> So long as it isn't used to disenfranchise people from a single vote, there's no problem. Now, things get complicated and we would have to do work to get it right in that we have inconsistent rules on residency in terms of students and temporary housing, and we have a significant number of people who don't want to see a national registry of citizens (see issues with using SSN as a national ID) but there's nothing specifically that Democrats would object to philosophically.

The problem comes when we start trying to purge the rolls and there are false positives. The bigger problem is when those false positives are disproportionately citizens of color. Similarly, voter ID cards are not problems philosophically as much as these ID laws disproportionately affecting poor people and people of color.

If you want an ID law, you make IDs free, you account for many of the edge cases like elderly people who don't have birth certificates yet are clearly citizens, and you bend over backwards to make sure everyone who can vote gets one regardless of it costing a little more.

<comment><USER7> In Germany and Europe (UK is outliner) you pay a fee for ID card, but it's valid for 10 years or so and cost is around 20-30 euro. Really don't understand what's the panic about in America, you don't have to do and pay it every year.

<comment><USER6> Germany hasn't had an issue with making it more difficult for minorities to vote since WWII. This was an attempt from last year: [https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/23/us/randolph-county- georgi...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/23/us/randolph-county-georgia- voting.html) \- It took a fair amount of protesting to stop it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> According to the article, moderate Republicans in Ohio insisted on transparency for purging voter rolls. They sent out the proposed list to various voter advocacy groups across the political spectrum, which reviewed the proposed changes and flagged mistakes. 80% were purged correctly. 20% were not.

Rather than condemning Ohio, they should be praised for bringing transparency to the process (as long as the mistakes are corrected).

<comment><USER9> No one should be praised other than the people who discovered "the mistakes".

The tactic here is voter disenfranchisement. It's a tried and true tool of the Republicans and has been around since forever.

The thing is inactive voters are just that, _inactive_. There is very small risk that some of their names might get used for voter fraud. But every time this is researched, only a handful of incidents are discovered and it takes thousands to swing an election. Those thousands can _easily_ be achieved, however, with sloppy aggressive and unnecessary purging.

I wish there existed the political will to issue "citizen ID" cards (or other mechanisms) to all citizens, like they do in civilized countries. These could be used for residency and authentication for voting, banking, taxes, and other functions. This authentication mechanism would instantly remove the phony concern of voter fraud amongst republicans while not disenfranchising voters.

<comment><USER10> > The thing is inactive voters are just that, inactive. There is very small > risk that some of their names might get used for voter fraud. But every time > this is researched, only a handful of incidents are discovered and it takes > thousands to swing an election.

You claim the risk is small, but I'm not aware of anything that actually supports this assessment. This form of manipulation is nearly impossible to detect in a meaningful way. All the studies I'm aware of [1] have used prosecutions for voter fraud as a measure of the extent of fraud, but that is obviously contingent on the fraud being discovered.

I'm part of an apparently nonexistent group of people who both believe in Voter ID laws and believe very strongly in maximizing potential voter turnout. People have ID -- opponents of voter ID have deliberately exaggerated the number of people without ids [2].

[1] [https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research- reports/debu...](https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research- reports/debunking-voter-fraud-myth) has a good set of articles attempting to debunk the notion that various types of voter fraud occur. They all rely on "credible allegations"

[2] [https://www.brennancenter.org/sites/default/files/legacy/d/d...](https://www.brennancenter.org/sites/default/files/legacy/d/download_file_39242.pdf) \-- just look at the first footnote and the description of the methodology, and if you buy their results then you're a sucker.

<comment><USER9> > [Voter fraud] is nearly impossible to detect in a meaningful way.

If the "victims" of voter fraud truly cared enough, they could audit the voter records for any election. Unless I am wrong, there exists a record of whether or not each person on the rolls actually voted. The intersection of the people who voted with those that are deemed truly inactive would be the extend of the voter fraud (at best).

No one seems to do that kind of study, however, because it's a lot of work and it's more "fun" to just blow thousands of people (mostly democrats) off the rolls.

<comment><USER10> > If the "victims" of voter fraud truly cared enough, they could audit the > voter records for any election. Unless I am wrong, there exists a record of > whether or not each person on the rolls actually voted. The intersection of > the people who voted with those that are deemed truly inactive would be the > extend of the voter fraud (at best).

To be clear -- what do you mean by "truly inactive"? Usually "truly inactive" means they haven't voted. So people who voted are by default not "truly inactive". You would have to take some sort of heuristic estimate of how likely it is that a voter is inactive, and cross that with the voting record, and then attempt to individually contact the voter to verify that they did vote. The quality of such a heuristic would fundamentally affect the results. In other words, the experiment would either confirm widespread voter fraud, or, way more likely, provide no evidence for or against voter fraud.

<comment><USER9> By "truly inactive" I mean voters who can't vote because they're dead, no longer live in that voting district, never actually existed, or are ineligible to vote. If these names appear as having voted, those are invalid and _might_ be an indication of fraud.

There's the another type of fraud, of course, where people use the names of active voters. A lot of people don't vote, so yeah, it could happen that someone else just takes their place.

Whatever the case, _both_ of these "fraud" scenarios are insignificantly small compared to the ham-fisted improper purging of _thousands_ of names, and other suppression tactics such as gerrymandering.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Anybody who thinks these schemes are about anything other than removing legitimate voters from the roles is deluding themselves.

<comment><USER12> That much is clear. This is only a few months after SCOTUS found Ohio's new election districts to be illegally gerrymandered.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> "And voting rights groups found an unexplained tranche — around 20,000 people — who had been marked to be purged because of inactivity in future election cycles, but were actually active voters in previous Ohio elections. These voters were in Franklin County, a Democratic stronghold in the state."

Aaaand there it is.

<comment><USER14> How hard is it really for a voter to reregister? You guys are making it sound like it they're taking away driver's licenses or something. All you have to do is hit the website. If you don't have internet access hit a library.

<comment><USER15> Because this is HN and you're probably young-ish: When you're older and you've set down roots the last time you updated your voter registration was probably a few decades ago. Chances are your polling place hasn't likely changed either. So you know when elections come, you go to your usual polling place, give your name, get your ballet and "pull the lever" so to speak. You're not thinking "Oh I better double-check my voter registration!" because you haven't needed to do that in ages because your address and party affiliation hasn't changed in years.

The US is strange: It will wring its hands over low voter turnout while also actively making it more difficult to vote.

<comment><USER14> I update my voter registration sometimes twice a year to match the party I most like at the time, It's always been online - easy peasy. I expect to get downvoted to hell but I also don't get why showing an ID to vote is such a big deal. After all, I have to look up the numbers in my drivers license to vote.

Also, how is it hard to vote? Absentee ballots are totally easy to get. If I was blind, I might have to plan ahead to get the help to do it. Otherwise, no biggie.

<comment><USER16> US history is why its a big deal to show your ID to vote.

Wikipedia has a great summary of the racist policies voter ID laws were made to enforce, and that voter fraud is "vanishingly rare" [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_ID_laws_in_the_United_St...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_ID_laws_in_the_United_States#History)

<comment><USER17> Maybe voter fraud is "vanishingly rare", but that statement in the wikipedia article only links to a NYT article which says:

> Academic studies have repeatedly concluded that fraud at the ballot box — > the sort that photo identification requirements might reduce — is already > vanishingly rare.

With no citation.

Anyway, "vanishingly rare" could mean that fewer than 1% of votes are fraudulent, but those fraudulent votes could be concentrated in a handful of key counties thereby having a big impact. I'm not arguing in favor of tougher voter ID restrictions but rather in favor of educated discourse.

<comment><USER16> I want to point out that there is no citation for this straw-man thought experiment.

Even the Heritage Foundation, which is incentivized to dig up as much voter fraud as it possibly can, has only found fewer than 1250 individual cases in what seems to be the last decade. This is overwhelmingly lower than the preposterous 1% presented in the above straw-man. [https://www.heritage.org/voterfraud](https://www.heritage.org/voterfraud)

Indeed my point was not just about voter fraud, but the racist history of Voter ID laws in the US. My overall point was that there is overwhelming and easily accessible evidence that voter ID laws are racist and that voter fraud is not an issue.

<comment><USER17> I can't tell what the "straw man" argument you're referring to. Could you clarify?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> In Germany we do not have this problem (neither voter suppression nor voter fraud), for a multitude of reasons:

1) everyone has a government-provided ID document: a passport, for German nationals the ID card Personalausweis also works, and for EU nationals (who can vote in municipal and EU elections) their country's ID document

2) the legal requirement to register at the city/region office ("Meldebehörde") where you live, and you have to prove this with a copy of your rent contract or property deed

3) everyone getting a document ("Wahlschein") by mail a couple of weeks prior to election date. If you don't get one but should have gotten, you can contact the election authority to investigate, and if you lose/misplace it you can easily look up where your voting place is, go there and have them locate you on the voter roll.

4) if any piece of official mail goes returned by the post as "undeliverable", the Meldebehörde will investigate and de-register you (thus also removing you from the voter roll)

The only real vote fraud in the last years was from a politician who had seasonal workers register at a company and apply for mail-voting, but that's it.

<comment><USER19> Yeah, from the European perspective the American situation is hard to understand. In the U.S., requiring everyone to register their address is going to be met with cries of Big Brother and small but vocal resistance. This is despite the fact that the vast majority of people have to declare an address to file their tax return and/or to have a driver's license.

The other piece is that the constitution, written before direct elections were common, explicitly leaves the execution of elections to the states, which makes it hard for the federal government to set standards or require this kind of registration. And it's politically intractable to fix these silly things in the constitution.

<comment> crooked-v It becomes much easier to understand when you realize that the modern Republican Party opposes centralized voter ID at the national level and supports stricter but wildly patchwork voting ID requirements at the local level for the same reason: it makes it harder for demographics they don't like to get acceptable IDs for voting.

For example, in 2015, North Carolina's Republican state legislature literally looked up the forms of ID statistically most likely to be used by black people for voting ID in the state and banned those for use in voting, while leaving the forms of voting ID most used by white people as valid. [https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/07/29/the-s...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/07/29/the- smoking-gun-proving-north-carolina-republicans-tried-to-disenfranchise-black- voters/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> As a Franklin county resident, I see multiple groups of volunteers who have a big push around August-October to concentrate efforts around the the Ohio State campus and downtown areas to register voters. This includes groups affiliated with campus political organizations, the League of Women Voters, and groups who seek signatures to bring issues to a ballot vote. The extent to which the article describes purging 40,000 Franklin County voters is much more than what I'd expect than people being ineligible to vote for reasons like leaving student voters leaving the state/county (and not updatign their address), becoming deceased, or the recent case regarding the "use it or lose it" rule. In my opinion there should be a formal audit that includes other state data to correct the discrepancies in the spreadsheet of voters to be purged.

Additionally, Ohio voter ID laws themselves can be regressive in harming poorer populations. Many don't have access to a nearby BMV bureau to get an ID, aren't aware of the registration deadline which has already passed, lack utility bills in their name, or can't get a stamp for an absentee vote to be mailed. For the the current and next ballot cycle it's important to allow citizens to voice their opinion at the box and to register with a party for primary votes as well.

</comment><comment><USER21> TLDR: We need national, universal, automatic voter registration.

#1 Our VRDBs only contain eligible voters. Ineligible voters are removed. This is very hard to verify, audit.

The Correct Answer is to list everyone, with a flag for eligibility, with a separate audit log for changes. aka standard DBA best practices.

#2 We already have virtually complete rosters of every person, living or dead, updated in near realtime. Commercial data brokers, facebook, law enforcement, national security. We should license or repurpose these readily available data sources for both voter database and the census.

#3 States _administer_ elections. Feds make the rules. Anyone who opposes nationwide standards should also oppose currency, weights & measures, intra- state trade, the entire American experiment, etc.

FWIW, some states already share data, to better track people who move, students, overseas voters (registered at home), deaths, etc. I haven't been active for a while, so don't know how far along those efforts are.

\--

Now about this article. Purging (caging) is the weaponization of normal data quality efforts for partisan reasons.

Option 1: Send verification mails to inactive (but still eligible) voters. Some sizable fraction won't be returned. USPS's UAA rate is %1, more for high density areas. Many people just don't response (eg looks like junk mail). Then aggressively, silently remove anyone who doesn't respond.

Option 2: Any official communication sent by election admin which is returned (recall USPS UAA 1%) is used to purge.

Option 3: Ignore or inject data quality problems. Match voter roll against other demographic databases, eg DMV. Purge any records for any error whatsoever. eg Mike vs Michael. Missing commas, hyphens. Whatever works.

This is from memory, I'm sure there's other strategies used, but these are the big ones.

Note that The Correct Answer above moots the entire problem. And would be both cheaper and nearly error free.

</comment><comment><USER22> There doesn't appear to be an explanation for the purges. I can understand the need to purge the voter lists of "dead" (literally or otherwise) entries, but surely it would be best if the state provided an explanation for each removal?

<comment><USER23> I think that's what happened here, which is how the 20% were found to be incorrectly marked.

<comment><USER22> I'm not so sure:

>And voting rights groups found an _unexplained_ tranche — around 20,000 people — who had been marked to be purged because of inactivity in future election cycles, but were actually active voters in previous Ohio elections.

and

>The experience has left some voters like Jennifer Kulina-Lanese, a former veterinary professional, shaken. She got a call from the League of Women Voters shortly after it received the list, informing her that the county where she had voted just last year had started the process for her to be purged.

>"I still don't know why, and that's what's scary," said Ms. Kulina-Lanese, who is 45. "The idea that Franklin County was starting a process to remove me was terrifying."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> America, the country where you can't stop massive voter fraud because every time it is tried, one of the two parties disallow legal voters from voting. America might be richer than Europe, but it seems to me to be much more dysfunctional.

</comment><comment><USER25> Lol all you have to do is vote by mail like all other sane States...

</comment><comment><USER26> I couldn't get past the paywall, but are there any independent watchdogs with real political sway about this, or do we need to rely on journalism and rights groups? The issue I have is that journalism could be intensely valid and yet also considered so politically biased that anyone on 'the other side' would dismiss legitimate corruption because of the source. And if a 'same side' media doesn't cover it, it could look like a complete fabrication because what someone understands to be legitimate news sources don't cover the corruption...

</comment><comment><USER27> How does the purging actually work? Is there sole evil republican henchman with database access? Is there no oversight into what is actually purged?

Trapped behind the paywall.

<comment><USER28> The Secretary of State is Republican, and surprise, the GOP pursues policies that restrict the ballot in a way that benefits them and disadvantages Democrats.

Ohio is a state where the GOP holds 75% of federal House seats despite winning only 50% of the vote. Similar effect holds for the state legislative offices

<comment><USER29> 80% of 235,000 is 188,000. Your argument is that it is okay to keep 188,000 invalid voters on the books because otherwise the republicans might win? Don't you see how fraudulent or no-longer-active voter registrations may bring about questions of legitimacy? 188,000 is no small number of people. Trump won Ohio with a smaller margin.

<comment><USER28> If the state can't put together a list that doesn't disenfranchise one in every five voters on it, it shouldn't bother.

Voter fraud is a non-existent issue and these mass-removals serve no basis except as cover to remove voters that don't support their party.

<comment><USER29> You don't think removing dead or moved voters is important? This is not about voter fraud. This is just about keeping your records in order, and making sure no one can raise suspicions about your electoral mechanisms.

<comment><USER28> Unless the state has an effective mechanism that doesn't disenfranchise voters, and that those moved or dead voters aren't voting, the motives are suspect.

<comment><USER29> > the motives are suspect.

Um, no they're not. Simply wanting to maintain a clean record is a personality difference that it is unreasonable to get suspicious over given the varying personalities of the various secretaries of state (the one who ultimately decides such policies).

<comment><USER28> It's not unreasonable when the party they're a part of has a long history of disenfranchising voters to gain an electoral edge.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Hacker Trade - Applying YC's philosophy to freelance contracting - <AUTHOR> http://hackertrade.com/ <comment><USER2> I don't see what this has to do with YC or how it is at all similar apart from trying to trade on the name.

What stops this turning into another oDesk type site?

Edit: I didn't read the part about the matchmaking.

Although if you are trying to appeal to a higher calibre of clients the website design probably needs to change, go with a more "prestige" feel rather than pictures of people slumped with laptops in coffeeshops.

Also ditch the "hacker" branding, this has too many wrong implications in the mainstream.

<comment><AUTHOR> Definitely - this is actually on purpose for the first phase, where we would rather focus on a small number of clients and hackers for whom it goes well, rather than trying to attract everyone who has something to outsource.

But, agreed, if we want to go beyond the types of clients who aren't scared of the word "hacker", we'll probably have to create a separate site for them.

<comment><USER2> I have a feeling that 'types of clients who aren't scared of the word "hacker"' will be most of your clients.

<comment><USER3> I'd say that depends on whether you want to become another oDesk. Their clients are certainly afraid of hackers.

If pg were looking to contract out work, he'd say something like <http://www.paulgraham.com/gh.html>

I do agree that at some point entrepreneurial "hackers" and established software companies look at things differently, and should engage each other productively in finding the right balance.

tl;dr Hackers could do better at being socially adept.

<comment><USER2> It really depends how far you can go with redefining a word.

This will be especially difficult because I imagine if you asked 10 HN readers what their personal definition of a "hacker" was you would probably get 10 different definitions.

If you are trying to imply a "hacker" as somebody who is in someway superior to the average software dev then what criteria would you put in place?

What is to stop any kid who read a bunch of PHP tutorials and can put together a simple blog app from calling him/herself a hacker?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I don't have many customers who'd want to pay good consulting money to get hacking / hackers / hacks, to put together work that was hacked together, a hacky job.

Unless this is a site where you get bleeding edge proof of concepts built?

The word hack for a wider audience means someone who can't cut it.

Where am I coming from? Dictionary.com seems to sum up this one angle.

hack

1\. a person, as an artist or writer, who exploits, for money, his or her creative ability or training in the production of dull, unimaginative, and trite work; one who produces banal and mediocre work in the hope of gaining commercial success in the arts: As a painter, he was little more than a hack.

2\. a professional who renounces or surrenders individual independence, integrity, belief, etc., in return for money or other reward in the performance of a task normally thought of as involving a strong personal commitment: a political hack.

3\. a writer who works on the staff of a publisher at a dull or routine task; someone who works as a literary drudge: He was one among the many hacks on Grub Street.

The other, less known, positive, meaning of hack* is only, largely known to the tech scene. Unless they are your market exclusively..

0.02 :)

<comment><AUTHOR> The feedback we've got around us and the posts on this thread, seem to agree on the fact that this is a clear branding issue, so we may reconsider our take on that one.

We preferred to start with something that would only try to appeal to clients who understand the meaning of "Hacker", as a sort of filter. And only introduce a different branding for clients later on, when we would want to extend the target audience. But it may be interesting to do some AB testing here, and see if we can get good clients without the Hacker branding too, from the start.

<comment><USER4> That could definitely be one way to go.

I'm not sure why you'd want to put effort into branding twice, though. Consulting is about a clear image and track record, it's hard enough to build and keep.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> How will billing work for this on a practical level?

Let's say I've done a week's work, and I charge by the day. Do I sent an invoice to you guys, or directly to the client? Do you bill me for your 10% cut, or is that factored in to the price you quote to the client? Will, in fact, I end up with an invoice to pay to you guys?

 _UPDATE_ : I somehow missed the bit about payment guarantee on your website, but would still like to know how this works as far as the forms my company needs to send :)

You also need to consider the nightmare that is charging VAT in Europe. I'm based in Poland, and anyone I bill who is also based in Poland, consumer or business, gets charged VAT at 23%. If the client is based in another EU country, but is VAT registered, they're zero-rated. If the client is in the EU but is NOT VAT registered, I have to charge the 23% tax. Finally, for everyone else, it's zero-rated.

Now, I have _no_ idea of the tax implications - if any - of the above when going through a third-party site such as Hacker Trade. Based of snippets I've read elsewhere (such as FastSpring's EU tax explanations on their website), I'm guessing that you might have to do some EU tax registration yourselves... but only if you're the one collecting money.

Interesting idea though, I've finally returned to full-time consulting and am building up my network, so this could be a real win for the likes of me :-)

<comment><AUTHOR> We're still ironing out the details on that one, so take my answer with a grain of salt - it still needs to get confirmed by the accountant & the lawyer.

But, basically, it would likely be very similar to what you get on vworker for example - the client transfers the money into escrow, and get an invoice for it. The % cut of the platform is deducted from the amount put in escrow and transferred to the freelance. The % is taken into account for the quote, so that it's shared between the coder and the client.

And, yes, we've had to deal with European taxes too, so we're familiar with the tax mess. : ) I don't have all the details on that yet, but I'll post an update when we do.

In any case, if you're selected, we'll figure out the specifics of your situation, to make sure everything is by the book.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> If you are calling yourself a freelancer, then you have the wrong mind-set. Treat your work like a real business. Brand your services. Whatever you do, don't call yourself a freelancer. You are missing out on the opportunity to present a much better image to your prospective clients.

Freelancer is bad, hacker is even worse. You might as well have thrown rock star and ninja on the front page as well.

Quote from the front page...

"Hackers can focus on code, and clients get peace of mind."

Sure, because these are the sorts of problems people who refer to themselves as freelancers or hackers have. If this service isn't taking care of marketing, accounting, budgeting, business strategy, etc. then the hackers can't just focus on code. If you need a service like this to give your clients peace of mind, then you probably shouldn't be doing client work.

If you guys really want to help connect people, then you should probably start by helping them get into the correct mind-set. Prospective clients aren't looking for hackers, they are looking for professionals.

ETA: This was a bit of a rant. So, I suppose I should offer something constructive. I think the service is fine, but I would change the message. I could see clients being turned off by the choice of wording. Also, you may want to provide different portals for clients and hackers / freelancers / ninja's / rock stars. The client doesn't care about all the benefits to the developer and doesn't need to see those details. Maybe a more simple "find talent" and "find work" page (like Elance) would be better?

<comment><AUTHOR> Agreed on the message/positioning, as discussed in previous comments - we'll see if we can find a better branding, at least for the client side.

About learning to get the right mindset, we would definitely like to include people who are new to freelancing in the first batch - you're right in the fact that this is probably one of the most valuable aspects of our help for them, besides the matchmaking itself.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'd like to hear more about your strategy for beating the cold-start problem. You'll need to ramp up both sides of your two-sided market to be of value to either side.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yep, that one is tricky.

Our approach is to start really small - we only need a small number of hackers and clients to get started. This allows to be in a similar situation as an small agency - we don't need to match the audience of elance/vworker to make it work. The human/case by case approach requires more work for us, for a lower cut than what an agency would take, but with a different goal in mind for scaling.

We could actually have done the first batch by ourselves, with just clients and hackers that we know and are interested. But we thought it would work as a better validation to give a chance to HN readers to join - we're more likely to get a more diverse set of situations this way.

The advantage for those who will be in the first batch is the extra care and attention we'll dedicate on making it work for them. We'll all be learning from the experience - aside from guaranteeing a place on Hacker Trade in the future, it's also a good opportunity to shape what Hacker Trade will be, and ensure that you get what you need from it.

<comment><USER8> The biggest issue I have had with hiring freelance developers is cost.

Everyone, regardless of location and skill and type of request all seems to want ~$100/ hour.

From a tutor that I looked into to off shore developers.

I just am amazed that it seems like everyone thinks they should be making $200K per year.

The tutor though, at 100 per hour to be teach development really blew me away.

<comment><USER9> Oddly, I've had exactly the opposite problem. It's difficult to find contracts in the $100-200 per day range. If I could find consistent, rewarding, challenging work, then I would gladly do it for standard pay. Unfortunately, I spend so much time finding contracts or getting burned by expanding scope or nonpayment, that I have to charge more just to survive.

Freelancing should pay at least the overtime rate of a typical developer. If someone is contemplating freelance work and makes $50,000 per year, than he or she should probably charge at least $37 per hour or else it makes more sense to work out an overtime arrangement with his or her current boss.

When we account for all of the downtime and having to eat so many losses (that are normally handled by an employer), I think that's how so many developers arrive at numbers of $75-125 per hour or more.

<comment><USER10> Hey Zack - freelancer here; if you want to chat about what you describe, get in touch (email@example.com)!

There's no reason to get burned, maybe I can help you out a bit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> A few things. (Disclosure: I'm a mobile dev/freelancer, been doing this own my own for a while with pretty good results)

1) I think the biggest issue is the cold-start problem discussed by another HNer below. Namely, while the copy sounds good and the coders in the photos seem trendy enough, do you actually have good clients? Selling promises about freelancing to either side plays to the ideal that we all want, but rarely does it work out that well. 2) How flexible are the payment / contractual terms? I usually see this as a negotiation with my clients which, if done successfully, improves the relationship. If there are disagreements about terms, is this service simply going to insist on the terms that benefit their interests? 3) Is the pre-project test work paid? What if I require at least some deposit on the overall project up-front? 4) Please don't spread misuse of the term hacker. You're trying to appeal to the coder-side of the demographic, but anyone serious should have no problem using a more professional term.

I'd consider signing up, but at this point it still does feel like another startup claiming to fix the problem with no guarantees of anything that different other than the best of intentions. No offense, but I've followed 2-3 companies like this so far and nothing's panned out anywhere near as well as traditional networking. I'm hopeful though, and definitely interested in hearing more about what you have to say.

<comment><AUTHOR> 1) Aside from the leads from our own network who have shown interest, we have got some good applications from clients already (even with the Hacker branding issue discussed below). So, even if we'll still have to go through the first batch to answer your question with a firm "yes", it's looking good.

Since we don't try to be big just yet, this is less of a concern for our first stage - if you get in, it's because we think we have a good match for you. Aside from the 5 minutes you would spend filling the application, you don't really have anything to lose to try.

2) Very flexible - if you and the client agree on something, we're willing to try it out. This is actually another reason for us to start small - to make sure that we can adapt quickly and match what works.

3) Yes, the test project is paid.

4) Duly noted - cf my answers on this topic below.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Good hackers don't need your services as badly as bad hackers do. If you focus on quality hackers, I think you'll need to drop your price.

Ten percent is reasonable if you provide a steady stream of work for hackers who don't have a clientbase. However, I have the impression that you're specifically trying to cater to _gifted_ hackers, who presumably already have an existing clientbase or a robust network.

<comment><AUTHOR> A lot of good hackers may have a good network and existing client base, but in our experience it's not always the case. You have good hackers who work in a cubicle because they don't want to tackle that part; hacker freelancers who don't want/like to do the necessary legwork to maintain a steady stream of clients...

Also, as mentioned below - even if you already have a good client base, applying allows you to extend your market - you can always evaluate the offers on a case per case basis, and see if the % cut is worth it. You get more options.

But you may have a point - it's quite possible that some client/hackers profiles will require less work from us than others.

<comment><USER13> Particularly right now. I can see using your service for the convenience factor, but I can't imagine a lot of companies or contractors being willing to accept a 10% surcharge on everything.

I'd consider making your costs more fixed if possible.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> A few questions / comments (as a prospective client):

1\. Do you have any thoughts or guidelines as to project size? Any lower or upper limits? (I sometimes have projects as small as a few hours' work for someone with the right background -- say, integrating with a particular tool or API. I would love a way to find skilled freelancers for this type of task. AnyFu sounds like it might be aiming at this, but they've been stuck in "we'll notify you as soon as [we're] ready" for a while now.

2\. How is the project price determined? Direct negotiation between client and contractor? Do you get involved (at least to make suggestions)? Is price determined before or after the matchup is made?

3\. It would be nice to have a general notion of what sorts of expertise your contractors have (collectively). For instance, are you recruiting designers? Frontend developers? Backend developers? What technologies are best represented? Before writing up a project proposal, it would be nice to have an idea of whether I have some chance of finding a good match.

<comment><AUTHOR> 1\. Small tasks are much easier to handle in that context. But that doesn't exclude bigger projects - we'll just make sure it is split into smaller tasks (the usual sprint/stories methodology of SCRUM usually helps a lot here)

2\. We start by asking both parties what is their price/budget. This allows us to do a first sanity check on both sides, and then we use that information, along with the project description, to see who could agree on a price. We discuss a potential match with both parties - if both agree to discuss, they get to discuss the final price together.

3\. True, it would certainly be useful. We have a good core set of skill currently in web development, games, Python/PHP/Node/JS - but that doesn't take into account the many candidatures from HN exposure today. We haven't had time to process them properly yet, but the set of expertise is much larger already. I'd say that, unless your project is extremely specific, we can probably find a matching skill set for you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Very interesting problem to tackle. Only problem I see is how the incentive structure will work out. The YC process works because as a hacker, there is a huge monetary incentive(average YC statup is worth 22.4m) to apply. However, it's not clear to me how the incentives will work out with hackertrade, since most hackers already have plenty of paid work opportunities.

<comment><AUTHOR> Two things here:

1) Yes, established hackers who already have plenty of clients and opportunities may not need the matchmaking. But it's also a way to extend the potential market, and get more choice & security - after all, you're never obliged to accept an offer, so there is nothing to lose to apply.

2) Some devs are good at delivering, but don't like/want the networking/business development aspect of finding clients. It's a way to minimize the amount of time spent on it, and focus on code instead.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Very cool idea! I'm wondering if it solves this problem that a lot of clients face- the client knows what they'd like, but have no clue as to what kind of coding is required to accomplish it. So when they look for freelancers, they don't know the alphabet soup of languages and end up connecting to people that might not be the best fit.

If you guys are acting as "matchmakers," you might want to specifically say that you can help people who don't know what they're looking for (if you offer that service). I've bookmarked you though, because finding good freelance talent is a real problem.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yep, good point. Helping to figure out what's needed is an important aspect - it's one of the most tricky parts for people who are starting to contract online or don't have all the necessary technical background.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I exactly need something like this.

I think that there is a need in the market for a site like this, that focuses on quality. And avoids the problems of massified remote work sites, that end up full of silly projects, with lots of poor programmers spamming everything to death.

The presentation is right. The fee is appropriate for not too long gigs. But perhaps in the case of longer terms contracts, some other option could be offered.

Hope that it goes well.

</comment><comment><USER18> It's a great idea and has potential to create value for both parties. Although the part where you say you guarantee the payments might be a little tricky when it involves transferring money across different countries. The client transfers the money to hackertrade, you hold the money and then transfer to the coder. It could be double-taxed and compromise the business cash-flow.

<comment><AUTHOR> This part we didn't really innovate - that's how plateforms like elance or vWorker guarantee their payments. Taxes can be an headache, but nothing that hasn't been solved already.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escrow>

<comment><USER19> How are you handling chargebacks? What if the service buyer does not honor you escrow arbitration after the process and files for a chargeback? are you going to take the money back from the service provider?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Congrats on the launch! Very similar concept to my own project, Folyo (<http://folyo.me>). Pretty much exactly the same thing actually, except Folyo focuses exclusively on freelance designers.

EDIT: there is one difference, which is that Folyo takes a $100 fixed fee per project, not a cut of the budget.

</comment><comment><USER21> Interesting idea. I respect that you are trying to match the client and the developers well, but the process you outlined seems to involve a lot of steps. Is there a way to simplify or automate portions of it? It also might be a challenge to be profitable charging 10% with the amount of back-and-forth you've proposed..</comment>


Programming Models for Distributed Computation - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/heathermiller/dist-prog-book <comment><USER2> The menu of papers for the associated class, [https://heather.miller.am/teaching/cs7680/](https://heather.miller.am/teaching/cs7680/), looks really rich. The class is from 2016. Looks like the book dates from 2016-2017. My first impression was that this was work in progress ...

I'd be curious to see what from this set Adrian Colyer [https://blog.acolyer.org/](https://blog.acolyer.org/) has already digested.

A perhaps interesting follow on would be to see which of these programming models are manifest today across the big cloud services .. or how they have advanced from this legacy work.

</comment><comment><USER3> Linear Logic / Session Types seem interesting. I've poked around some of the papers, but I'm not sure how to approach the subject yet.

[https://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/wadler/topics/linear- logic.ht...](https://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/wadler/topics/linear-logic.html)

<comment><USER4> Session Types, AFAIU are a specific implementation of a linear logic in some type system and I am not all too familiar with them in practice. However, I would like to think I am well versed in Linear Logic and Substructural Type Theory. I think the works by Wadler are a good place to start, in particular is a sort of review paper, based in intuitionistic logic (which he also covers in said paper), on linear logic. It's called 'A Taste of Linear Logic' (I actually have the paper open in Safari on my iPhone as I type this) and it is written as a sort of primer on the area. Wadler's bibliographies on the works contained in the pages you linked are a good source as well. If you are at all coming from a place of familiarity with Haskell, a decent overview of the current discussions on Linear Types in functional languages is at [2]. And lastly, if you like videos, Simon Peyton Jones has a great talk on YouTube [3] where he discusses practical linear types for Haskell, but the theory is not Haskell specific.

I will warn you that the latter two references make several arguments and then discuss uniqueness typing (which is related but very different) and that is a whole other rabbit hole of sources, but generally a good topic to dig into as well.

[1] [https://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/wadler/papers/lineartaste/lin...](https://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/wadler/papers/lineartaste/lineartaste- revised.pdf)

[2] [http://edsko.net/2017/01/08/linearity-in- haskell/](http://edsko.net/2017/01/08/linearity-in-haskell/)

[3] [https://youtu.be/t0mhvd3-60Y](https://youtu.be/t0mhvd3-60Y)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> For those who didn't figure it out - instead of raw markdown you can read the book already in html format that browsers can render: [http://dist-prog- book.com/chapter/](http://dist-prog-book.com/chapter/)

</comment><comment><USER6> I haven't checked these links for a couple of years, but here's a collection of distributed systems reading lists I compiled.

[https://gist.github.com/macintux/6227368](https://gist.github.com/macintux/6227368)

</comment><comment><USER7> lol hn never fails in it's shallow dismissal of an enormous amount of work: as of right now there's a comment on how this _textbook_ is too shallow (I guess if it were a content marketing medium post it would be much better) and how it can't possibly be substantive because it's written in _markdown_.

man what a bastion of intelligent discussion this place is.

<comment><USER8> It is fair to point out this is a product of a highly regarded computer science school.

So the honest question is: should we subject industry e.g. blogs to the same standard as the academy. I would think we should hold academic products to a much higher standard. I do agree criticism should be constructive. (One of PRs for example noted lack of mention of CSP.)

<comment><USER9> Hum... It does really depend.

Honestly, for me right now, coming from HN into random places, no I don't have different standards. But in a course having a textbook recommendation, yes, the standards are very different.

Anyway, you are out on a tangent. The work should be judged based on its quality, and for all the dimensions quality has, the presentation format is not one that matters.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The content seems shallow, the topic is extremely broad. Overall I do not feel this topic can be described really well.

<comment><USER11> I think "shallow" is being a bit uncharitable. The book here doesn't dive into ditributed systems theory very deeply but it gives a very rich overview of real industry tools used over the past few decades with plenty of context around why technologies are being used or discarded. They go into code examples of things like CRDTs so its not like its just prose.

One thing that feels off to me as a backend engineer that deals with distributed systems in practice is no treatment (AFAICT) of containers/virtual machines and how tools like kubernetes are providing the primitives that the distributed languages of the past provided. In general I think chapter 4 doesn't have a cohesive narrative on its treatment of languages for distributed computation. I know this is messy topic but I think more could be done to tie things to current art.

If I were to make a prediction, there's general trend towards protocols (mostly network level above layer 4) being the actual thing of interest for distributed computation, not single language runtimes. Wire-compatible DBs like AWS aurora and MySQL are an example, but also I think things like container orchestator's liveness and readiness checks over HTTP. As more primitives rally around the same core concepts, I think the general trend will be to go from conceptual similarity, to client library compatability (e.g. identical interfaces a la OpenTracing <> Lightstep, Jaeger) and eventually wire/protocol compatibility. Language runtimes are too much of a moving target as there are other pressures at play (community, tooling, typing, yes even syntax) that go into language choices over a decade.

<comment><USER12> Yes, i was also a bit disappointed reading e.g. the reference e.g. about CSPs, it should at least link some other textbooks here. However, I admire the work being put into this. It would be great if all university teachers would make the effort to publish open access. A dream would be collaboratively maintained textbooks with strong single editors for readability and consistent style. Also there should be foundations like apache, etc that market such material and put up quality control, pay lectors where the publishers are largely failing atm.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: The Met in pictures – Five millennia of art from around the world - <AUTHOR> http://visualizingvisions.com/metglobe/experiment/ <comment><USER2> Hey this is really cool! Thanks for putting it together.

There are obviously so many directions you could go with an active visualization and exploration experience for this data set.

My question for you then, is--what are you trying to enable your visual explorers to do better? How specific can you be in articulating what "problem" you want to solve for them?

E.g., Maybe you believe that art researchers or "visual explorers", whomever fits your target user here, need to be able to more swiftly filter the collection along different dimensions and then see the results grouped by country so as to see commonalities across countries that weren't apparent before. If so, that will inform how you design the interactive visualization.

With your current version, I would think more about the tag/filtering experience. Current behavior--when I click a tag, I'm forced to sit and watch it cycle through items with the same tag.

Forcing a user to play along at a certain speed is generally an issue, unless of course there is a narrative that is inextricably bound to such temporal constraints, and wouldn't make sense without them.

Great work though! Thanks for sharing.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey brianjoseff,

Thank you for the kind words. I am an art historian currently doing a PhD where I investigate the use of digital methods for art historical research. So my usual work is more academic in nature. In the meantime though, I work closely together with a developer and we like to create all sorts of visualizations, put together datasets, etc.

For The Met Globe we actually just wanted to create something nice for a large touch screen setup we have in our department. So the idea is that when people sit down for coffee and chat, they might get (un)consciously inspired by beautiful historical artefacts. There is a picture of setup on my twitter account: [https://twitter.com/FloorKoeleman/status/908239636660736001](https://twitter.com/FloorKoeleman/status/908239636660736001)

Floor

<comment><USER2> Ah! then the passive looping is probably great for stimulating (un)conscious inspiration. Good luck with your PhD!</comment></comment></comment>


Mathematician finds solution to Poisson formula problem buried in 1959 paper - <AUTHOR> http://phys.org/news/2016-03-mathematician-solution-poisson-formula-problem.html <comment><USER2> Three cheers for a honest man.

</comment><comment><USER3> Humanity still sucks at human knowledge management.</comment>


Custom PuTTY color themes (for us lucky, Win devs) - <AUTHOR> http://www.igvita.com/2008/04/14/custom-putty-color-themes/

<comment><USER2> Since PuTTY only has 16 colors, I just forward X11 connections and use gvim.

</comment><comment><USER3> lucky win devs?

</comment><comment><USER4> Careful, he's root!</comment>


If you want to change the world get over being a sugar cookie - <AUTHOR> http://alcalde.texasexes.org/2014/05/mcraven-to-grads-to-change-the-world-start-by-making-your-bed/ <comment><USER2> This was my commencement address! My best friend and I sat there pretty stunned at how good it was. I've shown this to a lot of friends and family and everyone considers it one of the better commencement addresses out there.

<comment><AUTHOR> And this has been an inspiration ever since.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> So if you want to change the world, blindly accept orders from authority figures, no matter how inane? Sure...

<comment><USER4> If you want to be a SEAL, blindly (trustingly) accept orders from authority figures _who are doing things specifically designed to produce the best SEALs that they know how to produce_. If you don't want to be a SEAL, don't.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Sounds like the sugar cookie test is a way of filtering out people who won't blindly accept arbitrary rules from authority.

<comment><USER6> > _Sounds like the sugar cookie test is a way of filtering out people who won > 't blindly accept arbitrary rules from authority._

Quite a _non sequitur_ there.

As mentioned during the speech, Adm. McRaven was describing his own SEAL training. Since SEALs are an elite branch of the US Navy, individuals have to explicitly volunteer to enter SEAL training, are screened to a very high standard, and are warned well in advance that the training is extremely taxing, both physically and mentally.

<comment><USER7> > _of the US Navy, individuals have to explicitly volunteer to enter SEAL > training, are screened to a very high standard, and are warned well in > advance that the training is extremely taxing, both physically and > mentally._

They are also conditioned not to question the training, or the missions, or anything much, for that matter.

<comment><USER6> To put it politely, if you think that, you don't know enough about the military or its training to have a meaningful opinion.

<comment><USER7> To put it politely, that wasn't an opinion, that was a statement of fact valid for every military in the world. Solders are there to obey commands, not to question them. And I've been through service.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Jeb Bush believes net neutrality rules are the 'craziest ideas' - <AUTHOR> http://www.engadget.com/2015/03/09/jeb-bush-says-net-neutrality-is-crazy/

<comment><USER2> Why does the right wing think net neutrality is a bad thing?

Don't they want to encourage business?</comment>


Facebook's new nostalgia feature is already bringing up painful memories - <AUTHOR> http://www.theverge.com/2015/4/2/8315897/facebook-on-this-day-nostalgia-app-bringing-back-painful-memories <comment><USER2> I imagine it could be very difficult to see posts by or about friends or family who have passed away but you could look at it as an opportunity to remember good times too.

The Facebook timeline always strikes me as kind of false by only presenting purely positive events in someone's life. Negative events effect people profoundly but aren't represented at all by Facebook.

I understand also that one wouldn't want reminded of such things whilst the pain was still fresh.

My conclusion is that people are complicated...

</comment><comment><USER3> Not a day goes by that I'm not thankful for ditching FB.</comment>


Tesla Semis Are Cheaper Than Rail Enough of the Time to Reshape Ground Freight - <AUTHOR> https://cleantechnica.com/2020/02/16/tesla-semis-are-cheaper-than-rail-enough-of-the-time-to-reshape-ground-freight/ <comment><USER2> The article touches on many factors that influence the cost of freight traffic by road and by rail, but it doesn't mention diesel taxes that help pay for road maintenance. Presumably electric trucks will eventually also have to pay some kind of similar toll or tax for the use of the roads.

<comment><USER3> ... and fuel/user taxes tend to only pay for something like 50% of the road cost. The rest ends up being a government subsidy for road shipping which might be reexamined if electric trucks ever become a big thing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I find the argument about the Tesla windshield being a cost savings fascinating. Truck transport companies operate on thin margins in a commodity market - if there was something to be squeezed out in efficiency or cost savings by using stronger glass - wouldn't it have already been done?

</comment><comment><USER5> Train capacity is also sharply reduced during a downturn by stowing cars to keep prices elevated. Having an alternate option (an option with capital overhead that makes it more difficult to park during a downturn) will hopefully force more competition during those times.

</comment><comment><USER6> A large part of the article's argument is based on convoys of self-driving trucks where only the first truck is actively driven. The others don't have drivers or can be sleeping.

So you can mentally add "...when self-driving technology pans out and laws change" to the title.

</comment><comment><USER7> I'm disappointed not to see any consideration of "tons of freight" replacement intervals for roads versus rails.

</comment><comment><USER8> > In China, high-speed rail is all electric with externally supplied > electricity. This isn't hard, it's just not the freight rail standard yet. > The engines are all diesel electric hybrids as it is, so displacing the > diesel part is relatively straightforward.

This is hilarious.

<comment><USER9> I concur.

The American Transcontinental railway system had it's foundations laid in a time where full electrical generation and distribution were not by any means solved problems.

Furthermore, the safety issues that would come with trying to use any of the previous rail infrastructure, (which one would be mad _not_ to given how much of it there is) would make things nigh impossible to make work safely given the fact there is quite literally nothing separating people from the tracks. Which is not something would worthwhile to have to implement everywhere given that would consume far more energy to establish than it would save in operation for a very long time.

Also, China's "high speed" rail formula is great for moving people around, but definitely _not_ a regime you want to have to design around for freight. Freight is generally far more massive/dense than the same volume of people. Acceleration of that load to/from excessively high speeds is an engineering nightmare. Not impossible, but definitely expensive.

That's just the points I can think of off the top of my head. I'm sure someone in the industry would have more insight than I.

<comment><USER10> I can't imagine upgrading the US freight rail system with basic catenary technology to be that expensive. You don't really need all the fancy tensioning technology and stuff for a train that goes above 50mph maybe once a month; an offset electric pole would be enough. It's not that much more a safety issue than the 50 year old wooden electric poles we already have running mains voltage all over the country. Also in contrast to passenger services the US frieght system actually has a lot of money being thrown around so it'll be able to afford it.

That being said I still think this article is a bit of a shill piece. Reinforced glass windshields aren't going to affect shit, especially when they are already mounted 6 feet off the ground and thus out of range of most kicked up road debris.</comment></comment></comment>


Enough with the whiteboard coding during interviews - <AUTHOR> http://klaig.blogspot.be/2012/08/enough-with-whiteboard-coding-during.html

<comment><USER2> I see this opinion expressed a lot, but I don't get it. I think whiteboard coding is a great tool.

Maybe other people choose something so ridiculously abstract and difficult, but the way we do it at Thought Sauce it is always a very simple problem.

We make it clear that we care more about your approach than the code. We even kind of pair program on the board.

We don't make anyone feel stupid, and it works.

If it's a good fit we follow up with a day coding with the team (paid of course) and then make an offer.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thx for your insight. I mainly reacted to this post [http://java.dzone.com/articles/developer- interviews-%E2%80%9...](http://java.dzone.com/articles/developer- interviews-%E2%80%93-code) which shows the adverse effects where you can read stuff like : I am looking at "logic", "out-of-box thinking" and ability to "respond differently" to probably the simplest question at the spur of moment</comment></comment>


UK researchers create graphene-based sieve that can remove salt from seawater - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-39482342 <comment><USER2> Back at university I dreamt of creating bacteria to do desalination, powered by the sun. All the necessary components exist–in fact, a seemingly endless number of genes code for channels and transports that selectively target the charged ions (Na^2+, Cl- mostly, but also Potassium and Magnesium). It's partially the legacy of life having arisen in saltwater, and many biological processes are controlled with ion concentration gradients. Signal transmission along a nerve? -> Ions. Want to get all this water out of here? -> Transport the salt across the membrane, and the water follows voluntarily.

<comment><USER3> This is interesting to think about. As I'm sure you've considered, bacteria and other living cells exist in a state of highly regulated homeostasis. In bacteria, things like charged ion concentrations are maintained internally by various physiological mechanisms (chiefly the membrane-bound transport channels you describe) at specific concentrations with little variation. Salinity concentrations are generally the same as the surrounding seawater (marine bacteria are usually osmoconformers, as opposed to more sophisticated osmoregulators like fish), and the transport mechanisms exist as adaptations to maintain this state.

So while some aquatic bacteria can exist at a wide range of external salt concentrations (they are "euryhaline"), I don't know of any bacteria that have adaptated to actively concentrate salt internally above the salinity of typical seawater. Beyond a certain not-very-useful threshold, this would disrupt too many metabolic pathways and kill the bacterium. So I don't see how a concentrate-in-the-bacteria-then-filter-them-out approach to industrial desalination would work.

You might be thinking about brine pool extremophile bacteria / archaea, but again, they are just well-adapted when it comes to expelling salt or resisting salt intake, not actively concentrating it internally.

However, if you could embed euryhaline bacteria into some kind of impermeable membrane in a controlled orientation, and engineer them to express the right kind of one-way channels on opposite sides of the cell... there are some big bioengineering obstacles to doing this, but it's an interesting idea. It would basically be a sped-up version of the double reverse osmosis desalination approach already widely used, potentially more efficient and available to be powered more easily by sustainable / free energy sources.

I'm just typing as I think there, so maybe there's been work in this area already.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The layering approach has much potential. In this case, graphene oxide layered with epoxy resin stabilizes the membrane and lets them control pore size.

The next step, problems with contaminants (seawater) fouling the membrane, might be mitigated with more layers? Say a Teflon layer to aid in cleaning. Or an ionized layer to repel many particulates.

I wish they'd said more about how they control pore size. How does the epoxy layer avoid covering the pores? Is it laid down before pores are etched or something? Fascinating subject.

<comment><USER5> The paper is quite short and very readable (especially if you are just skimming and can skim over some of the details/jargon) but here [0] is a diagram (from the paper) that perhaps will help you understand what is going on.

[0] [http://imgur.com/a/LNWUz](http://imgur.com/a/LNWUz)

[edit]

To summarise, they prepared graphene oxide laminates using vacuum filtration, and then stored them at different relative humidities by changing the salt concentration of the storage liquid. The different relative humidities cause different layer spacing, which they measure with X-ray diffraction, and choose whichever layer spacing they want before adding the epoxy.

The relevant quote from the paper:

 _Thick (≈100 µm) GO laminates were prepared by vacuum filtration of aqueous GO solutions, as reported previously. The laminates were cut into rectangular strips (4 mm × 10 mm) and stored for one to two weeks at different relative humidities (RH), achieved using saturated salt solutions. The resulting interlayer spacing was measured by X-ray diffraction as shown in Fig. 1e and varied from ≈ 6.4 to 9.8 Å with RH changing from zero to 100%. GO laminates soaked in liquid water showed d ≈ 13.7 ± 0.3 Å. All these values agree with previous reports, where the changes in d were attributed to successive incorporation of water molecules into various sites between GO sheets. Individual GO strips with desirable d were then encapsulated and stacked together using Stycast epoxy as shown in Figs. 1b,c to increase the available cross-section for filtration to 1 mm (see Methods and supplementary Fig. S1). The stacked GO laminates, now embedded in the epoxy (Fig. 1c), are referred to as physically confined GO (PCGO) membranes because the epoxy mechanically restricts the laminate's swelling upon exposure to RH or liquid water (Methods). The stacks were glued into a slot made in either metal or plastic plate (Fig. 1b). Two sides of these stacked PCGO membranes were then trimmed off to make sure that all the nanochannels are open (Fig. 1d) before carrying out permeation experiments, in which ions and water molecules permeates along the lamination direction as shown in Fig. 1a._

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Reverse osmosis has been around for a long time and is used on boats everywhere for desalination. This sounds like a new membrane that requires less pressure and thus energy? I guess sieve sounded better?

<comment><USER7> RO membranes are notoriously finicky and non-robust. They require a lot of maintenance and can be ruined by common chemicals like chlorine. A more robust desalination membrane would be a very good thing.

<comment><USER8> When I was involved in RO in the early eighties, that was exactly the issue. In the context of offshore drilling rigs, we just couldn't get the adherence to protocol around flushing and filtering that the units needed to work over a reasonable lifetime.

We eventually gave up and went with an Alfa-Laval heat exchanger based approach.

<comment><USER9> Why wasn't the flushing automated?

edit: I have worked on many RO systems and we always did auto flushing and I am not sure I ever saw anything other than that. It was pharma though.

<comment><USER10> Likely the issue is, with a large RO plant you hire people for the specific domain knowledge and develop a work culture around it. For a place like an oil rig none of this specific domain knowledge is central to the work at hand. So the technology isn't reliable in that context.

<comment><USER8> Exactly. It was a small scale system and the rig mechanic or whoever was supposed to do it as one of their 100 or so responsibilities so it often wasn't done. It was also pretty much a V1 system so it was just very sensitive.

To set some context that people here might appreciate, there wasn't a single computer or data link to offshore drilling rigs at that time. We were just starting to play with radio modem links.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Seeing as we are unable or unwilling to deal with the present micro and nano- particles resulting from decades of plastic use and disposal, I worry about the environmental effects of graphene.

<comment><USER12> Abspestos 2.0

Funny enough, its not actually banned in the USA, just a liability nightmare. I ocasionally still see brake pads with the stuff. I suspect graphine, and other 'nano' materials will be similar in practice.

<comment><USER11> That would be _malpractice_.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I swear I've heard about this before... is this one of those stories that emerges about a technology that never seems to enter the market? That "super slick" coating for condiment container interiors is another that springs to mind.

<comment><USER14> Desalinization is already with about a factor of 2 or 3 of the thermodynamic optimum, so improvements can't be revolutionary. Desalinization mostly needs cheap clean energy.

<comment><USER15> Also, waste is a major problem, environmentally.

<comment><USER14> Are you talking about the brine? This is trivial if you just put a pipe a few hundred yards out to sea. The concentration is diluted extremely quickly. (The only exception is if your desalination plant is _below_ sea level because then you have to pump the brine up hill, which costs some energy.)

<comment><USER16> I've seen the assumption that the brine dissipates quickly challenged.

Fluids can remain subbornly un-mixed, over large distances and for long times. Given that brine is heavier than seawater, it will almost certainly tend to sink and flow along bathymetric contours, perhaps pooling in local low spots. And sealife can be exceedingly sensitive to changes in temperature, ion density, salt content, etc.

This reminds me of a book in which an ecologist described a discussion with a chemist over the concentration of some pollutant in seawater. Roughly, "Assuming a well-mixed solution..." starts the chemist. "How are you planning to stir the oceans?" asks the ecologist....

<comment><USER14> I've seen data on this and dilution was extremely fast, as expected.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> This is all fine, but if it isn't inert and if it 'leaks' graphene, it can be super toxic as well. I don't want to pu-pu it, but it is legitimate concern.

<comment><USER18> I didn't know that graphene was toxic. I should stop licking my pencils.

And from what little chemistry I know, I though graphene oxide was rather inert.

<comment><USER19> The naive (very hand-wavy) explanation for the toxicity of graphene (nanotubes to be specific, not sheets in general) is not chemistry, rather the nanotubes physically rupturing cell organelles. Same with asbestos: small rigid particles that cut everything else in pieces.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> What stops this from getting clogged?

<comment><USER12> Standard filters catch most particulate matter, this is able to remove dissolved impurities afterward.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I hope this isn't Science being taken to a irrational extreme, as tends to happen with news and science.

This has incredible potential not only for the developing world but also for sea travel and even the fact that we are running out of drinkable water in the west.

Only 2.5% of the water on the planet is even potentially drinkable. If we were able to convert even 1%. Crazy.

<comment><USER8> Note that reverse osmosis desalination through membranes already exists as the article notes. (Not sure what the current state of the art is as I haven't worked in this area for a long time.) The question in whether this has advantages to the desalination systems used today.

<comment><USER22> Generally speaking, the Aussies and Israelis have some of the top of the line Reverse Osmosis Purification Tech. I saw a ROPU (reverse osmosis purification unit) truck from the Army Corps of engineers when I was active duty US Army and that thing was unreal. You could ingest raw sewage into that thing and out would come drinkable, albeit not wonderful tasting, clean drinking water.

<comment><USER23> That only works when you have the luxury of burning massive quantities of oil on the taxpayers' dime.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Is there a reason this wouldn't be subject to the same physics that requires a lot of energy to desalinate water by other means? Thermodynamics puts a limit on how efficiently you can reduce entropy like that.

<comment><USER25> I wouldn't say "a lot" in economic terms: "The theoretical absolute minimum amount of energy required by natural osmosis to desalinate average seawater is approximately 1 kilowatt-hour per cubic meter (kwh/m3) of water produced, or 3.8 kilowatt-hours per thousand gallons (kwh/kgal)." [https://www.amtaorg.com/wp- content/uploads/7_MembraneDesalin...](https://www.amtaorg.com/wp- content/uploads/7_MembraneDesalinationPowerUsagePutInPerspective.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> we have experienced droughts in Puerto Rico. this could likely lower our water prices as well.

[http://www.noticel.com/noticia/177413/la-sequia-es-para- larg...](http://www.noticel.com/noticia/177413/la-sequia-es-para-largo-asi-lo- predice-la-historia.html)

<comment><USER27> As many drought hot spots around the Globe. I hope this gets the traction it really deserves

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> This is somewhat OT, but I've noticed a trend -- although I can't say how recent -- of headlines of the form "British [X] do [Amazing Thing]", particularly (but not necessarily) from the BBC. I note that the HN headline has been changed to "UK researchers" (IIRC, it said "British Scientists" earlier) and this BBC article doesn't actually use this phrase in their headline, but it appears prominently in the tagline.

This may be because I'm restricted to English language articles, but I don't see, for example, "Spanish researchers do [Amazing Thing]". Even in English, I don't regularly see "US/Australian/NZ/Canadian/South African/etc. [X] do [Amazing Thing]"; even though I'm sure plenty of amazing things have been done by these folks.

I understand that the popular press is directed towards the masses, but is the nationality/allegiance of [X] really so important? More so than their discovery/invention/whatever? I'm British and, in a time when populist nationalism is causing all kinds of problems, I'm not sure this rhetoric is helpful. Just be proud of the achievement.

How about just: "[Amazing Thing]"?

Or, if you want to associate it with people, to make it more personal and less "stark" (perhaps to sell it better): "Humanity achieves [Amazing Thing]".

<comment><USER29> > in a time when populist nationalism is causing all kinds of problems

(I realize this forum will be almost overwhelmingly in favor of the above statement, but thought I would respond anyway to give an alternative viewpoint from outside).

What problems? Is it really causing problems, or is it just that you are politically opposed to it? The _lack_ of nationalism I would say has caused far more problems over the last few decades (Mass clashing of cultures, rise of terrorism, global multi-nationals exploiting workers, not paying taxes etc, moving democracy and accountability further and further away from people).

If a family member achieved something you would naturally feel more "proud" than if it was a person in the world picked at random.

For some people, their nationality is important to them - an extended family of shared identity, culture, experiences and values. I would much much rather use a local taxi company, which will benefit my local community, friends, family, than use some faceless global thing like Uber, which will benefit some rich people in another country.

Further, competition is good. It's the way we achieve things. If a team of scientists in [other_country] see this news, they will likely be spurred on.

This is why things like the space race worked so well.

<comment><USER30> Well it's causing the UK to leave the EU which is a disaster by any measure, not including idiots wanting "control".

<comment><USER29> > Well it's causing the UK to leave the EU which is a disaster by any measure, > not including idiots wanting "control".

So you're just politically opposed to it.

It's not a disaster if you're very much opposed to an EU superstate.

<comment><USER31> This is just a slippery slope fallacy. There was clear opposition to an EU superstate in many countries, there's no way the UK ever would have ended up in one. If anything, this makes a (smaller) EU superstate more likely.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>