Why Twitter's decision on Scraperwiki is bad for data democracy - <AUTHOR> http://gravyanecdote.com/uncategorized/why-twitters-decision-on-scraperwiki-is-bad-for-data-democracy/ <comment><USER2> This issue is just an instance of a big problem: there is not such thing as a data democracy, only a theory. It's not about Scraperwiki only, the SLA for the free Twitter API is very restrictive (i.e: number of calls per hour).

Twitter (and others) works like a cartel, imagine that you want to pay to increase the number of API calls per hour, you don't have a straightforward way to do it. Twitter has a lot to learn from what Google did almost a decade ago: make it easy to pay and work with your service instantly (AdWords).

<comment><USER3> A little off topic, but I'm curious where the HN crowd lies on the ethics of scraping.

I'm a bit on the copyleft side -- I say, if something is made public, it's fair game. If you want to protect your data from being scraped, you very easily indicate that by putting it behind a login.

But in my opinion, anything google is allowed to access and put in the index, I can access.

<comment><USER2> I think at the startup level you can "hack the system". The issue comes when you grow.

<comment><USER3> As a practical, or ethical issue?

IE, is it just as "wrong" in your opinion to scrape sites, regardless of size or profitability? Or are you espousing the practical argument that it's fine because you can get away with it when flying under the radar?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> What, a centralized service is not good for democracy? Who would have guessed!

</comment><comment><USER5> I don't get it. Is the author under the impression that Twitter data is some sort of essential common resource? That's ridiculous. Its private and and its for sale by a for-profit company.

This isn't about "data democracy". Thats a weasel word the author used to try and sound persuasive despite his weak argument. This is about the author wanting to have cheaper access to Twitter data and whining about how much it will cost him to get that data.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hiya! Francis from ScraperWiki here. There are a couple of things going on:

Firstly, it is about inconsistency between how developers are treated and how people-who-can-use-Excel are treated.

Secondly, it is that _vetting_ of "data use" is so hard, it means low end users just can't buy it at all (financial and red tape reasons). Even if they are happy with the per-Tweet cost.

Speaking for ScraperWiki, we want Twitter to make more money from their data. More details here: [https://blog.scraperwiki.com/2014/08/the-story-of-getting- tw...](https://blog.scraperwiki.com/2014/08/the-story-of-getting-twitter-data- and-its-missing-middle/)

<comment><USER5> Twitter seems to have a strategy for monetizing their data that is at odds with your company's strategy. This is not about "data democracy", its just a business dispute. You're making it sound like its ideological but its not. You want something from them and they said no. That's all.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Or, you know, you could learn to code. That would open up a myriad of opportunities for you, and help prevent this sort of loss of independence in the future.

<comment><USER7> I really don't think that will help. It is not that Twitter is insisting that people stop using (unlimited, unmetered) scraping and move to (unlimited, unmetered) APIs. Rather, it is that Twitter has stopped offering unlimited, unmetered APIs and is now charging for use.

<comment><USER6> I agree that that is the real problem--that said, the article took the stance of "Why is Twitter being so much nicer to developers than non-coders?"

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Any links to information about the decision? Googling the two company names didn't turn up much. Has this been publicized?

<comment><USER9> Here is a link from ScraperWiki from the article:

[https://blog.scraperwiki.com/2014/08/the-story-of-getting- tw...](https://blog.scraperwiki.com/2014/08/the-story-of-getting-twitter-data- and-its-missing-middle/)

<comment><USER8> Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Couldn't Scraperwiki release a tool which allowed anyone to scrape Twitter and have it upload the data back to Scraperwiki? Would that get around the SLA?

<comment><AUTHOR> Probably not.

See Twitter's response to this blog post of somebody trying to do something similar: [http://mashe.hawksey.info/2011/03/export-twitter- followers/](http://mashe.hawksey.info/2011/03/export-twitter-followers/)

Even if we could, the users would have to register a Twitter developer application, making the user experience much worse than just OAuth, for no good reason.</comment></comment>


Pantai Remis Landslide - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantai_Remis_landslide <comment><USER2> Direct link to video: [https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=H6Ma0SVjMHA](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=H6Ma0SVjMHA)

</comment><comment><USER3> Watch the video until the end. It seems a bit boring even after the landslide has started, but seeing the _entire P̶a̶c̶i̶f̶i̶c̶ Indian Ocean_ linger at the top of that last bit of land, waiting to plunge into the open space, was fascinating.

<comment><USER4> A sight to behold. I've been to that area and I believe it was the Straits of Malacca, which is connected to the Indian Ocean rather than to the Pacific. Not quite an ocean but still awe inspiring to see the massive power that water has.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> And the Wikideletionists have flagged it already (not already I suppose, the article is 11 years old)!

<comment><USER6> That was me. I don't consider myself a deletionist, but this seemed like a pretty egregious example of something that does not meet the bar for having its own page.

I might be wrong :). You can go ahead and disagree with the proposed deletion; it's Wikipedia. I can assure you I am a very light editor. If there is a cabal, I am not a member.

<comment><USER7> Why would anyone think this way?

<comment><USER8> Because the more inclusionary wikipedia is, the less rare and valuable it is to be a wikipedia contributor and/or editor.

Imagine if _everyone_ was allowed to write a factual, well-formed, properly cited article ?

<comment><USER6> Sorry, what? I made the comment above precisely to highlight the fact that the proposal was made by me, some random person, and it can easily be disputed by you, some random person, because everyone can (and should!) edit Wikipedia.

Your sarcasm is really quite hurtful.

<comment><USER8> OK. Zero interest in arguing about inclusionism for the hundredth time so I'll take your word for it that you mean well and I wish you good luck.

Changing subjects:

How does one change the username their HN posts are made by, after the fact ? That's a neat trick ...

<comment><USER5> That is an awesome trick, please let us know how! The account was created hours after the comments, and the comments no longer appear in the original commenter history.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> That was incredible to watch. I'm assuming that whole edifice collapsed due to the impact from the mining, right?

<comment><USER10> Yes, it collapsed because the miners dug a huge hole right next to the ocean.

What's _really_ crazy is that the Red Sea might have formed in a single event like this one but thousands of times bigger!

I can't find a link now but, uh,

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bab-el- Mandeb#History](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bab-el-Mandeb#History)

> Paleo-environmental and tectonic events in the Miocene epoch created the > Danakil Isthmus, a land bridge forming a broad connection between Yemen and > Ethiopia. During the last 100,000 years eustatic sea level fluctuations have > led to alternate opening and closing of the straits.

<comment><USER11> Looks like you haven't heard about this: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zanclean_flood](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zanclean_flood)

<comment><USER10> OMG!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Would love to see someone apply one of those neural network upscalers to see this in 4K :)

</comment><comment><USER13> Anyone know where specifically this happened? In the form of a Google maps link, preferably.

<comment><USER14> In Malaysia links in the wiki.

<comment><USER13> I was thinking more specifically, I wanted to look at the cove formed:)</comment></comment></comment>


The Best Books I Read in 2013 - <AUTHOR> http://www.thegatesnotes.com/Personal/Best-Books-2013 <comment><USER2> "But I read mostly nonfiction because I always want to learn more about how the world works."

Boy oh boy, if I had a quarter every time I heard that probably I could get a tall Starbucks latte. Many, _many_ people are under the assumption that fiction is stuff that somebody made up and hence useless while non-fiction gives you information about the world; so if you're a busy person, read non- fiction (it's of, course debatable if such a neat classification even can be done). What these people do not realize is that great fiction can provide _more_ information about the world, humanity in general, and what's even more important, yourself, then you can ever glimpse by reading another Gladwell book.

<comment><USER3> Still, fiction is fiction.

It's like all those questions : would you rather do this, or live all your life with this. They are fun, but they are useless as they never happened. There is no point thinking about them besides playing with your imagination.

Fiction is the same to me, yes it came from a real context, but it's still a work of fiction and doesn't teach you anything about real life.

e.g. Are you gonna learn about dating by reading romantic novels or real life stories?

<comment><USER4> _Still, fiction is fiction._

"You can tell a true war story by the questions you ask. Somebody tells a story, let's say, and afterward you ask, 'Is it true?' and if the answer matters, you've got your answer.

For example, we've all heard this one. Four guys go down a trail. A grenade sails out. One guy jumps on it and takes the blast and saves his three buddies.

Is it true?

The answer matters.

You'd feel cheated if it never happened. Without the grounding reality, it's just a trite bit of puffery, pure Hollywood, untrue in the way all such stories are untrue. Yet even if it did happen -- and maybe it did, anything's possible -- even then you know it can't be true, because a true war story does not depend upon that kind of truth. Absolute occurrence is irrelevant. A thing may happen and be a total lie; another thing may not happen and be truer than the truth. For example: Four guys go down a trail. A grenade sails out. One guy jumps on it and takes the blast, but it's a killer grenade and everybody dies anyway. Before they die, though, one of the dead guys says, 'The fuck you do that for?' and the jumper says, 'Story of my life, man,' and the other guy starts to smile but he's dead.

That's a true story that never happened."

<comment><USER5> I read that book. It left me convinced that I couldn't learn anything at all from those fictional war stories since I couldn't distinguish the truths from the half-truths, and it was a turning point in my literary life as I realized I do indeed prefer to read non-fiction.

(PS I still read and enjoy fiction. I don't get why everyone's so up in arms about Bill Gate's mild preference for non-fiction)

<comment><USER6> It seems like more than a "mild preference" if what he read was that skewed to non-fiction.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Well, I'm no Bill Gates, but here are the best books I read in 2013:

* So Good They Can't Ignore You (Newport). If you've ever daydreamed about how much better your life would be if you were only working at that cool company, you should seriously read this book. By not focusing on just getting a cool job, but instead doing deliberate practice and being "so good they can't ignore you" you can increase aspects of any job that are scientifically-proven to make you happier (control, autonomy, and expertise).

* The Making of a Chef (Ruhlman). If you have any interest in cooking (even if you just watch Top Chef) you will like this book. A major theme of the book is discipline which aligns well with software; code quality, good design, maintaining a test suite — all of these things are signs of a true craftsmen, but they are easy to shrug off without discipline.

* Are Your Light's On? (Gause, Weinberg). I would recommend it to anyone dealing with arguments about solutions or confusion about problems, especially when non-technical folks are involved. The biggest win for me was making a mental shift from "Problem Solver" to "Solver of Problems", which allows us to focus on finding who is impacted by a problem and identifying the real story behind the problem.

I'm currently reading Punished By Rewards (only halfway through) but it is pretty interesting so far and will probably make the cut on my final list :)

<comment><USER8> I'm a huge fan of Cal Newport. I've been following his blog for _years_ and I love his methodical approach towards deconstructing and demystifying various career related things.

Some books I read this year that stand out:

* Emperor of All Maladies (Mukherjee): Beautiful look into the most elusive disease of our generation. Mukherjee provides a biography of cancer.

* The Art of Learning (Waitzkin): I've been following Josh Waitzkin since I was a little kid. I fell in love with his Chessmaster series. Waitzkin was the inspiration for (and child actor in) _Searching for Bobby Fischer_. A chess prodigy and former IM, Waitzkin deconstructs his learning style and how it allowed him to become a leading Tai Chi martial artist.

* Humble Pie: Autobiography of Gordon Ramsay. I am a fan and found it pretty honest (although his cockiness leaks in a bit). It's a very quick read.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Shame this thread is dominated by that single sentence on nonfiction.

Some books I enjoyed this year:

* The Player of Games - [http://amzn.com/0316005401](http://amzn.com/0316005401)

* A Guide to Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy - [http://amzn.com/B0040JHNQG](http://amzn.com/B0040JHNQG)

* The Emperors Handbook - [http://amzn.com/0743233832](http://amzn.com/0743233832)

* The Price of Inequality: How Today's Divided Society Endangers Our Future - [http://amzn.com/0393088693](http://amzn.com/0393088693)

* Decisive: How to Make Better Choices in Life and Work - [http://amzn.com/B009JU6UPG](http://amzn.com/B009JU6UPG)

* Chaos: Making a New Science - [http://amzn.com/0143113453](http://amzn.com/0143113453)

* Made in the USA: The Rise and Retreat of American Manufacturing - [http://amzn.com/0262019388](http://amzn.com/0262019388)

<comment><USER10> I think the top comment sums up a lot of criticisms about Hacker News quite well.

On subject, I really enjoyed The Emperor's Handbook, and would definitely recommend it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I have an awfully long commute each day (around 3 hours) and spend most of the time reading fiction (scifi and fantasy).

I do this for two reasons:

1\. It's fun.

2\. In fiction authors have the liberty to go dip shit crazy with their possibilities. They can even change the inertia of the universe they are in.

I also think reading this kind of books helps to think outside the box and often helps to get a fresh view on problems I'm working on.

It also helps me relax my mind while reading, which I feel is a prerequisite for it to work properly.

PS: here are some of the works I particularly enjoyed lately:

Howey, Hugh.: Wool (and the entire Silo saga, very good read); Sanderson, Brandon: Mistborn: The Final Empire and the sequels (Sanderson is a genius when it comes to creating consistent universes); Phillips, Richard: The second ship (trilogy, contemporary argumented with alien technology); Corey, James S. A.: Leviathan Awakes (expanse series)

</comment><comment><USER12> Top comment on the blog post.

"Bill, you are really inspiring me to increase my concern for the critical issues of economy and technology. You are a gift to the world. thank u."

Wow, Gates has really cleaned up his public perception.

<comment><USER13> No offence, but where have you been getting news on his perception in the last few years? He's proven probably the most significant philanthropist in history, this isn't new.

<comment><USER14> Let's say _one_ of the most significant philanthropists. Carnegie and Rockefeller were extraordinary philanthropists and in inflation-adjusted dollars, Rockefeller gave away more.

What Gates has done that's unique is to pressure/induce other super-wealthy individuals to also donate their wealth to charity.

<comment><USER15> Gates isn't being measured as the most significant philanthropist because of how much money he is giving away, inflation adjusted or otherwise. He isn't even measured that way because he's also directing much of Warren Buffet's (and others) wealth towards philanthropy; those those are significant accomplishments.

Rather, he's being measured as the most significant philanthropist, because his underlying belief systems, is so all encompassing:

From: [1]

 _Guided by the belief that every life has equal value, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation works to help all people lead healthy, productive lives. In developing countries, it focuses on improving people's health and giving them the chance to lift themselves out of hunger and extreme poverty. In the United States, it seeks to ensure that all people—especially those with the fewest resources—have access to the opportunities they need to succeed in school and life. _

[1] [http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Who-We-Are/General- Informatio...](http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Who-We-Are/General- Information/Foundation-Factsheet)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I just took a road trip and looked at one of Bill Gates previous favorite books list, and picked "Tap Dancing to Work: Warren Buffett on Practically Everything, 1966-2012". I've always wanted to know more about Mr. Buffet, so I thought this would be a great choice.

I almost drove off the road listening to him talking about bonds vs stocks and percentages. It was interesting, but definitely not a road trip book.

That said, I finished Snow Crash on the trip, and it was a great book. I think I preferred Cryptonomicon a bit more, but some of the theories in Snow Crash were incredible, and way before their time. Hiro Protagonist and YT are also awesome characters.

<comment><USER17> With "The Baroque Cycle", you can combine the experiences.

(I'm mostly kidding, I enjoyed it, but some parts do go on)

<comment><USER18> No kidding. Here I am 80% done after only six years!

<comment><USER19> Tip - get the unabridged audiobook versions from Audible, I couldn't finish Quicksilver in print form but I've listened to the entire Baroque Cycle multiple times.

Edit: Jack Shaftoe is probably my favourite fictional character: King of the Vagabonds, L'Emmerdeur, Half-Cocked Jack, Quicksilver, Ali Zaybak, Sword of Divine Fire, and Jack the Coiner....

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I find lists like this and Sivers.org/book very useful for finding new reading material, some good ones I've read this year (in no particular order);

Who owns the future - Jaron Lanier

Canoeing the Congo - Phil Harwood

Margaret Thatcher - The Authorized Biography

Venture Deals - Brad Feld / Jason Mendelson

1000 Ultimate Experiences - Lonely Planet

<comment><USER21> if you like those lists check out [http://www.sparkened.com](http://www.sparkened.com)

we are collecting lists of influential peoples favorite stuff

we have warren buffett, bill gates, elon musk, heaps more

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> The Beginning of Infinity - David Deutsch (enhanced my critical thinking)

The Wide Lens - Ron Adner (a more complete view for developing projects, foreseeing the inevitable problems beyond your immediate reach)

Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World - Haruki Murakami (just awesome)

Snow Crash - Neal Stephenson (tomorrow's world, written the day before yesterday)

And here's all the 40-something book I've read this year: [https://www.goodreads.com/user_challenges/562634](https://www.goodreads.com/user_challenges/562634)

</comment><comment><USER23> I see he mentioned _Catcher in the Rye_. I read it after hearing so many people say how it was such an influential book for them. John Lennon was even killed by a guy supposedly inspired by this book, and it's been often banned (some of the scenes might be unsuitable for a conservative school, I suppose).

Can any technical-types here explain if they found it particularly impressive? It's well written but I didn't think it very notable. Do I need to read it with a specific mindset?

<comment><USER24> I am in the same boat as you. People who love it are crazy about it. I started it on a plane flight and the guy next to me chatted my ear off about how it changed his life for 20 mins. My current theory is that if you read it in your childhood, it resonates with you. I was 25 when I read it and it did not.

<comment><USER6> I read it in my childhood and was unimpressed, so it's not just that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Mine:

\- Jules Michelet, History of France (pg suggested somewhere to read books about history. I now fully agree, it is a way to get the best possible understanding of today's world. As much as we have to understand how a cell has grown from nothing to its current state to really understand what it is, we also have to understand how a country has been built in the long history to understand it's current issues)

\- Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow (read it again).

</comment><comment><USER26> I'd just like to add my annual joke that Gates really should get an Amazon affilliate account or he's never going to make any money.

<comment><USER27> I think it would be interesting to see if he did get an affiliate account, and specified all of the aff money would be donated to a charity, how much cash would it raise? A nice way to siphon Amazon's profits into charity...

<comment><USER28> What profits?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> At least no Malcolm Gladwell. Bill Gates the voice of sanity - who woulda thunk it.

<comment><USER30> Why is this Gladwell character brought up so often? I'd never had known he exists if it wasn't for his detractors.

<comment><USER31> How many college-educated liberal folks with a non-engineering background do you know? It's all but impossible to avoid him in these circles.

(I say this as a philosophy degree-holding liberal pinko who is is exasperated by Gladwell. To be fair, I'm more exasperated with the culture of cherry- picking near-banalities wrapped in an engaging narrative that he and the TED folks have propagated rather than their work itself.)

<comment><USER30> I know a few, but perhaps they're not close enough to New York?

Sounds like you're complaining about style over substance... I suppose I'd find it annoying as well.

<comment><USER31> Precisely the opposite: he has a very engaging style, which makes his lack of substance all the more insidious.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> 1\. Chaos: Making a New Science [ [http://amzn.to/1fbmC73](http://amzn.to/1fbmC73) ] still makes an awesome read despite its age.

2\. Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers [ [http://amzn.to/1kFszdH](http://amzn.to/1kFszdH) ] - great book on stress and its effects by Robert Sapolsky (have you seen his lectures on behavioural biology? Fascinating stuff, even if you always thought 'meh, biology' \- the guy is an amazing lecturer)

</comment><comment><USER33> "Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman"

</comment><comment><USER34> The Navigator - by Morris West. Not new. Has a good story along with a few implied lessons about handling yourself and others. Set in the context of a sea voyage from Hawaii, to find a remote, uncharted island where ancient Polynesian navigators go to die. Is a bit like "Robinson Crusoe" or "The Swiss Family Robinson", after they find the island, with some masala (to use an Indian term) thrown in :-)

Masala:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masala](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masala)

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masala_(film_genre)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masala_\(film_genre\))

[http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/56966.The_Navigator](http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/56966.The_Navigator)

[http://www.amazon.com/The-Navigator-Morris-L- West/dp/0688030...](http://www.amazon.com/The-Navigator-Morris-L- West/dp/0688030610)

</comment><comment><USER35> Need not have to label the Fiction genre as a non-educative one. Numerous amount of fiction books teach about the world, the cultures and provokes self- introspection.

Non-fiction, agreed. Especially Biographies of successful people who made it from the scratch after a lot of struggling, like Mr. Gates himself.

<comment> pre-show-mac If your dad owns private equity in starbucks and gives you money to buy software from IBM -- THAT is hardly pulling yourself up from the bootstraps yo.

<comment><USER36> Apparently he read Gates' fictional biography...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> Being a fan of some Russian authors like Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Turgenev, Gorky and others, reading their books I got a glimpse of the Russian culture and society of that era. Would somebody suggest me similar type of authors from past English era?

</comment><comment><USER38> If you want to completely lose your place in an HN thread, make a comment. I hate that.

</comment><comment><USER39> Nonfiction still has the viewpoint of the writer. Even if the narrator is silent, their biases and worldviews infiltrate the work. At least in fiction this is explicit.

</comment><comment><USER40> Rework and Art/Fear were the best books I read this year.

</comment><comment><USER41> >I read a lot, but I don't always choose what's on the bestseller list.

Wait. Is he saying that sometimes he _does_ choose what's on the bestseller list?

<comment><USER42> > _" Is he saying that sometimes he does choose what's on the bestseller > list?"_

Is that a problem for you? Does it make your hipster friends angry?

Let's see what I read from the bestseller's list this year, off the top of my head: Quiet, Thinking Fast and Slow, Devil in the White City, Steve Jobs, and yes, 1 or 2 of the Game of Thrones books. I also read The Corrections, which wasn't on the best-seller list _this_ year, but was definitely hyped in its day (Oprah Book Club! How mainstream!)

In fact, I make an _effort_ to read the bestsellers lists for ideas. It makes me more well-read, not less.

<comment><USER41> Ha. I was making as joke that Bill is so powerful that he can choose what goes on the bestseller lists (sometimes).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> Currently reading Malcolm Gladwell's _David and Goliath_ and it's easily one of my favorites of 2013. The introduction - Gladwell explains what actually happened in the epic biblical battle of the same name - is revelatory and an unforgettable piece of literature.

Malcolm Gladwell may be too popular to be 'cool', but he's a master storyteller. Haters gonna hate.

<comment><USER44> Gladwell comes up so often here on Hacker News that I have a FAQ about him:

Malcolm Gladwell, who has said in an interview[1] that he writes to try out ideas, is good, while trying out ideas, at crediting his sources. Any reader of a Malcolm Gladwell book (as I know, from being a reader of the book _Outliers_ ) can check the sources, and decide from there what other sources to check and what other ideas to play with. Gladwell doesn't purport to write textbooks, but I give him a lot of credit for finding interesting scholarly sources that haven't had enough attention in the popular literature. He is equaled by very few authors as a story-teller who can tie ideas together in a thought-provoking assembly.

[1] [http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122671211614230261.html](http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122671211614230261.html)

"Q: Do you worry that you extrapolate too much from too little?

"A: No. It's better to err on the side of over-extrapolation. These books are playful in the sense that they regard ideas as things to experiment with. I'm happy if somebody reads my books and reaches a conclusion that is different from mine, as long as the ideas in the book cause them to think. You have to be willing to put pressure on theories, to push the envelope. That's the fun part, the exciting part. If you are writing an intellectual adventure story, why play it safe? I'm not out to convert people. I want to inspire and provoke them."

<comment><USER43> The BS on HN is _much_ worse than anything I've read from Gladwell. Where's your FAQ for that?

<comment><USER42> No idea. I've asked the same question; I've read all of Gladwell's books (and essays on his site). I've enjoyed almost everything he writes. He's great at telling pop-sci stories. Most can be read in a sitting or two. Sometimes it's nice for your non-fiction to not read like a textbook.

But, apparently the HN crowd only reads Shakespeare, Dostoevsky and Hemingway.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> These are coffee table books about interesting/ironic details of our world, not any actual reshaping. I used to read such books in the pursuit of being an "intellectual," then picked up Marcus Aurelius and realized how puerile all the coffee-table folderol really is.

<comment><USER46> Too many people would rather not deal with the difficulties of reading foundational works. The task of reading coffee-table folderol is much easier than having to actually rethink what you know when you read works that have stood the test of time. I, too, am guilty of having read too many coffee-table books and have only really started to learn now that I avoid those books. Picking up a kindle and a tablet have especially helped in my newfound pursuit of knowledge because, ironically, the most valuable books/articles/essays tend to be freely available online.

<comment><USER45> The truth is often hidden in plain sight simply because most will never go looking for it.</comment></comment></comment>


Google CEO memo says 48 fired for sexual misconduct - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/25/google-ceo-memo-says-48-fired-for-sexual-misconduct.html <comment><USER2> Just for context, google has 85,000 employees. They fired 0.0005% due to sexual harrassment. I wouldn't call that a sexual harrassment problem, that's just humanity, shit is going to happen at that scale.

<comment><USER3> You're off by multiple orders of magnitude.

<comment><USER4> 48/85000 = 0.000564706

I think he just forget to multiply by 100 to get percent instead of ratio - 0.0564706%, which still represents a pretty small fraction. His conclusion is still valid I think - two orders of magnitude difference still gives you a tiny number

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Original title: "Google CEO admits company had a sexual harassment problem — says it has fired 48 employees for sexual misconduct" (32 characters too long)

<comment><USER5> I suppose more interesting is that 13 of those were "senior" managers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> What's normal for a company? This would be like 1 per every few thousand but I don't know what numbers generally are.</comment>


Ask YC: What is the best area in SF Bay Area for startup hackers? - <AUTHOR>

In regards to my previous submission (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=295139) — I've moved to SF within 24 hrs after that submission and now I am wondering – what is the best area/neighborhood around in terms of possibility to meet startup hackers and/or attend interesting related events, etc.?
Any ideas?
Thanks :) <comment><USER2> Last night Yahoo! YUI engineers hosted a meetup for the new 3.0 version at the Brickhouse in Soma. There was also another geek gathering at Cnet and all headed afterwards over to the 21st Amendment Brewery also in Soma. Our office is in Soma, as is Justin.tv and many other startups, so Soma is probably a good area to look around.

</comment><comment><USER3> The Mission has a pretty high concentration of young people, and a lot of the startup people I know live around there. Rent in the area may be more reasonable than elsewhere but not by much, given its popularity. If you aren't here permanently you might try the Sublets/Temporary Housing section of Craigslist - I had good luck there, and you should be able to find something for less than $500/wk.

<comment><USER4> 500 per week??

so less than 2k per month? that seems pretty pricey...about to move into the mission and paying 800/mo.

<comment><USER3> I was referring to the price he stated in his original post (he said he didn't want to pay more than $500/wk). I'm living in the mission now and paying much less than $500/wk (but I have 4 roommates).

<comment><USER4> ok gotcha, didnt see that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I host a Meetup called Hackers and Founders in Sunnyvale every month. It's been growing a lot though, so we might end up going to every other week. We have 30 people planning to attend on September 18th, and I'm holding off on allowing more RSVP's because the bar we have it at gets pretty crowded. If you wanted to crash the party around 7:30 or 8pm it would probably clear out by then. There is another one scheduled for October 1st.

It's a low key event which consists of having a burger and a beer with hackers and people interested in startups. Our Meetup page is here: <http://entrepreneur.meetup.com/1737/>

As far as where to go to meet Hackers.... In the Bay Area, just strike up a conversation with people. 1 out of 10 people living in the area are engineers. You're bound to meet someone.

</comment><comment><USER5> If you're looking for places to live, I really like San Jose. Sure, it's not, The City(tm), but down town does have a lovely little, urban lite feel to it. There are plenty of working class people and plenty of hackers in the area. It's not the sexy place to live, but heck, for what people are paying for a one bedroom apartment up in SF, I'm getting a 4 bed/2 bath house with a yard and an office big enough for 3 people. And, if I want to go up to Yoshi's and hear some really great jazz, it's only 80 minutes away.

<comment><USER6> +1 on this.

I recently took a job at a startup in Campbell, and the San Jose area is really nice. It's not as expensive at SF, but it's still "bay area".

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Either San Francisco proper (especially SOMA), or around Palo Alto / Mountain View would be my suggestions.

Most of the meetup type events I've been to have been in SF. Lots of startups are based in SF too (of the winter 2008 YC companies I think only a handfull are still in the valley, the rest are in SF or elsewhere).

Startups seem to congregate in or near SOMA in particular. The three SF JS meetups I've been to have been in SOMA: Hi5, SlideShare, and Serious Business. Also: Twitter (and their old office's new residents, Get Satisfaction), Engine Yard, and numerous YC companies like Disqus, SnapTalent, Xobni, Justin.TV. And lots of others I would probably know about if I actually lived up there.

But the valley is great too. Of course there's lots of startups there as well. Palo Alto and Mountain View are both quite nice. But be careful because there are lots of boring suburban and strip mall type areas in Silicon Valley.

</comment><comment><USER8> This probably doesn't answer your question directly, but (if you haven't already) I'd recommend taking a look at: <http://www.paulgraham.com/marginal.html> (and his other essays)

<comment><USER9> Except that's old news (at least the real estate part of it). All that marginal space has been turned into paying real estate. Not only in SF but in just about every slightly expensive city in North America.

There was an article last week in the NYT about garages and what they add to the value of a property in Manhattan. Its in the millions. Chances are, if you pay a million extra for a garage, at the very least, you're parking a car there.

Admittedly, if you go far enough out in the suburbs, its not the case. But then you're in the suburbs, which has other challenges (transportation, etc).

All that aside, SOMA is where everything happens. If you can't afford to live there look incrementally further south until you find a place that you can live.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! I am currently in a hotel in SOMA, but think to move a little bit southwest I guess — I don't want to spend more than $500/wk for rent, and housing is really a bit crazy in SF ;)

<comment><USER10> You can definitely find a place cheaper than $500/wk in SF. I live in the city, and pay way less than that.

<comment><AUTHOR> Short term rentals seems to be more expensive than long-term ones

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> We just moved our startup to the Bay Area a couple of weeks ago :) My partner and I found a temporary place in Mountain View for the next few weeks while we look for a more permanent place -- but everyone has recommended us to either live in SF or Palo Alto.

We should meet up some time once you are settled!

<comment><AUTHOR> Done. I am settled and would love to meet with people around :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Meetup.com is good resource for events, also sf.garysguide.org - helped to give me a feel for what goes on where.</comment>


Britain Is Poorer Than Any US State (2014) - <AUTHOR> https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2014/08/25/britain-is-poorer-than-any-us-state-yes-even-mississippi/#5cdaf1c235ef <comment><USER2> There's a documentary on Netflix about physicians setting up shop on a race track to offer treatment to the poor and indigent in Bristol, TN: [https://www.newsweek.com/remote-area-medical-shows-what- amer...](https://www.newsweek.com/remote-area-medical-shows-what-americas- uninsured-go-through-health-care-287507)

You wouldn't see these scenes in even the most deprived corners of Newcastle- upon-Tyne or the Rhondda Valley. The crowds the event attracts! This is what a developing country looks like.

<comment><USER3> Ahh, HN, where someone doing a good deed is an illustration of how the United States is secretly a third-world hellhole.

<comment><USER4> What is the good deed you're referring to?

<comment><USER3> Is that a rhetorical question, or did you really not read the GP comment?

<comment><USER4> I did read, but didn't understand the parent comment. Apologies!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think the sleight of hand here is that "Britain is poorer" reads as "the people of Britain are poorer" even though strictly speaking in GDP terms, Britain the _country_ has a smaller market.

GDP is not wages. You can make tonnes of money in a company and none of it ends up as wages (just goes in the bank) so GDP is high but standards based on wages are no different.

As an example (I could be wrong - not an economist) but a single company making $1B more in one year would equate to a GDP/per capita increase of $10K in a town of 100K.

There are loads of places in the USA that looks desperately poor compared to everywhere I have seen in the UK so I can live with the headline as an economists click-bait.

</comment><comment><USER6> So given this information as well as the UN report on US and the fact that the US is in poverty like conditions [1] I think it's safe to say everyone is broke.

This post from reddit on /r/funny isn't funny - it is the truth [2]

[1] [https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?N...](https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=22533) [2] [https://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/9fq5e4/the_simpsons_...](https://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/9fq5e4/the_simpsons_how_times_have_changed/)

<comment><USER7> Inequality is one thing, but the US is still a wealthy country.

<comment><USER8> > a wealthy country

Who is the country in this context though, does GDP mean the people are wealthier?

<comment><USER7> The wealth of a country is a question of what resources it has, public and private, not how they are distributed. Saying that "everyone" is broke misses the point that it's inequality that is getting worse.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Median adult wealth in the UK is almost double the US ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_pe...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_per_adult)). This article is somewhere between methodologically lax economics and UKIP drivel.

<comment><USER10> You're confusing wealth and income. Americans earn more but save less.

<comment><USER9> I'm not -- the article is making this mistake. Your second sentence is precisely my point.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Ahh, Tim Worstall, senior of the Adam Smith Institute and former press officer for UKIP.

I can stop at the byline to avoid his unusual approach to economic fact.

</comment><comment><USER12> GDP per capita per hour worked is a better metric to use when comparing countries. Most Western European countries have fewer hours worked per worker, but when they work have the same productivity. I'm not sure about the gini coefficient, but both of the numbers given seem low. The US's was over 0.42 from what I've read in other sources.

<comment><USER13> > GDP per capita per hour worked is a better metric to use when comparing > countries.

Comparing what? Wealth? Efficiency? Happiness? Athleticism?

If you are comparing economic well-being, use GDP per capita. If you worked one hour today and $100 or eight hours and got $100, either way your richness/poorness is $100.

If you are comparing efficiency or something, do the per hour thing.

<comment><USER14> I'm sure we'd all vastly prefer to be the person who works an hour for $100 and has the rest as free time. If those two people have equal "richness" then the term is not very useful.

<comment><USER13> If you're suggesting that wealth/income is different than quality of life, I would have to very strongly agree.

<comment><USER14> I'm going a bit further and suggesting that free time ought to be incorporated into "wealth" somehow. After all, time is money.

<comment><USER13> The great depression had a lot of people with a lot of time. "Rich with time", you might say.

<comment><USER14> That's why I want to incorporate free time into "wealth," not replace it altogether.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> So what this article primarily shows is that "wealth" (as measured by PPP- corrected median per-capita GDP) isn't that relevant a metric for measuring anything except "wealth". Of course the not-so-subtle implication is that "wealth" is intrinsically "good" and that income redistribution has not achieved "good" (although the final remark in itself is a silly _cum hoc ergo propter hoc_ and in itself reveals the biases of the author).

Few people disagree that the median purchasing power in the US is greater than in Europe; the real question is "so what?"

</comment><comment><USER4> What this shows me is how misleading comparisons like this can be. I think the UK has been brought into US politics over the last few years, and living in the UK it's funny how far from the truth some of the claims made can be. I'm sure the same goes in reverse though.

</comment><comment><USER16> Most of Europe actually. I was reading a piece I believe CATO put out about this recently.

<comment><USER17> Why would you read anything from CATO?

<comment><USER18> I'm also curious why you wouldn't read anything from CATO.

<comment><USER19> Because it's an ideological propaganda mill that is only helpful (in terms of necessary time investment for any given level of confidence) in arriving at the truth on any issue, compared to ignoring them completely, when dealing with their admissions that are contrary to their overt bias, which are infrequent enough that reading their output is a net loss.

That said, it's still better than Heritage.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> "All that redistribution hasn't made the Nordic poor richer than the American poor but it has made the rich poorer."

I'll take issue with this - the poor in Nordic countries and Britain have a much stronger social safety net. So maybe a better conclusion is that in Britain they are still as poor as before, but with access to similar health care as the rich (who are slightly less rich to allow for this).

</comment><comment><USER14> It sure doesn't seem to be reflected in how people live. Is this just using the wrong measure for "poorer"?

<comment><USER19> Yes, GDP per capita is a measure of aggregate output relevant to population, not wealth (which is a stock and not a flow) and not living standards (which are a flow, but not the same flow). Even with PPP adjustment it doesn't measure common living standards, because it doesn't distinguish between broad and narrow distribution.

Median income measures are better for standard of living comparisons.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> My economic knowledge is lacking, how good of a metrics is PPP?

Specifically this jab:

> showing that the bottom 10% in the US have the same incomes (yes, PPP > adjusted) as the bottom 10% in either Sweden or Finland. > While the top 10% > have very much larger incomes than the top 10% in either country. > All that > redistribution hasn't made the Nordic poor richer than the American poor but > it has made the rich poorer.

If PPP is a good metric, that would mean there are about the same percentage of people starving and lacking medical care in the US as in Nordic countries. That is incorrect if general media portrayal is correct.

</comment><comment><USER22> This story validates what I felt when I lived in the UK several years ago during research. I felt the country had so much money (London) but everyone lived so poor.

I was getting paid basically the same numerical value as I had been in the US, but all the prices were in pounds.

And the cars were so old, like twice as old as typical cars in the US.

I wondered where all their tax money was going -- and I figured to the poor north of the country.

Yet people in the UK generally behave so well, and are polite, and are educated and proud. This is really impressive -- the power of social psychology in the face of measureable economic deprivation.

<comment><USER23> Or maybe it's going towards health care, education, and social services. What a concept

<comment><USER22> Not even. Reading their news about NHS, all they talk about are cuts and the controversies of having to ration service based on postcodes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> He should remove the outliers and study those separately. The gini consideration goes a bit in that direction, but not far enough. Possibly even split the population in 4-5 buckets: from people under the poverty line through to the extremely rich and then compare each of those. Admittedly, this would be way harder but would paint a much better picture.

</comment><comment><USER25> This Wikipedia page may also be of interest. It has two lists: 1) median household income, and 2) median adult income.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income#Gross_median_hou...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income#Gross_median_household_income_by_country)

<comment><USER26> Also this list of countries by income equality: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_eq...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_equality)

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> It's a bit weird that the author acknowledges the difference between UK regions and London, promptly ignores that, then continues to adjust the US figures by the different PPP figures by state. It definitely makes the whole thing a lot less apples to apples.

Also, the cost of goods and services being cheaper in the US might not be a strictly good thing. If food, clothing and haircuts are only cheaper because businesses are employing people on well below a living wage, or exploiting cheap labour from undocumented immigrants, then it's hardly something to celebrate.

On that last point: "the bottom 10% in the US have the same incomes (yes, PPP adjusted) as the bottom 10% in either Sweden or Finland. While the top 10% have very much larger incomes than the top 10% in either country. All that redistribution hasn't made the Nordic poor richer than the American poor but it has made the rich poorer". I'm not sure of the details, but it's easy to see how that would be misleading if those income figures don't account for government transfers from rich to poor, or nationalised/socialised state services in health, transport or education.

</comment><comment><USER28> The question is, will Brexit help or hurt with this? Will Britain be better off than the rest of Europe as a result of leaving the EU, and how long will withdrawal pains last?

<comment><USER29> Decades and they won't be, unless they don't want access to the EU market for their goods. Best case they have to follow all EU law and have no say in the matter.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Not surprising.

The whole place is basically a big rust belt. Industry is dead, martitime doesn't generate a lot of jobs, the US captured tech, and banking produces money but not employment.

</comment><comment><USER31> This article keeps talking about mean GDP.

Unless you live in a perfectly communist society, mean GDP is a poor proxy for how wealthy the people in it are.

Additionally, if the author wants to adjust for PPP, they should also adjust for cost of healthcare, education, median transportation expenses - all of which are much higher in the US. (All right, median transportation expenses may be higher in the UK. I honestly have no idea.)

Also, it's worth considering how much GDP in each country is spent on projects that don't improve anyone's life. If half your GDP is spent on building tanks and submarines and nuclear weapons, while your people want color TVs and washing machines, or a health system that won't bankrupt them, it's often not the best use of your economic output.

<comment><USER32> >healthcare, education, median transportation expenses - all of which are much higher in the US.

Transportation by car costs dirt in the US. Transportation by rail isn't so much higher to make up for how dirt cheap it is to go places in the US by car when compared to Europe.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> What a load of tripe. The sheer level of hand-waving in their calculations makes their bias pretty clear.

</comment><comment><USER34> How do other European countries compare?

</comment><comment><USER35> Off topic: What is this form of title when they add stuff like "Yes, Even Mississippi" which doesn't add any value? Is there a term for it?

<comment><USER36> I'm tempted to classify it as an instance of the logical fallacy _appeal to emotion_.

<comment><USER35> Thank you, I think that's what I was looking for.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> and Brexit hasn't arrived yet...

<comment><USER38> Switzerland isn't in the EU and is doing fine.

Switzerland poverty rate - 6.6% Germany poverty rate - 16.7%

Source: [https://www.indexmundi.com/factbook/compare/switzerland.germ...](https://www.indexmundi.com/factbook/compare/switzerland.germany/economy)

<comment><USER39> I'm going to assume you're not British / European, but for the record Switzerland is in Schengen and EFTA, Britain is heading for being in neither.

<comment><USER40> Britain is already in neither; it's never been in Schengen, and left the EFTA when joining the EEC as the EU was then. Although the other 3 countries in EFTA are part of the EEA (edit: which is how they're part of the single market), Switzerland isn't. Instead, they participate in the single market via a bunch of bilateral treaties:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Switzerland%E2%80%93European_U...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Switzerland%E2%80%93European_Union_relations)

<comment><USER39> I know. That wasn't the point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> "In the US food is generally cheaper than it is in Europe, medical care generally more expensive."

I'm not sure when medical care is cheaper in the US. Within the VA system, maybe?

Also, the ranking does not stack up against wikipedia figures:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_GDP_per...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_GDP_per_capita) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_\(PPP\)_per_capita) (Where PPP is already accounted for, so this guy is doing it twice).

UK would come in ~35th. Similar to Nevada or Michigan.

<comment><USER42> > I'm not sure when medical care is cheaper in the US

You literally just quoted the article saying it's more expensive in the US.

> In the US ... medical care generally more expensive

<comment><USER41> generally = sometimes it is less expensive. I guess it wasn't clear, but my point was that healthcare is on average much more expensive in the US.</comment></comment></comment>


US space companies prepare for space station docking - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17541345 <comment><USER2> This is great.

Interestingly, a capitalist economy might be provoking a modern version of the space race - i.e. companies competing to meet the contracts push hard on development and testing to win. Orbital's language in this article, for example, is very competitive.

This is cool; it's how we progressed to space so quickly in the first place after all.

Also:

 _The Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport, or MARS, to give the launch site its proper name,_

Someone at NASA has a sense of humour :D

<comment><USER3> Indeed. I find it interesting that the (first) space race was very much rooted in the Cold War and as such a race between ideologies; Capitalism vs Communism. Yet, both sides used similar structures, i.e. state driven bureaucracies to get to space. Which seems - from an ideological standpoint - to fit much better with Communism. In a way, having companies compete to get into space is way overdue. Exciting times!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I haven't yet seen an article that I feel really shows how much is riding on these missions. This first interaction between private and public space agencies represents passing the torch to the next chapter of space exploration. If either of these guys drop the torch (i.e. smash into the ISS), it's going to be a serious setback for privatization, and without funding for a public alternative we will probably end up watching China or Russia take the lead as the dominant space-faring country.

<comment><USER5> There's a note in the article that the docking will proceed autonomously. I understood that SpaceX has people working on computer vision for autonomous docking, which I think is farther along than NASA is.</comment></comment>


Tyrian Purple - <AUTHOR> https://believermag.com/logger/vintage-tech-4-tyrian-purple/ <comment><USER2> This as a fascinating article. It mentions Tyrian purple, in fact the word _purple_ is derived from the ancient greek word, πορφύρα (porphura), for the Tyrian dye ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purple#Etymology_and_definitio...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purple#Etymology_and_definitions)) which was adopted into Latin and from there many European languages ([https://www.omniglot.com/language/colours/multilingual.htm](https://www.omniglot.com/language/colours/multilingual.htm)). It's interesting that the modern Greek word for purple is _μωβ_ (mov), which comes from μόρον (moron), the blackberry ([https://lsj.gr/wiki/%CE%BC%CF%8C%CF%81%CE%BF%CE%BD](https://lsj.gr/wiki/%CE%BC%CF%8C%CF%81%CE%BF%CE%BD)) and is also adopted into Turkish as _mor_. Since it's estimated that the sound denoted by β changed from classical Greek /b/ to modern Greek /v/ in the first century AD one might venture a guess that the switch from _porphura_ to _mov_ may be from that time (caution: armchair historical linguistics hunch that I just made up, may be totally off).

Another interesting fact I just found out: According to Wikipedia the Chinese glyph for purple, 紫, is from Old Japanese むらさき (murasaki), the word for red- root gromwell, the roots of which were used for the purple dye and medicine. This, of course, is the pen name of the Japanese author, whose actual name has been lost, and has been named "Murasaki Shikibu" (Lady Murasaki), after the heroine she invented.

Down the rabbit whole with one word!

<comment><USER3> Mov to Mor makes sense. Murasaki and Mor was fascinating.

Turkish and Japanese has a lot of unexpected similarities. When it comes to conjugation even. As a native Turkish speaker, watching Japanese with subtitles leads to me picking up conjugation rules and they map identically.

Another strange etymological association that was unexpected to me is the phrase "my stomach is hungry". It is present in both Turkish and Japanese.

<comment><USER4> _onaka ga suiteimasu_

I'd translate the Japanese to English as my "stomach is empty". Same word for example as an empty room.

<comment><USER3> I was basing that example off of this answer on Quora: [https://www.quora.com/I-speak-Japanese-and-am-learning- Turki...](https://www.quora.com/I-speak-Japanese-and-am-learning-Turkish- These-languages-have-a-lot-of-similar-words-but-different-grammar-any- explanation-for-this/answer/Can-Deniz-5)

<comment><USER4> Yes. I see now where you got it from.

Nevertheless, I stick to my previous translation. Of course, I have no Turkish, so I cannot comment on the similarity.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This site is somewhat annoying on mobile, the sign up pop up, the nominated banner that you have to close, the large vote for us icon in the corner, the blue box that cuts into the content as you scroll up and down.

<comment><USER6> Here's a readable version: [https://outline.com/XadkNU](https://outline.com/XadkNU)

I hate that "make websites usable" is a key service someone has to provide, but that's where we are.

<comment><AUTHOR> Though I rarely read articles on my phone or tablet, instead preferring my laptop, I realize that most people do the opposite. Even crap sites like the Believer are far easier to navigate on a computer. Sometimes it helps to be a Luddite.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Websites ought to be at least as readable as books. But books don't repeatedly throw advertisements in my face, ask me to sign up for mailing lists, and put permanent immovable obstacles to reading in front of the text.

If your website cannot be bothered to make itself readable, then I cannot be bothered to read it. Bye.

</comment><comment><USER8> This is one of the most annoying web sites I have visited, with multiple pop up interruptions and overlays, close buttons visually disconnected from the dialogs that they close, etc. I gave up on the article because of the horrible reading experience. I have no idea why this site is nominated for a webby; they must not have evaluated the mobile experience.

</comment><comment><USER9> Warning: site has modal sign up dialog box without close button - the close button is in the far top right of the screen instead</comment>


Ask HN: What happend to center mouse cut and paste in Linux? - <AUTHOR> Been captive on RHEL 6 for a long time.  Installed a new linux distribution (fedora) and found that center button cut and paste does not work.  Installed ubuntu, same thing.  Google search seems to tell me "that is the way it is", and you can only cut and past like that inside a single application (which for me means an xterm).  What has happened? Why would something like this that has been around for 30+ years across ever unix / window manager environment not be supported? <comment><USER2> It still works for me in Debian stable, with either GNOME 3 or MATE. I'd be sort of surprised if both Fedora and Ubuntu disabled it by default but it's possible.

One thing to remember is that the middle-click clipboard it's a _separate_ clipboard from the Ctrl-C/Ctrl-V one. It's called the "primary selection", and as the name implies, it's updated if you select something new or even unselect the old selection. And nothing automatically synchronized with the Ctrl-C/Ctrl-V clipboard, so if you select something, copy it, and unselect it, middle-click won't work to paste any more but Ctrl-V (or Edit | Paste) still will.

If you want them synchronized you can use two autocutsel processes to do this (autocutsel synchronizes between either the "primary selection" or the "clipboard selection," and yet another type of X11 clipboard called the "cut buffer", so you need two to sync each selection with the cut buffer). [https://blog.nelhage.com/2008/09/autocutsel/](https://blog.nelhage.com/2008/09/autocutsel/) describes how to do it. You might have had something like this in your RHEL 6 dotfiles that didn't get copied over to your new system.

</comment><comment><USER3> And here I thought that clicking a mouse button to paste must have been one of the greatest mishaps in computer history. I hate that thing with deep passion, I don't want to think about the number of secrets and inconvenience that thing has led to for misclicking in an IRC-window or something like that.

Sorry for the non-constructive comment, I guess it is nice to know that some appreciate it.

<comment><USER4> The worst thing is when whatever you're pasting has a newline attached, so pasting it also 'presses' return.

<comment><USER5> Thats useful for pasting many command lines though.

<comment><USER3> True, but that's yet another reason as to why a mouse click for paste is a bad idea.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Uh, if still works though?

On both fedora and Ubuntu.

Ah, on second thought: it might be because of Wayland. I've been using i3 so haven't been able to switch from x-land... So I wouldn't have encountered that problem

<comment><USER7> > I've been using i3 so haven't been able to switch from x-land

Check out Sway.

<comment><USER6> not an option, unless you own an AMD or nouveau supported card.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Support for the often confusing X11 clipboard - aka CLIPBOARD/PRIMARY - predominantly depends on the toolkit (think GTK, Qt) your particular application uses. I'm very fond of Mark=Copy and Ctrl+Insert/MiddleClick=Paste, and to teach all the (modern) applications I also use to honor my preferences, I have a clipboard manager installed. My choice is XFCE's `clipman`, but all the popular and big desktop environments offer their own, functionally at least equivalent application for the purpose: KDE has "klipper", for example, while GNOME probably sports an extension that does the job. There are more standalone implementations, too, that don't target a specific DE at all.

Running one in your session allows to sync the toolkits' clipboards with X11's clipboard, which is what I choose to do - you only have one (history-enabled) clipboard that way, but it keeps the surprise effect ("Oh... I wasn't aware I was gonna paste _that_...") to a minimum, too :)

</comment><comment><USER9> For ref, the 3 clipboards in X are:

      xclip -o -selection clipboard # XA_CLIPBOARD

      xclip -o -selection primary # XA_PRIMARY

      xclip -o -selection secondary # XA_SECONDARY

</comment><comment><USER10> Works on Arch Linux, like it should

</comment><comment><USER11> Just install gnome-tweaks then launch it and in the subsection Mouse and Keyboard you will find everything to get back your middle button to copy/paste.

Additionally you can also install the gnome shell extension Mousetweaks to enable gestures with a laptop trackpad.

</comment><comment><USER12> I still prefer X instead of Wayland. I do not use a desktop environment, and I also think X is a better design (although many of the extensions are not so helpful I think).

(Also, I like the middle mouse cut and paste, too. I still use it in xterm)

</comment><comment><USER13> Is there something emulating this under windows? I love how that clipboard is more fragile: any selection fills it and it doesn't touch my main clipboard.

</comment><comment><USER14> Works on CentOS 7 and recent Ubuntus. Might be an issue with GNOME 3 getting dumbed down and all.

<comment><USER7> GNOME 3 session uses Wayland now by default, so I wouldn't be surprised if it worked only for X11 clients or so.

<comment><USER15> Fedora uses Wayland if your drivers support it (i.e., i915 Intel does, Nvidia blob does not). As a result different users may have a different experience.

FWIW, CentOS 7 is ancient and long predates Wayland in Fedora.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> X11 -> Wayland.

</comment><comment><USER16> Ubuntu did away with the default behavior to make it "more Mac-like". Although in my experience, the majority of people who want a more Mac-like experience go out and buy a Mac.

I set it back to default behavior on Ubuntu.

[https://askubuntu.com/a/1028857](https://askubuntu.com/a/1028857)

(Another Ubuntu annoyance - in "improving things" by switching from X11 to Wayland, they did away with the Gnome terminal tooltip which shows me how many characters I am resizing my Gnome terminal to. So it is now a rigmarole to set that up each time. Although they seem to turn that on and off at random, some random Ubuntu releases still seem to have it on by default).</comment>


H.R.861 – To Terminate the Environmental Protection Agency - <AUTHOR> https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/861/text <comment><USER2> What a stupid idea.

Anyone in favor of this should have to spend a few months in Dehli, Beijing, Chongqing, or even worse, a true industrial city or district in either country. The rivers and creeks are full of visible toxic waste, sewage and garbage, the air is so foul and acrid that almost everyone wears masks, your eyes can burn from who-knows-what chemicals in the air, water is trucked in from hundreds of miles away from clean sources (and sometimes imported from different countries entirely). No, that's not fog, that's pollution. No that's not a cloudy day, that's pollution. After a few days with enough time spent outside, you develop congestion and a minor sensation of having a cold, and when you blow your nose a bunch of black and brown soot comes out. But hey, you can pay slave labor wages to make cheap disposable crap for oversees consumer markets!

<comment><USER3> > Anyone in favor of this should have to spend a few months in Dehli, Beijing, > Chongqing, or even worse, a true industrial city or district in either > country.

I wish people understood something about environment concerns, the action of using cleaner methods is a 'cost', and this cost is only worth paying when the people behind it are willing to pay the cost.

These countries aren't dirty because they don't have an EPA, they are dirty because they are making their lives better and for the time being they don't care about spending huge cost on keeping things clean.

Consider it to be like writing tests for your code. Writing tests for your code is a cost and not every team is willing to pay it, even though they should. If govt creates a National Testing Agency in 1987 which forced teams to have certain code coverage and tests then it would have faced major opposition from most people. In 2007 even fewer teams wrote tests, and in 1997 very few teams wrote tests. Similarly in 2027 testing standards would be a lot bigger norm where the presumption would be that every component is fully covered and tested.

When West had its industrial revolution it was pretty dirty, but it was acceptable to most people because their standards of living were going up exponentially high. Sooner or later after reaching a plateau of progress, they realized that at this point they don't care about increase in standards of living via goods as much as they care about other things like cleaner environment etc.

People in India and China currently don't care so much about environment because of the magnitudes of progress they are seeing. Soon enough they will start valuing cleaner air and water.

<comment><USER4> I strongly disagree with your statement. Many people in India and China would be happy to have cleaner skies. Especially in China, they know that they have too many polluting factories, and their economy has gotten to the point that they can afford to have treatment of the exhaust - but many companies pay off regulators as that is cheaper than treating their waste products.

Some of the very poorest of the poor would be more open to dirty industry so they can have a more affluent lifestyle, but it is not something they all want. And in the US, we didn't have people willingly trading off more pollution for better jobs - there just wasn't an easy way to stop the polluters.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Look I'm an Aussie living in Japan, but I know what the EPA is.

Someone please tell me this won't pass. I really hope not, and I hope this is a moon shot of a bill, as I know how much my original country and my new country follow the US.

<comment><USER6> Honestly you never know these days, but it's not a bill from an influential rep, has few cosponsors, and so far has no important movement, so right now it's unlikely. I suspect that the republicans in congress understand that the correct way to get what they want is to have the president order the EPA to roll back tons of regulations, not to literally undo hundreds of thousands at once without review.

Something many people (even Americans) don't realize about the US system is that thousands of bills get introduced every session that have zero chance of passing. They're just to score political points with the home crowd.

<comment><USER5> Ahh thanks for the reply.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> More of the backstory, including excerpts of the email that the bill sponsor sent to his peers:

Unfortunately, includes auto-play video, but: [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bill-to-abolish- epa_us_5...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bill-to-abolish- epa_us_5890e638e4b02772c4e9c552)

</comment><comment><USER8> This came up last week. Same thing then as now: this is a House bill by a 32-year-old first-term Congressperson from Florida. Any Congressperson can write any bill they want. Some of them do, hoping to get press coverage. If we had a story for every whackjob go-nowhere bill from the House, the front page would be nothing but this stuff.

The EPA isn't going anywhere.

</comment><comment><USER9> This comment is completely incidental (because I don't have the energy to comment on the sad content), but does anybody else find the typography and style of these completely bizarre? It looks stuck in the 19th century, and it is very confusing. "A BILL" is much larger than the actual title.

I know one reason for legal ideosyncrasies is that they need a very specific and precise language, and form, to leave no ambiguities. But then the contents of the bill is just one line, "The Environmental Protection Agency shall terminate on December 31, 2018". I'd love them to propertly terminate their cables, or maybe terminate a cockroach, on that given day.

And, don't they have to make it a lot more specific, like what happens to the buildings, the people, ongoing contracts, what older bills have to be amended, and so on? Or is this just an order to some other branch to draft an appropriate law? I find the US government system sometimes very confusing.

</comment><comment><USER10> Question for my American cousins: In your opinion, what percentage of fellow Americans see themselves as part of the global community? I've read a few comments on HN on many different topics along the lines of "but that wouldnt work in the states because we are different". I'm genuinely curious how disconnected from the rest of the planet people feel/are. Thanks in advance.

<comment><USER11> I have met families in rural West Virginia who for generstions haven't ventured outside of the country. They trace their ancestry back to before 1776. The connection with the global community does not seem real to them. Take this as an extreme example of what some rual communities are like.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Republicans will never be held accountable by their voters, ever.</comment>


Forrest M. Mims: Early days at MITS INC - <AUTHOR> http://www.sunandsky.org/MITS_History.php

<comment><USER2> I spent much of my fourth grade year with my nose buried in a copy of Getting Started in Electronics from Radio Shack. This definitely brought back a lot of memories.

<comment><USER3> My entire youth + part of my adult life was spent reading his books and doing his projects. He taught me everything about electronics that the basic school system could not.

Ok, now I'm going to dig them out + go through them. How he can write so much uppercase always amazed me. (please don't tell me it was a font!)</comment></comment>


Is Social In Google's DNA? - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/17/is-social-in-googles-dna/

<comment><USER2> It doesn't matter. The web is in Google's DNA, and facebook is a decent enough model to copy, from there they can just run on iterative improvements, which google excels at.

On a more philosophical note, Google is very much a social driven company. PageRank may seem like a wonky academic algorithm but it's a wonky academic algorithm designed to extract data from natural social human behavior (linking sites). That's a major factor of Google's success, they leverage the latent, _user-generated_ , implicit data from hyperlinks as a source of explicit, tangible data. That very much conforms to social networking as well, taking data in human form (noisy, subtle, contradictory, and indirect) and making sense of it in machine form.</comment>


Is Facebook Coming to an End? - <AUTHOR> http://stats.stackexchange.com/questions/83136/is-facebook-coming-to-an-end/83262#83262

<comment><AUTHOR> While the fuss has died down somewhat, I thought it would be useful to post the CrossValidated (StackOverflow's statistics and machine learning cousin) take on the recent paper about Facebooks "inevitable" decline.</comment>


A x64 OS #1: UEFI - <AUTHOR> http://kazlauskas.me/entries/x64-uefi-os-1.html <comment><USER2> I had no idea UEFI booted directly into long mode... I feel like a moron who hasn't kept up with the times, but admittedly I'm not super into kernel dev. Can I just ignore segmentation entirely? It has always been my least favorite part of programming on x86

<comment><USER3> > I had no idea UEFI booted directly into long mode

I was really surprised to learn that it requires PE executables and Windows' custom x64 calling convention. I know it's just a small technical detail for booting ... but it's kind of scary that Microsoft had so much sway in the design of how our future PCs will boot =(

<comment><USER4> MS even had to add ARM64 to the PE spec in order to support ARM SBSA. At least I think the FAT LFN patents has expired by now.

<comment><USER5> Microsoft has granted a patent license for FAT patents for anyone implementing stuff required for UEFI.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> _> Despite my strong attachment to the Rust community and Rust's perfect suitability for kernels1, I'll be writing the kernel in C. Mostly because it is unlikely people inside the university will be familiar with Rust, but also because GNU-EFI is a C library and I cannot be bothered to bind it. I'd surely be writing it in Rust were I more serious about the project._

I saw an example of booting from UEFI in Rust: [http://blog.theincredibleholk.org/blog/2013/11/18/booting- to...](http://blog.theincredibleholk.org/blog/2013/11/18/booting-to-rust/)

<comment><USER7> This is quite an old version of rust[1]. I tried this a little while ago (but got frustrated trying to link it)

[1] For example:

* ` _u16` would now be: `_ const u16` * `int` is no longer a type. * `slice::as_ptr` is now a method, so using transmute to extract the pointer from a slice is probably not ideal. * `core` is a crate that includes things like transmute so you don't need to manually include rust intrinsics etc.

<comment><USER6> Yes, it's obviously somewhat outdated, since it's from 2013, which was before the first release.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> You still can't just ignore BIOS. It might be on the deathrow, but it's still got plenty of life in it. Hell, knowing Intel, x86 BIOS will be supported until x86 itself keels over.

Is it okay that I fantasize about that?

<comment><USER9> Linus Torvalds agrees with me and you, (U)EFI is an overengineered mess that is complex enough to be an OS itself:

[http://yarchive.net/comp/linux/efi.html](http://yarchive.net/comp/linux/efi.html)

<comment><USER8> Huh. Well, if stories are to be believed, it's STILL better than BIOS.

<comment><USER10> Bios is wonderful because it's limited; Nobody wants to try shoving more functionality into it. No system management, no drivers, nothing.

The bios loads your kernel, and then you get out and do your own thing. And that's the advantage of it.

<comment><USER11> EFI drivers are great if you want to repair a machine without taking the boot disk out.

[http://appleinsider.com/articles/11/07/20/new_macbook_airs_m...](http://appleinsider.com/articles/11/07/20/new_macbook_airs_mac_minis_feature_lion_internet_recovery_disc_less_repair)

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

<comment><USER9> The ability to boot from the network has been there for traditional BIOS too:

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

[http://wiki.osdev.org/PXE](http://wiki.osdev.org/PXE)

<comment><USER12> PXE is good (someone needs to sit down with me and a bottle of rum and work out why PXE behaves differently after a hard reboot in VirtualBox), but I've got to hand it to Apple, Target Disk Mode is _nice_. They also had some kind of multicast netboot-installer before most OSes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> In case others find it interesting, I tried to look around for any relationship between linuxbios/seabios and uefi - and found some references tianocore and edk/edk II:

[https://github.com/tianocore/tianocore.github.io/wiki/EDK_II...](https://github.com/tianocore/tianocore.github.io/wiki/EDK_II_Overview)

Looks like seabios is (mostly) happy being a bios (with possible plans to be packaged as an "csm application" (I'm guessing that means being loaded from efi)). But, s far as I can tell, for a free/open uefi toolkit, tianocore is the project to look at.

I'm a little disappointed that I couldn't easily find a ready-to-run uefi space invader or tetris clone... ;)

[ed: eh, I see tfa links to tianocore's ovmf code for vms... Oh, well... ]

</comment><comment><USER14> Huh, just the other day i was pondering delivering the OS on a card/chip with a bit of flash space for storing patches and drivers.

Right now it seems we get into a whole lot of problems because we have the OS sitting on the same RW space as user files and programs.

<comment><USER15> Would your idea include small form factor external media as the "card/chip"?

What would be the negatives to this approach?

I have been doing this for many years and have still not found any.

Currently I prefer RO space embedded in the kernel for the "core" OS and mfs/tmpfs overlay for a RW, larger "additional" OS.

If RW portion crashes, the system falls back to the RO portion.

<comment><USER14> Well my initial thought was a PCIe card, but it could likely just as well be an SD or such if set up right. And yeah, you can get an approximation of it using _nix and clever mounts.

But i was thinking about having the initial OS sit on an actual ROM chip with a flash chip next to it on the same board/die.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Sadly, UEFI implementations are as buggy as anything else. Missing start of Option ROMs? Invalid GPU initialization? I have hit this and more with both Phoenix and AMI. And also security issues thanks to magic buggy Intel blobs.

At least there is a valid, but hard to compile and deploy reference implementation.

It is funny that CSM mode is so much more polished and tested than pure UEFI one. And that so many cards still do not provide compatible firmware.

</comment><comment><USER17> That's awesome. I hope that I will get to do something similar as part of my university degree.

</comment><comment><USER18> huehuehuehuehue is a wonderful name for a kernel

<comment><USER19> I was surprised the author is not Brazilian.

<comment><USER20> Huehuehue has kind of become a meme around the internet...</comment></comment></comment>


Segway was supposed to change the world. Two decades later, it just might - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/30/tech/segway-history/index.html <comment><USER2> One thing I didn't understand here was, what exactly does Segway have to do with electric scooters in the first place? Why do scooters need the fancy self-balancing tech from the original Segway, or, if that's not what it's doing, what are they doing? Surely it's not something as lame as having a bunch of patents on the idea of sticking a battery in a scooter?

<comment><USER3> Segway/Ninebot build a range of personal transportation products. All of them except the powered kickscooters are self-balancing in some form: [http://www.segway.com/products/consumer- lifestyle](http://www.segway.com/products/consumer-lifestyle)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I really don't know what's happening with Segway, but an antidote:

I was at the grocery store, and an older lady was riding one of those cheap- looking hover board type contraptions inside the store - except that there was a post, and seat attached to it. She was whizzing all over the place on it with ease and grace. It was an excellent sight.

<comment><USER5> "She was whizzing all over the place on it with ease and grace. It was an excellent sight."

I was in a country other than the United States and I saw an older lady _run_ to catch a bus. She was easily 65, maybe 70. It was neither interesting nor noteworthy to any of the other (swiss) people on the street with her.

Walking is the universal medicine and we live with an enormous burden of health, fitness and longevity problems (including obesity, diabetes, "lower back problems", knee and hip issues, etc.) due to the car culture that we live in and the related _near refusal_ to walk anywhere.

No, this was not an excellent sight - it's the sign of a sick society that will _do anything_ to avoid the simple, free and easy remedy to almost all of their problems.

<comment><USER6> Walking is not a universal medicine for someone who has trouble walking. You don't see that person running to catch the bus because they can't. They might not even be able to get to the bus stop. They can't get their own groceries. Sure, you can try to tie this to some generic tangent about 'car culture' or whatever, but the idea that a person (whose health history you know nothing about) being able to exercise their autonomy is somehow a bad thing is pretty odd.

<comment><USER7> I think the argument being made is a lifetime of neglecting your body (poor diet, lack of exercise) leads to an inability to use your body, which in turn encourages you to use these assistive devices, which makes the problem worse still in a viscous cycle.

A biological analog would be Type II. You consume too much glucose, you develop insulin resistance, you take insulin, which makes your insulin resistance worse, and so on. The problem there too, is diet and exercise.

<comment><USER6> Right, but there's nothing in the story posted that suggests this argument is relevant or appropriate - it's just judgy, tangential ranting. You can be the world heavyweight champion of walking and still end up disabled late in life.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Scooters may be handy for people who don't live where there's significant snow or ice on the ground for months at a time.

I see all kinds of people riding exercise bikes in gyms. May they should switch to non-electric scooting instead.

</comment><comment><USER9> I'm surprised they didn't talk about the crowdfunding campaign they have going for their new e-skate, The Drift

[https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the- drift-w1-experience-s...](https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the- drift-w1-experience-segway-s-new-age-e-skates#/)

<comment><USER10> Wow. Is this already copied by the Chinese cloners?

[https://www.amazon.com/Koowheel-Electric-Balancing- Hovershoe...](https://www.amazon.com/Koowheel-Electric-Balancing-Hovershoes- Freeline/dp/B07CZV53F1)

<comment><USER9> Not really? It feels like they basically saw hover boards and then split them in two. If anything Segway probably saw a market opportunity.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Not sure about the article's "world changing" claim but I do love electric scooters. The Segway ES1 is $600 on Amazon - [https://amzn.to/2SH2zYh](https://amzn.to/2SH2zYh)

<comment> village-idiot Replacing the car for last mile transit _is_ world changing, if it happens.

<comment><USER12> Other than for people with limited mobility, can you help me understand why people think this is so? To me, it seems like evolution solved this problem for us when we became bipedal. It's entirely possible (even likely) that I could just be a crank, but I genuinely don't see the point of scooter rentals for healthy, sufficiently mobile people.

<comment><USER13> A scooter has about the same functionality as an e-bike but can go on sidewalks without seeming nearly as threatening. Use in bike lanes, go 4 times as fast as walking, no sweating like a bicycle, and more portable and much cheaper than an e-bike. If my commute is a mile from a train station on both ends, that is 40 minutes of walking a day. Probably good for your health, but cutting that down to 10 minutes by using a scooter could make trains much more useful for many people. Make it 2 miles on each end, then a bicycle is really needed. Bulky and not allowed on many subways. e-scooter could work just as well.

Plus they are pretty fun to ride.

<comment><USER14>
      without seeming nearly as threatening

Quite the contrary.

Scooters are viewed by the riders as _less_ dangerous than bikes. Result: they take more risks, especially risks to pedestrians.

<comment><USER13> A person on a scooter is barely bigger than just a person. They stand maybe 4 inches higher. They are like like a person running. A bit annoying and going too fast, but not that big a deal. A bike going the same speed is a much bigger object.

<comment><USER14>
      They are like like a person running.

You've clearly never seen a scooter clip a person's ankle and break it. I have. The point of contact is not torso to torso, it's metal to ankle.

It's common here for scooter retrievers to stack multiple scooters crosswise on the driven scooter's floorboard when carrying back for charging or deployment, making it a 3+ foot wide wrecking platform.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Is Ninebot not owned by Xiaomi? [https://www.mi.com/global/mi-electric- scooter/](https://www.mi.com/global/mi-electric-scooter/)

<comment><USER16> Xiaomi has invested in Ninebot [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ninebot- xiaomi-investment...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ninebot-xiaomi- investment/xiaomi-backed-chinese-firm-acquires-iconic-scooter-maker-segway- idUSKBN0N60GN20150415)

<comment><USER11> They also make an electric scooter that competes directly with Segway/Ninebot [https://amzn.to/2RvYp4b](https://amzn.to/2RvYp4b)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> How do they compare to bikes for city transit?

Also, the prices of Segway kickscooters from Bird and Lime (1$ + 0.15$/min) seem way higher than Mobike's prices (around $10/month, unlimited rides).

</comment><comment><USER18> ohh another hot air bubble product.. "electric scooters" ... that will pass too.

what we really need is updated modern public transportion network, high speed electric trains/ efficient transportation hubs..... not bicycles and scooters LMAO !! This is a 21st century! Why are we going backwards? They make a good toy though.

<comment><USER19> I'm not with you on this one.

I don't live in California and the amount of electric scooters I've suddenly seen out of nowhere is crazy. It might be a fad, but unlike you, I'm more like 30% thinking it is a fad vs 100%.

My reasoning:

* Batteries have gotten better than even the basic Segway days

* The scooters are portable. You can fold them and take them in to your dorm, apartment, etc, preventing theft. A lot of work places won't complain about you charging them at work either

* The entry level price is so much lower. I never saw a casual person on a Segway, but I see casual people on the electric scooter bandwagon already

* There is also a large subset of folks that had Razor scooters. I wasn't part of that, but I can understand them being more willing to adopt if they had previously used unpowered scooters.

* Running in to someone might be a problem on San Francisco sidewalks, but it isn't on, say, ISU's sidewalks.

<comment><USER20> Charging inside your house is very dangerous, especially in NA where most houses are wooden.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EljeP5XmETA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EljeP5XmETA)

<comment><USER21> Same is true of cellphones and laptops. It depends on the brand.

<comment><USER20> 1 scooter battery equals several or tens of notebook batteries, mobile devices generally use safer li polymer ones nowadays.

These scooter batteries sustain intense charging and discharging cycles, I won't bet my house and life on it.

<comment><USER22> At my hackerspace we charge our 18650 cells inside those green ammo boxes. Battery lockboxes are a way to stay pretty safe, even if a li-on, li-po, or lead acid battery explodes, in a steel box it can't do so much.

Obviously, doesn't help without removable batteries, which are more common on ebikes.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Cathay Pacific data hack hits 9.4M passengers - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-45974020 <comment><USER2> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18297608](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18297608)

</comment><comment><USER3> So what happens with all this data?

I'm willing to bet some of it is pretty critical[valid credit card details?], it might end up in the Dark Web, auctioned off or something like that.

Some of it is useless (not valid anymore, or just junk emails used to sign up).

Cathay doesn't tell us what else has been leaked (or they don't know), but what if there's a team on the other end of the hacks that actually analyses the meta data of these hacks, and finds out the frequency of movement of some people, and add that to their 'alpha' ?

<comment><USER4> Could contain more than just CC details; I'd be worried about passport numbers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I do wonder when/if companies will move wholesale to avoiding security mechanisms that rely on the secrecy of particular pieces of static information (e.g. passport numbers, Social Security Numbers (In the US)) etc.

The number of breaches of personal data now mean that in many/most cases an assumption that only a person knows something about them is extremely unlikely to hold across a large userbase.

Of course you then fall back to "how do you validate that someone is who they say they are" and probably things like biometrics, and/or other forms of 2FA will need to feature.

</comment><comment><USER6> "The company has no evidence that any personal information has been misused." Yeah? Well my dog has no evidence of these details being misused either, but I would still trust his opinion over Cathay's on this topic.

Edit: "If my personal information was accessed, how might I be affected?

We are very sorry for any concern that this may cause you."

So .. please change your passport number, birthday and previous travel history if you are still concerned?

So infuriating. The people who SHOULD be impact by this are Cathay Pacific share holders and senior management, whom should get a rinsing due to fines.

</comment><comment><USER7> It is unclear from any reporting as to how this technically happened, which is a shame but hopefully that will be made public in the coming days. Some other outlets[0] have an interesting statement:

> _The breach also included details about where each passenger had traveled > and any comments made by customer service representatives. The amount of > data accessed varied among passengers._

Based on those details, and the mention of 'no passwords were compromised', chances are this breach has come from an internal helpdesk type system, or possibly CRM. If however the statement around the passwords changes, that opens up a few other possibilities.

What this doesn't sound like, are the attacks we saw on British Airways[1] and Ticketmaster[2], where javascript was injected into the payment pages to vacuum up payment details from customers.

The statement around "The company has no evidence that any personal information has been misused" is always an interesting one, and is one of the many reasons I created my startup Breach Insider[3], so that data breaches like this could be detected much sooner (not 7 months later, as we have seen here), with minimal false positive alerts, and definitive evidence if any data has been misused. By using real email addresses that are unique to each company/business, you can be sure to find out if that data ever leaks & is abused for things like spam or phishing.

[0] [https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/24/18019958/cathay- pacific-...](https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/24/18019958/cathay-pacific- airline-data-breach)

[1] [https://www.britishairways.com/en- gb/information/incident/da...](https://www.britishairways.com/en- gb/information/incident/data-theft/latest-information#)

[2] [https://www.riskiq.com/blog/labs/magecart-ticketmaster- breac...](https://www.riskiq.com/blog/labs/magecart-ticketmaster-breach/)

[3] [https://breachinsider.com](https://breachinsider.com)</comment>


The Laborers Who Keep Dick Pics and Beheadings Out of Your Facebook Feed (2014) - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/2014/10/content-moderation?mbid=social_fb

<comment><USER2> Honesty to the max. In a survival analysis, do you measure the _Confirmation bias -- > an attenuated base-signal that can be gathered through a lexical analysis/ over a semantical evaluation average and it's rate change. I would decide that measuring emotive packets is difficult w/out cadence level measuring the baseline or determining on a semantic level, what the emotive packets are based off an _intell library.</comment>