The Vice of Selfishness - A critique of Ayn Rand's Objectivism (1987) - <AUTHOR> http://www.liberalviewer.com/AynRand.htm <comment><USER2> This essay appears to be pointing out a problem with many, if not the majority, of philosophies and ideologies: oversimplification.

Objectivism states that if all humans were to pursue their own self- actualization at all times, the world would automatically become a better place. Socialism states that if every man contributed his best and received what he needed, again, the world would become a better place. Neither is possible in the real world.

Economic hardship, social need, and lack of opportunity prevent many in the world from coming close to achieving objectivist self-actualization, and the greed and selfishness fundamental to human nature preclude many people from working for the benefit of others. Further, other elements of human nature, such as altruism and empathy, mean that there will always be many people working for the benefit of others rather than themselves. But, social and economic status often prevent these people from doing so, and require that they work for themselves, even if not achieving self-actualization in the process.

Essentially, the reality is that these philosophies are interesting to think about, but should not be used to govern the real world. The real world will always need a mix of capitalism and socialism, selfishness and altruism, love for oneself and love for others. It's never as simple as people like Rand or Marx make it out to be.

</comment><comment><USER3> This critique is pretty lame, especially for some guy who claims to have been follower or student of AR for a time. He either wasn't paying attention or not very bright. The objections he raised are all addressed in detail by Rand in her writings. For example, the idea that Objectivism is against charity and helping the poor is one of the standard canards and misrepresentations. Objectivism has nothing against charity as long as its voluntary. Taking money by force to support a welfare class is immoral. Him and all his socialist buddies are free to give all their money to the poor if that's what they value. As far as the actually needy, i.e. those who are disabled or unable to care for themselves, they are literally dependent on those who are not needy and their need is not a moral claim -- not a moral obligation to be enforced by the govt. In a free society the voluntary charity would be generous and sufficient for these cases because unlike the ever growing need of a parasite class the actual needy is a fairly small and finite group and thus a marginal, side issue in ethics.

Now if these clowns really want to stop AR they should attack her theory of concepts. I'm waiting....

<comment><USER4> I wish I could up vote your response more than once. Good Job!

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Here is a list of his counter-points to objectivism and my list of counters to them:

1) "If [social program] restrictions can make twenty million hungry, then destruction [of social programs] could quite possibly starve to death vast numbers of people."

This does not prove that objectivism is flawed just that migration to a purely objectivist system would be difficult. The real issue in this case is the populace being accustomed to a certain way of life and then changing it on a dime and expecting them to change on a dime or starve.

2) "The first flaw results from Objectivism's overextension of the correct repudiation of rewarding people for need to the prohibition of even helping those in need."

In Atlas Shrugged, Dagny is helped when she is injured after a plane crash by the industrialists that were abandoning society. Rather than view it as helping those in need, think of it as investing in those in need. If you're a leech on society and then you fall on hard times why should society work harder to find a way to save you? It's not pretty, and I'm fairly opposed to it, but it is logical.

3) "Further, by saying he will never live for the sake of another, John Galt and the Objectivists cannot live their lives for Ms. Genovese's sake even long enough to make a phone call."

Making a phone call in this situation would be an investment in your community. It would do even an objectivist a disservice to have a murderer running around and perhaps targeting them next. Self-interest would dictate that the crime be reported. What those people went through is something much more to the core of human instinct which unfortunately may or may not follow philosophical knowledge to the tee, even within the objectivist. :)

*Concession-

I will give the writer this point: I'm not sure what reason an objectivist has to try to maintain the world past his/her lifetime (RE: the OP's environmentalism point). This is something I'm curious about. Is the ultimate idea that other objectivists should work to ensure that this objectivist doesn't screw up their future?

[edited typo]

<comment><USER6> We are valuers; just because our lifetimes are finite does not mean that what we value vanishes when we die--there are children, friends, institutions, even a broader affection for the best of mankind in general, and love of justice and principle, that extend well beyond your own grave.

<comment><USER5> Ty for that!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This essay completely misses Ayn Rand's point.

Consider your life and the basic problem of deciding how to live it.

Being "selfish" means living your life according to what is most meaningful to you. For some that means heading to Wall Street, for others it means being a doctor, and for others it means working at Burger King.

In modern terminology, Rand's term "selfish" should be substituted accurately with _self-actualized_. Her term "selfish" was actually chosen as a deliberate synonym for "self-actualized" that didn't sound like psychobabble.

Now the question becomes, under what circumstances would anyone claim that a person _should not_ be self-actualized? One might also wonder what would be the consequences of living one's entire life in a state of self-actualization vs non self-actualization.

It is this sort of question that Rand addresses in the book. She makes the rather bold moral claim that each human _should_ live a self-actualized life, and that to avoid doing so is to commit a moral failing.

Now let's quickly examine the concept from a political perspective. What would it mean to not be selfish?

Suppose you are a young man who is very talented at the Violin. You know in your gut that to create beautiful music with the instrument will bring you tremendous happiness and pride. You want nothing in life other than to experience this happiness every day, so you practice long and hard. That you please others is nice, but it's secondary to your own love of music.

Rand would applaud such a person. Rand's critics would claim that the violinist should have been "selfless" and joined the clergy or perhaps become an orderly at a hospital, helping to clean up vomit and spilled fluids.

By definition, selfishness is doing something you want to do, and selflessness is doing something you don't want to do. So what Rand's critics are advocating is akin to self-flagellation. This is not a new idea, as anyone who has read or watched the DaVinci Code knows -- the wacky priest uses a spiked strap to make sure that he is not enjoying whatever he is doing, since self-sacrifice is his highest value.

So what about people who work for non profits, are they selfless? Not really. They simply enjoy making the world better more than they enjoy earning more money in each paycheck. Selflessness for someone who works at a non profit would be working in a job that was truly meaningless... such as perhaps working as a clerk in a huge corporation.

Political systems like Socialism which attempt to embody the idea of shared self-sacrifice would view the clerical job as every bit as noble as a more meaningful job because someone must do the clerical work for it helps society as a whole.

Rand's value of individual choice and self-actualization -- appreciating and glorifying the occasions when a person truly loves his life's work -- is fortunately not all that foreign to HN readers.

<comment><USER8> That's wonderful, if you can hack it. However, in the real world, we have billions of people on the planet who are not capable of living the life they imagine.

What people take issue with is Rand's ideological claim that the best way for the people of Earth to achieve a future in which everyone has the capability to "self-actualize" is to focus primarily on their own "self-actualization." That's not obvious at all. Most people feel that our overall well-being is served when the most fortunate among us (those with the resources to pursue their own dreams, and excess resources beyond that) are taxed to some degree to try to give other people a better chance at a self-actualized life.

<comment><USER9> As Francisco d'Anconia would say, 'check your premises.' Your argument is predicated on the assumption that there are billions of people on earth not capable of living the life they imagine. Exactly Rand's point is that this assumption of yours is not the case, and that, in fact, these people choose not to live the life they imagine, either because they refuse to work hard enough for it (they're lazy), they consciously decide to loot the efforts of others by force (they steal), or they simply don't have the ability to do so (they're incompetent). In all cases Rand's argument is that these people should not be entitled to any of the productive efforts of those who produce.

I agree with the original commenter that the essay completely misses Rand's point. Rand does not ignore the complexities of social systems set up to repress and down-trod the disadvantaged. Such social systems are precisely the product of the looters who attempt to destroy productivity and creativity, not the result of a self-actualized group who achieves their collective self- actualization at the expense of others. The essayist's example of Genovese's murder and the conclusion he draws from it is a complete oversimplification. A selfish person would help a fellow human in distress for any number of reasons: to stop an injustice they see as unconscionable, for a reward, so that they could live with themselves afterwards, etc. 'Selfish' does not mean that one does not help others; it simply means that if one helps others it is for their own purposes, not because of charity or pity.

I've thought many times, though, that Rand conveniently ignores (insofar as I've read) the case of those who truly can't care for themselves: the sick, the insane, and perhaps the crippled as well. But it should be noted that when asked, Rand categorized herself as a novelist who developed a philosophy for the sake of writing her novels, not a philosopher who wrote novels.

<comment><USER10> >I've thought many times, though, that Rand conveniently ignores the case of those who truly can't care for themselves: the sick, the insane, and perhaps the crippled as well.

There is an interview with Ayn on a talk show and was asked about what should happen to the "ungifted". She believes that first it is the parents responsibility to support them but if they are poor and can't afford to then private charities should look after them.

Found the clip if your interested (around 5-6min in): <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUwTHn-9hhU>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Here is the same post on the objectivism forum, and their counter-arguments on the critique !

<http://forum.objectivismonline.net/index.php?showtopic=15999>

<comment><USER11> This is a pretty good list of the value judgments typically made by objectivists, and more generally libertarian-capitalists:

'First, in our system "underprivileged" people essentially do not exist. The percentage of people genuinely unable to support themselves is infintesimal. We do have quite a collection of moochers and bums, but that is no one's responsibility but their own.' 'What would stop welfare recipients from becoming working, productive members of society when their taxpayer-looted dole is cut off? Nothing but sheer laziness and a continued desire to remain parasites, in defiance of reality' etc.

<comment><USER5> And that was a great list of broad generalizations by you! Thanks for illustrating.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> The guy who wrote this has a channel on YouTube - [http://www.youtube.com/user/LiberalViewer?PHPSESSID=5a91ae4c...](http://www.youtube.com/user/LiberalViewer?PHPSESSID=5a91ae4c09aca4c79dfe372b8ea76d44)

and he talks about this critique on one of his broadcasts - <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-tIY99QFFk>

</comment><comment><USER12> The writing style is very odd. It begins normally, but the second half or so is written in a high-school-student-esque manner. The last paragraph actually begins with the words "in conclusion"(!) It's as if the author had started to write this piece in an honest way, and then, halfway through, remembered that he was writing it for a class.

<comment><USER2> "Philosophy 120a November 4, 1987 Professor Fischer"

Apparently, he was writing it for a class: his class.

<comment><USER12> I can only hope that the article was written by one of Professor Fischer's students, rather than the professor himself :)</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How do you come back from a failed acquisition? - <AUTHOR> throwaway and anonyous CTO and cofounder here - we have been around for 2 years, and for the last 2 months in serious talks with a major ($6bn t/o) company to sell our startup. the deal would clearly be great for the founders personally - but also provide fantastic strategic assistance to the startup, propelling our user adoption to insane levels and giving us the financial backing to scale.
We were told last week that the VC who backs this large co won't do the deal for internal politics reasons. Bigco (right up to VP level) still want to do it, but can't.
we've broken off talks, have lost months of traction and work - aside from the enormous emotional cost, and i'm personally totally despirited. the thought of leaving product alone again and getting into months of further VC courting to raise the money leaves me cold.
what's more, our current VCs & angel investors - previously delighted to be involved + finance cheaply with the smell of an exit around the corner - are now dropping us like a hot turd, putting us at serious risk of going under in the coming months.
we've built a startup that's so disruptive, we nearly had an exit within 2 years - but now we're about to crash and burn.
just wanted to share the story and hope there are some vague lessons to learn from it. <comment><USER2> Most importantly, don't despair. Things may not turn out exactly the way you want them to, but they will turn out ok. You live in a great time and have phenomenal skills and experiences. You'll do ok. Never lose sight of that.

It's great that you asked the question. When you're overtaken by waves of emotions, it helps to get an impartial perspective. Here is what I think about your situation. In the movie Lincoln, Daniel Day-Lewis delivers this line:

      A compass, I learnt when I was surveying, it'll point you to
      True North from where you're standing, but it's got no advice
      about the swamps and deserts and chasms that you'll encounter
      along the way. If in pursuit of your destination, you plunge
      ahead, heedless of obstacles, and achieve nothing more than to
      sink in a swamp... What's the use of knowing True North?

You just screwed up with your tactics and fell into a swamp. That's ok -- just make sure to learn your lesson. Deals fall through. No deal is ever done until the paperwork is signed and money is in the bank. When it comes to deals, never put your eggs in one basket. I'm sure you already got it, so there is no use brooding over it. It's time to move on.

The biggest question you need to answer right now is if you still believe your startup is the True North. Is it the best possible thing you could be working on? From your question it sounds like you still believe that. If you do, good. Then it's time to fight like hell. If you don't, there is no harm done. If it's not the True North, what does it matter if you fell in a swamp? You can pull the plug and start again, with the new, truer direction, now based on everything you've learned.

If you still believe in your company, then fight! I don't know the details of your particular situation (valuation, metrics, team size, runway, amount of money you need to get to the next milestone, etc.) so I can't give tactical advice on how to get out of your particular swamp (or even if it's possible). Pick five advisors you really trust. Poll them on what they think you can do to get out of your situation and move on to building your company. Then decide on the best strategy and fight like hell to make it happen.

Feel free to contact me privately if you need to (email in profile), and good luck! Don't despair. Take a day off and do what you have to do to forget about your company for that day. Then pick yourself up and get into work. It's the first day of your company's new life. Where do you want to take it?

<comment><USER3> _email in profile_

That field isn't visible...

<comment><USER2> Whoops, thanks. Fixed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> _vague lessons to learn_

I've never been in this position, but this story reminds me of PG's "startups in 13 sentences" ([http://www.paulgraham.com/13sentences.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/13sentences.html)) and more precisely the 13th rule:

 _13\. Deals fall through.

One of the most useful skills we learned from Viaweb was not getting our hopes up. We probably had 20 deals of various types fall through. After the first 10 or so we learned to treat deals as background processes that we should ignore till they terminated. It's very dangerous to morale to start to depend on deals closing, not just because they so often don't, but because it makes them less likely to._

If you follow the advice to "treat deals as background processes that we should ignore till they terminate" then you won't "lose months of traction" when an acquisition deal falls through.

<comment><USER4> Couldn't agree more. Even in my very short experience I noticed that there is a trend for deal talks to consume a lot of time and energy, and to fall through. If the deal is very interesting it's difficult to treat it as a background process, but at least you should never put yourself in the position where your future depends on the deal closing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> If you only have one exit opportunity (via one bigco) that's problematic. Is that actually the case?

Think like a board member/advisor who doesn't have to actually do the work. IS the company valuable without bigco?

Consider the emotional aspects to be unrecoverable sunk costs. (And, it doesn't matter to the market if you're pumped or despondent.) Is there a way to extract value from what has been created? Is the value worth the time*labor cost?

>we nearly had an exit within 2 years

You might want to reconsider a the nature of an exit to be a series of opportunities that present themselves with increasing frequency as your company creates value. Even a [hair salon | food truck | gardening service] doesn't have a once-in-the-life-of-a-company opportunity to exit. Software companies shouldn't have one chance either.

And a funny thing happens as you create value--you'll become less and less interested in the bigco's and exits that do present themselves.

It sounds like you have created a lot of value. If that's the case, don't let emotions of hopes-dashed weigh you down. Focus on your business and create more value.

</comment><comment><USER6> That sucks. I spent a very unpleasant 9 months in the early '00s at a startup I founded bouncing from big valley tech co to big valley tech co chasing acquisition deals, each of which consumed 3-4 months of effort and attention, each of which involved us eventually getting into the mindset of being acquired by that company, each of which failed.

Deals fall through; that's just what they do. Yours fell through because a director at the acquirer objected. Others fall through because the market shifts suddenly, or because a competitor to your acquirer spooks them by picking up one of your competitors, or because you lose a key person, or because their business development person leaves, or they get a new CEO, or because a bluebird deal happens for them and they pick up some totally unrelated company that ices you out of their plans for a year.

You're lucky the acquirer told you the deal was dead. That doesn't always happen; dead deals can limp along for months and months, especially if you don't know how to qualify them. This is a reason people hire "business development" people for their startups, but frankly having a BD person might just mean you'll be exposed to more of these horrible prospective deals; if people aren't banging down your door, it's not in a BD person's interests to qualify deals strongly.

My advice is, go into every potential acquisition as if it could not possibly happen. Maximum jaundice! Assume it's going to fall through. Shield your team from the talks. Decline to introduce the acquirer to most people on your team until things have materialized. Talk to people who have sold companies before about the steps their deals went through so you can judge what "real" is (it's probably not just "signed MOU"). Certainly don't expose yourself before the CEO has signed off.

A possible added benefit to this posture is that it also plays hard to get, which while it won't actually increase the valuation you get might keep you from blundering into unnecessary concessions.

My guess is you weren't really all that far into the deal, because no part of your posting talks about vast and intractable legal fees. So, cheer up: you could have been a couple more steps down the road, and a couple hundred thousand dollars in hock to the lawyers too.

</comment><comment><USER7> If there is a lesson to learn, perhaps it's that there's more than one perspective on looking at something. It sounds as if you've been thinking a lot about all the positives of an acquisition - this is no bad thing, but perhaps you would feel less depressed and dispirited if you considered the other side of the coin.

I think an acquisition is a little like a marriage. Nearly everyone goes into them for the 'right reasons'. Both parties are really excited for the future, and looking forward to the adventure - but even then, we know that many marriages (and acquisitions) end up in failure. It would not be the first time a company has been acquired with promises of growth and development only to find that business priorities change, and they're suddenly getting scattered around the acquirer.

Let me give you an anecdote to balance your own. About three years ago I was working for a start-up that got acquired by a big, publicly listed company with a ~$1 billion market cap with several 'A-Listers' on the board. We were really excited: we were going to have access to many more markets, be able to accelerate a lot of the stuff we were doing, just like you.

Two years later, the entire group was worth _less_ than the amount they'd paid for us, and our market cap had gone from $1 billion to _8 million_. Last I heard (by this point I had left), they had just declared Chapter 11.

The moral of this story, if there is one, is that you just don't know what's going to happen. Is your company really _" about to crash and burn"_? Is it that bad? Maybe not (...at least, I'd assume so). Is a _" disruptive startup"_ one that exits in two years? Would being acquired let you keep being disruptive? I think it's great you posted your experiences here - but maybe, and it might just be me reading this into what you've written, you're letting the moment of the now cloud your judgement.

<comment><USER8> The issue here is that both sides want the acquisition, and it's being blocked for external reasons that have nothing to do with the fundamentals.

I'm generally pretty negative on the build-to-flip mentality. However, sometimes an acquisition is the right thing, and I also think this investor is a horrible person for blocking an acquisition that both sides clearly want, just to serve his own career goals.

Investors ought to be passive beneficiaries. Yes, their financial interests deserve respect. No, they shouldn't be the real bosses. Funding ought to be the commodity, almost like a utility; talent ought to be treated as scarce and precious (because true talent is). But in the modern Valley, it's gone the other way.

<comment><USER6> You are totally free to only accept money from investors who will have no control over your company.

<comment><USER8> As you know, VC is a reputation economy and the VCs all talk and collude. VCs can get whatever terms they want because they know that if you say no, they'll bad-mouth you to the rest of the investor community. It's extortion.

People don't end up in those kinds of deals because they're stupid. Not all of them, at least. Often, they have no other choice because an investor will either back them or end them, the latter being a power they have in this backward, feudalistic reputation economy.

<comment><USER6> If you feel that way about investors, don't take outside investment. We didn't. Things worked out peachy.

It's a strange thing, to feel entitled to set the terms under which people give you their money. We didn't like the available terms. I don't have much nice to say about the venture capitalists I've known. But I don't have an elaborate worldview built around those impressions, and you do. You should try to shake it off.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> _the VC who backs this large co won 't do the deal for internal politics reasons_

"internal politics" is a problem to solve. The VC is backing the $6b company, and not yours? This is where your VCs/advisers/backers should provide that "non-financial assistance" they love to talk about.

</comment><comment><USER10> My advice is this: You and your co-founders should each take a couple of days (separately, not together) off, away from the office, in some quiet contemplative place (most hotels in America fit the bill) where you can each do some thinking about what is important to you. Don't plan to do any work during this period, turn off your email and phone and just think about what's most important to you for the business. If you can come back from the short retreat with a clear destination for the business, you've achieved the initial goal. Then, take a day or two to discuss with your co-founders, with brutal honesty and candour, about the overlap and differences in your respective view of the business. If there's still a lot of overlap, then take whatever time you need to come up with a plan.

The game plan here is simple: get clear, define some goals, build some consensus and come up with a plan.

I get the sense that you've got a lot of pain, confusion and doubt clouding your thinking right now, so taking a few steps away from all the noise of operations should help you find what you need to find.

Good luck with it all.

</comment><comment><USER11> > we've built a startup that's so disruptive, we nearly had an exit within 2 > years - but now we're about to crash and burn.

But what about making money? Is it so disruptive you haven't been able to charge for it yet? That sounds like a consumer app. Are you another Instagram? Could you be Snapchat? (snicker)

In all reality, either you are so disruptive that you need help finding a way to make money, or you should be able to raise more money if it's something that's actually adding value. Something is fishy when your current investors are dropping you after this deal fell through, either the company is in more dire of a situation that you can see, or something else is up.

I don't know what actual advice to give other than take a close look at what you're doing to see if it's truly providing value not just "disruptive" and if there is an opportunity to start generating revenue to fund yourself. That's the most obvious solution to a startups cash flow problems. If you are solving someones pain point, I bet there's a few people out there willing to pay for it.

</comment><comment><USER12> My terminology is going to be off because its been a while, but if they are serious have them sign a term sheet, that has a exit clause; if for some reason the deal falls through they reimburse you for the time spent. If they are serious about the deal they will sign it, a 500K exit clause, as an example, is small change to a 6b company but can mean alot to a small startup. I know this does not help with your current situation, but might be useful for people reading who will find themselves in an acquisition.

</comment><comment><USER13> If a product is so disruptive, how can it possibly fail within two years? I think you are misguided.

<comment><USER8> _If a product is so disruptive, how can it possibly fail within two years?_

Running out of money tends to have that effect.

The problem with VC is that the VCs (in consumer web) aren't really into technology per se. They're trying to take advantage of the short-term, emerging natural monopolies that technology creates. This means they force fast growth whether it makes sense for the company or not, and even if it's a sound business, it will have to ask for money in 18 months regardless-- because it's been forced to grow headcount and scope so dramatically.

It really is a rigged game. The more traditional approach to business (10 to 30 percent growth, getting rich slowly) isn't allowed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> There's a good chance "internal politics" was a made up excuse when they decided that the acquisition simply wasn't worth the $$$. Then your corpdev or VP contacts don't look like assholes for backing out, because, you see, it was someone else's fault.

</comment><comment><USER15> We went through a similar situation. Signed an LOI for 8 digits. Went through 6 weeks of DD and the deal fell through because of the board.

I have never been so disheartened in my life.

You really have to ask yourself - why you started the company? My co-founder and I decided we didn't want to be in the business forever, but had to get to cash flow positive to make it easier to get board approval by pre-IPO companies.

We hustled to cash flow positive in 6 months and we're acquired 9 months later.

It's a marathon, not a sprint. Keep your head up. We found it really valuable to be open with people you trust and talk through things. Happy to chat by phone or grab coffee if you need someone to talk to.

</comment><comment><USER16> So near and yet so far. You got this close to a deal. Just hang in there, if there is one there ought to be others right (?!). Startups are hard for this and a myriad other reasons. you know it. Right from getting the product right, getting traction, raising funding, and the exit. You seem to have lined so many of the ducks so far. Like a marathon, just hang in there buddy. you have what it takes. Like someone mentioned, take a day or two off to clear the head, and refocus. Fight, fight, never give up !

</comment><comment><USER17> The largest lesson should be to not put your company on hold, not for anybody, not for any opportunity. Deals fall apart all the time, for many reasons. Work your company hard, until it is self-sufficient, and don't let anything get you off track.

For your company specifically, your description doesn't sound like politics, that sounds like someone found a red flag in a due diligence effort, and nobody wants to tell you what that red flag is.

</comment><comment><USER18> huh? If the product is that good, you should be able to find others who are interested in it, or if you are making money from it - be able to survive?

</comment><comment><USER19> Rule 13: [http://www.paulgraham.com/13sentences.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/13sentences.html)

</comment><comment><USER20> If internal politics is the major reason for the acquisition not going through, then your product must be good enough to attract other bigcos. Seems like the progress you had with the acquisition talks would also be a selling point to VCs when you raise your next round.

</comment><comment><USER21> Hindsight: Always deal directly with the decision maker. Don't put all the eggs in one basket / Have mitigation strategies. Does show validation.

Foresight: Leverage nimbilness. Read up on other aquisition cases. Maybe 3rd year is the charm?

</comment><comment><USER22> Take the company off hold and keep pushing along. Focus on what's next. They might come back to you. Seriously. Don't count it, but it does happen in M&A. Next time you can ask for more $$.

</comment><comment><USER23> Please contact me, details in profile.

</comment><comment><USER8> I sincerely hope that what I have to say here helps you: [http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/11/30/heres-the- hn-...](http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/11/30/heres-the-hn-post-that- paul-graham-bdfl-of-silicon-valley-wont-let-me-write/)

<comment><USER24> Did you double-post your comment and then delete one?

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Make 'em pay. Become so successful that the VC who screwed the deal looks like an idiot.</comment>


XML vs. Google's new protobufs - <AUTHOR> http://www.cafeconleche.org/oldnews/news2008July8.html

<comment><USER2> _However although I do see wire format documentation on Google's site, I don't see an actual BNF grammar anywhere and that makes me nervous._

So what? The .proto file may not be a BNF grammar but it tells an application what to expect and presumably the generated code can check for validity. e.g.

      message Person {
        required int32 id = 1;
        required string name = 2;
        optional string email = 3;
      }

Is that really any different from

      <Person> ::= <id> <name> | <id> <name> <email>
      ...

    ?

</comment><comment><USER3> Mr. Harold is missing the point here. Protocol buffers are _not_ meant to replace XML as a "public" API transport, they are meant to replace it on backend solutions, where one entity controls both endpoints.</comment>


Code Snippets and Scripts for Developers on Sketchmouse - <AUTHOR> http://www.sketchmouse.com <comment><AUTHOR> A community created for developers by developers to save, manage, and explore code snippets for their projects, as well as exchanging knowledge with other developers on a wide range of programming languages.</comment>


How We Built the ARKit Sudoku Solver - <AUTHOR> https://blog.prototypr.io/behind-the-magic-how-we-built-the-arkit-sudoku-solver-e586e5b685b0 <comment><USER2> Since the author spent so much time on the optical character recognition step, it's worth mentioning that you don't even really need OCR for this task.

You can just find the squares, group the characters in the squares into visual equivalence classes, assign each class an arbitrary number, solve the puzzle in terms of those numbers, then fill in each empty square with the (average?) image of the equivalence class it matches.

This would allow you to solve a Sudoku puzzle with letters or WingDings instead of numbers, and the output font would naturally match that of the original puzzle.

<comment><USER3> That's an interesting idea! What happens if the source puzzle doesn't have all of the digits present though?

<comment><USER4> Take random characters from WingDings.

<comment><USER2> This! Still, admittedly, this is a drawback of my strategy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> An earlier thread about the same app where the dev promised to write this medium post: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15299822](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15299822)

</comment><comment><USER6> > By the time we launched the app it was trained on over a million images of > Sudoku squares.

This is super cool, but I can't help but think that something is missing if it takes hundreds of thousands of examples of digits for a machine learning algorithm to be able to differentiate them. It wouldn't take a human child this many. The available machine learning algos are not using near the amount of information available.

<comment><USER7> You'd think recognising a square (containing squares and more squares if need be) would be relatively simple and not require advanced machine learning / training. Or that recognising a square doesn't take as much. The demo also indicates the sudoku needs to be fairly accurately scanned, similar to a QR code.

<comment><USER8> I don't think the square recognition used any machine learning.

> We use iOS11's Vision Library to detect rectangles in the image.

Looking at [https://github.com/gunapandianraj/iOS11-VisionFrameWork](https://github.com/gunapandianraj/iOS11-VisionFrameWork) \- this definitely doesn't touch CoreML

<comment><USER3> It's unclear whether Vision uses machine learning behind the scenes though. It's kind of implied in their docs that it uses CoreML behind the scenes (which makes sense with the other things it does like Face recognition and object tracking).

The nice thing is it detects "projected rectangular regions" so even if the puzzle isn't aligned with the camera it still works.

I do wish I had more control though; it runs into trouble sometimes and there's not much I can do other than apply heuristics afterwards to determine whether I should throw out the sample or continue.

Example of a bad read from Vision Rectangle Detection: [https://imgur.com/a/RSpTG](https://imgur.com/a/RSpTG)

<comment><USER8> > Example of a bad read from Vision Rectangle Detection: > [https://imgur.com/a/RSpTG](https://imgur.com/a/RSpTG)

Well, it's technically correct - it did find a rectangle :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Really enjoyed reading this. The process is really explained well including all the fun rabbit holes and unexpected pitfalls on launch day, and the technical steps to overcome.

Interesting limitations to work around such as vertical planes vs horizontal, and focal length.

Not _at all_ surprised they saw better performance with almost immediate payback by training models on their own $1,200 hardware than running in the cloud.

Very interesting they trained their own character recognition model and not only that but built their _own_ custom crowd-sourced image labeling system complete with accuracy checks and review screens.

Overall, fantastic write-up!

<comment><USER3> "They" haha :P

I was surprised to read that IKEA had 70 employees working on their ARKit app! ([https://twitter.com/DanielZarick/status/917472837295837185](https://twitter.com/DanielZarick/status/917472837295837185))

This whole thing (including the backend tools) took me about the equivalent of 1 month of full-time work (I was doing it mostly nights & weekends though since our games are what pay the bills).

I brought in one of my (excellent) designers from Hatchlings a couple days before launch to make the cool grid "scanning" animation and to do our branding and logo.

<comment><USER10> Only 70? I can see lots of work creating accurate (in size and in colors) 3D models of every item in their catalog that look good, and maybe even more discussing with management whether the current model accurately portrays the product.

I don't know whether the functionality is present (last time I checked, the app wasn't available in 'my' App Store), but integrating the app with their inventory system(s) and translating it also can't be free.

<comment><USER11> They have some in-store kiosks for building mocked up rooms already, which would plausibly have some usable assets there.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The machine vision part of the ARKit project is definitely "wow"!

I had fun writing a Sudoku solver in Julia.

[https://github.com/sgt101/simons-silly-sudoko-in- julia](https://github.com/sgt101/simons-silly-sudoko-in-julia)

</comment><comment><USER13> So, 6 years ago, Google Goggles could solve sudoku puzzles for you from pictures.

It's interesting to compare how far the interface/speed has come in 6 years if you watch the videos of how it was done then: [http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2011/01/google-goggles- gets...](http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2011/01/google-goggles-gets-faster- smarter-and.html)

(Goggles did not do the image handling on device)

</comment><comment><USER14> I think, in a year or two, someone will build a crossword puzzles solver using AR, ML, and computer vision. Granted, it is more difficult because we need to recognize the alphabets and solving crossword puzzles is much harder than solving sudoko. At least, the crossword puzzles solver can give word recommendation if it can not solve the puzzle completely.

<comment><USER15> Crosswords are pretty tough, partially because many puzzles (such as the Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday puzzles in the New York Times) have enough wordplay in their answers (not just the clues) that they break normal crossword rules, in a specific way that the solver has to determine. I think Dr. Fill ([https://arxiv.org/abs/1401.4597](https://arxiv.org/abs/1401.4597)) is still the state of the art.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> I found this very interesting, regarding crowdsourcing the training data:

"After the first pass I had enough verified data that I was able to add an automatic accuracy checker into both tools for future data runs (it would periodically show the user known images and check their work to determine how much to trust their answers going forward)."

</comment><comment><USER17> Seems like the challenge of applying AR is more in smart design than advanced ML.

<comment><USER3> Good observation! Be sure to check out part 1 where I talked about the design decisions behind the app: [https://blog.prototypr.io/why-we-built-magic- sudoku-the-arki...](https://blog.prototypr.io/why-we-built-magic-sudoku-the- arkit-sudoku-solver-306dde6c0a77)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Does anyone know how the detection of sudokus on vertical planes can be achieved. Great article esp on the crowdsourcing and machine vision fronts, but the authors explanation of this aspect left a lot to be desired.

<comment><USER3> Sorry, I was pretty hand-wavy with that because it was basically just trial and error until it worked sufficiently well.

The data I had available to mess with was the difference in width of the top of the puzzle and the bottom (with some trig you can determine its angle relative to the camera) and the projection matrix of the camera relative to the scene origin.

It's not perfect but it works better than having nothing at all.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Definitely cool, and I like the application of ARKit. But using ML to solve a sudoku seems like overkill. I remember writing a constraint-based solver as the first assignment for an undergrad-level AI course back in uni. Surely this implementation is less efficient? Someone let me know if I am wrong.

If the aim was to simply learn new tech, though, then I get it. I am just wary of ML being a hammer used on anything even remotely resembling a nail.

<comment><USER20> The author says ML wasn't used for solving Sudoku. Vision was only used for transducing the image of a sudoku puzzle to a puzzle structure in memory.

<comment><USER19> Oops, must have missed it. Thanks for the clarification.

<comment><USER21> It says they used a "traditional recursive algorithm", probably referring to the backtracking solution. In my experience it's fast enough to not matter for this sort of application (the other things that are going on are 1000x more complex).

<comment><USER22> There is a small fraction puzzles for which simple backtracking gets stuck on unproductive branches and essentially never finishes.

<comment><USER3> Do you have any examples? I'd love to improve the algorithm.

Someone on /r/programming pointed me here: [http://apollon.issp.u-tokyo.ac.jp/~watanabe/sample/sudoku/in...](http://apollon.issp.u-tokyo.ac.jp/~watanabe/sample/sudoku/index.html)

But the app seems to already handle those Ok without doing anything special: [https://www.dropbox.com/s/arfd03kr8ieczk5/recursive- solver-k...](https://www.dropbox.com/s/arfd03kr8ieczk5/recursive-solver- killer.mov?dl=0)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Did they really acquire 600,000 images for training data by scanning books by hand? How long did that take?

<comment><USER3> A couple of hours. I made a tool to do it automatically. Flip page, hold up phone, move it around to a few different angles, flip page, repeat.

I should note that's 600k small squares so each full puzzle scan yields 81 small images.</comment></comment>


Investigation: Why is SQS so slow? - <AUTHOR> https://blog.afoolishmanifesto.com/posts/investigation-why-sqs-slow/ <comment><USER2> A better title might be: "The Perl library Furl is horrible; use something vaguely functional instead if you need to make HTTP/S requests using Perl."

Good tip, if I was using Furl (or even Perl), but utterly unrelated to SQS, and not obviously generalisable to other libraries or languages.

<comment><USER3> It doesn't even appear to be the obvious library to use to access SQS from Perl.

Odd article.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Up next: Why is desktop linux so unresponsive? A deep dive into my broken keyboard.

</comment><comment><USER5> This feels more like I'm reading the intro to a hypothetical blog post. What was the thing that Furl did that was bad? How does Curl do it better? Is there anything SQS-specific about the issue, or was the initial setup about queuing systems just extraneous info?

</comment><comment><USER6> tl;dr: The author was seeing some network issues. Switching the HTTP client library fixed them.

</comment><comment><USER7> Good thing I read the comment before I read the article, because I couldn't really follow the post... I am not alone. Anyway, I am glad author figured it out!

So I was looking up "furl" [1] and the first thing returned was a Python library called "furl". But the actual "Furl" in the blog post is a Perl library [2]. Open source project owners, please hear me out... can we please avoid name collision?

[1]: [https://github.com/gruns/furl](https://github.com/gruns/furl) [2]: [https://github.com/tokuhirom/Furl](https://github.com/tokuhirom/Furl)

</comment><comment><USER8> I didn't carefully read every word but a skim didn't seem to answer the question in the headline.

And I'm not interested enough from what I saw to read every word. Something about curl?

</comment><comment><USER9> Extremely interested; didn't finish once in the author got into the weeds with sysctl and furl.</comment>


Numbers follow a surprising law of digits, and scientists can't explain why - <AUTHOR> http://www.physorg.com/news98015219.html <comment><USER2> There have been other posts about this before on HN, I'm pretty sure. The Wikipedia article

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benford%27s_law>

reviews some of the literature on this observation.</comment>


Owning the American Dream, ending the trap of rent servitude - <AUTHOR> https://www.urbanitus.com/owning-the-american-dream-ending-the-trap-of-rent-servitude/ <comment><AUTHOR> My co-founder, Kyle, and I wrote this.

Republics and democracies rely on people having power and ownership in their communities. In our modern world much of this power, in the form of home ownership, is relegated to debt-financed mortgages on homes.

We believe there is a financial path to home ownership that sits between mortgages and renting that will provide adequate returns to investors and dominate both mortgages and renting.

The social impact, and market impact, could be staggering if we are right.

<comment> algebra-history Sounds like a cool idea, but I couldn't figure out how you bootstrap. Do you rely on warm hearted homeowners to take a cut in their potential profit from the potential for renting ?

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey!

Our models indicate if we can get market rate mortgage debt on our portfolio (likely) to fund 80%, and prime plus low to average mezzanine debt rates on 15% to fund the rest all holders can make returns - including equity - so long as we minimize fees and keep occupancy high.

In the long run, there are many ways being the gateway to financing a home / a person's largest monthly expense allows many methods for expansion.

Real estate is a fairly efficient market but the strange dichotomy between rent and mortgages mean there are two starkly different return structures. There's a lot of margin in between the two to create a hybrid that satisfies everyone.

<comment> algebra-history I'm not savvy when it comes to debt, mortgages, real estate, investors, and the like, so I have difficulty understanding your message. But, I am happy to hear you're going for it!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you!</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


On adding a "free" operator to JavaScript - <AUTHOR> https://mail.mozilla.org/pipermail/es-discuss/2012-October/026007.html

<comment><USER2> here's my thoughts... this sounds more like a bug in the specific js runtime to me (are there the same problems in v8?) why not just alter 'delete' to work how the author describes so that delete explicity undefines out the reference so it can be GC'd? I think the idea of allowing js to worry about memory is probably not a good one as 'free' seems to suggest.</comment>


Drug Discovery, Development and Deployment Maps - <AUTHOR> https://ncats.nih.gov/translation/maps <comment><USER2> That's a pretty awesome diagram! I've never seen it all laid out in one place.

Reinforces the idea that when I used to do medicinal chemistry, I was just a cog in a very large machine!</comment>


If All Stories Were Written Like Science Fiction Stories (2004) - <AUTHOR> http://web.archive.org/web/20040929041451/http://www.shrovetuesdayobserved.com/flight.html <comment><USER2> Taken to extremes in actual science fiction, this tendency yields "wiring diagram fiction [1]." It was more prevalent in older SF. A few contemporary authors produce it often enough that I prefer reading the Wikipedia entries for their novels over the actual books.

I prefer the "immersion" approach where neither characters nor narrator bother to remark on what is considered ordinary from the perspective of their fictional setting. Science fiction also ages more gracefully when the author doesn't base some key element on a now-discredited New Scientist article that he read while the story was being written in 1980. Just describe the effects without being overly specific about the mechanism, and adventure-oriented readers miss nothing while technically-minded ones can fill in the blanks from their own imaginations.

[1] From the delightful Turkey City Lexicon: [https://www.sfwa.org/2009/06/turkey-city-lexicon-a-primer- fo...](https://www.sfwa.org/2009/06/turkey-city-lexicon-a-primer-for-sf- workshops/)

<comment><USER3> The author(s) of that piece really don't like space westerns...

<comment><USER4> Westerns, as a family of genres, are the first fully-simulated genre. They depict a never-was fantasy-land reinvention of human society, glorifying exaggerated violent and sexual behaviors that serve both to elevate and rewrite a period of history that did not exist as depicted, and legitimizing those behaviors' analogues in our own modern world.

Space Westerns are, well, Westerns in space. They typically espouse some sort of manifest destiny and spirit of exploration, justifying victories based on being the good guys.

<comment><USER3> Can you explain what you mean by "fully-simulated genre?"

<comment><USER4> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulacra_and_Simulation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulacra_and_Simulation)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is just as true for new SF as for the old, and I love it. eg. Andy Weir:

[https://io9.gizmodo.com/read-an-excerpt-from-andy-weirs- spac...](https://io9.gizmodo.com/read-an-excerpt-from-andy-weirs-space- thriller-the-ma-1495315872)

> Hermes is powered by ion engines. They throw argon out the back of the ship > really fast to get a tiny amount of acceleration. The thing is, it doesn't > take much reactant mass, so a little argon (and a nuclear reactor to power > things) let us accelerate constantly the whole way there. You'd be amazed at > how fast you can get going with a tiny acceleration over a long time.

</comment><comment><USER6> A thought I had recently is that science fiction and fantasy should really be called society fiction. If we had robots/dragons, how would people behave differently, and how would that restructure society.

Traditional western literature explored all the ways that people could behave within their current society, and it wasn't until the industrial revolution/world wars/space race/information revolutions that people started seeing and imagining how societies could be changed.

<comment><USER2> Some authors do really think about how technological developments could change societies, and I love them for that.

I adore the Culture novels of Iain M. Banks, for example, while I only feel a moderately warm regard for Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Both settings have roughly the same imaginary technologies: nigh-limitless energy, replicators, faster-than-light communications and transportation, teleportation, strong AI. They both started in 1987. But ST: TNG imagined a future society that was still easily recognizable in terms of social relations and behaviors. In the Culture, AIs make most of the big decisions while most people are (effectively) beloved pets of the AIs; people are also immortal, gleefully unemployed, regular users of recreational drugs, and biologically enhanced for pleasure as well as health and intelligence.

I really hope that Amazon doesn't file off the interesting parts of the Culture setting in their upcoming adaptation of Consider Phlebas. Dennis Kelly at least seems to appreciate the source material:

[https://variety.com/2018/tv/news/consider-phlebas-iain-m- ban...](https://variety.com/2018/tv/news/consider-phlebas-iain-m-banks-amazon- novel-dennis-kelly-1202706327/)

<comment><USER7> I have never managed a warm regard for TNG.

Installing a Ship's Channeler killed it for me. A long time after, I learned about "teching the tech", and all was explained. Contempt for the audience is hard to hide.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I took a creative writing class in college. At the end of the class, we each read a section of a story we had written to the rest of the class.

I had a typed up copy of my story in my hands, eagerly awaiting my turn, but the moment I opened my mouth I realized that I had written a garbage piece of SF that was mostly S and not enough F. Devastated, I left the classroom after reading it, and didn't return.

<comment><USER9> Sorry to hear that! Taste improve faster than ability, so when learning a creative subject there will be a stretch where it feels like your stuff is getting worse rather than better.

<comment><USER8> For me the best lesson was to have an audience if you want to improve. Something that's not obvious when you're writing becomes obvious when you share it with others.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I actually enjoyed it. After realizing where it was going, I imagined myself as someone from the 18th century or earlier reading about something I haven't experienced before.

</comment><comment><USER11> Dull SF written in the 40s I suppose. Even super hard SF will only go on about the one crucial scientific plot point. Boring is boring in any genre.

This particular SF story could of been jazzed up with more exposition about Ann's body.

</comment><comment><USER12> This is very true. Also, it's pretty cool.

Most people forget what a difference technology makes and someone should appreciate it.

Or to put it another way "Everything is amazing and nobody is happy"

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUBtKNzoKZ4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUBtKNzoKZ4)

<comment><USER13> I don't think it's true for modern science fiction and also for the good classics.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I once submitted a short story to some SF mag (forget). Editor sent it back with a very short note roughly: 'Not too bad. But the character isn't changed by his experience in any way."

Well derp. The -tech- changed. Guess he wanted litrachuh.

</comment><comment><USER15> It made me realise the SF I do read and like is people-centric and simply does not bother with technical detail. It's just taken for granted.

</comment><comment><USER16> That is not how Science Fiction is written. At least according to the Star Trek Writers/Directors Guide [https://www.bu.edu/clarion/guides/Star_Trek_Writers_Guide.pd...](https://www.bu.edu/clarion/guides/Star_Trek_Writers_Guide.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER17> I miss stories written in that style.

<comment><USER8> There are plenty being written every year. They still show up on "best SF books" lists, too.</comment></comment>


You and Your Research, by Richard Hamming - <AUTHOR> http://blog.samaltman.com/you-and-your-research <comment><USER2> This is a great talk. It should be read every year by anyone who wants to make a difference.</comment>


How to deal with deceptive time logs from a vital contractor? - <AUTHOR>

I am an American founder of an online startup. I'm using a developer in Belarus and am generally very happy with his diligence and the quality of his work, to say nothing of his hourly rate. He was recently promoted within a large IT company in Belarus, so it's not surprising that his work is of high quality.
We met in person once when I was in Belarus. I am a pretty good judge of people, and I liked him very much. He hasn't figured out how I can get money to him in Belarus yet, but he's willing to work anyway, because of his complete trust that I'll pay him.
His time logs have always looked a little inflated, however, and lately they are more so. Further, I recently noticed an error in his time logs so large that it clearly shows sloppiness, at best, on his part. Certain time entries not possible because I didn't even give him the specs for that work until a few days later. (And for various reasons, I know he didn't simply record the wrong day.)
I am willing to cut him some slack because he's from a different culture, he's in his early 20s, and I am his first moonlighting client. I am inclined to attribute these problems to his youth and inexperience, and perhaps aspects of Belarusian culture, rather than malice or deceit. Also, his role in the project at this point is so crucial that firing him would be a crippling loss. That said, I am only willing to work with someone I can trust -- so we need to clear this up ASAP.
Have any of you been through a similar situation? Do you have advice about how to handle it?
I just discovered this a few minutes ago and have not said anything to him yet. I'd like our mutual trust to go up, rather than down, as a result of our conversation about this topic. <comment><USER2> Two common reasons this happens in my experience:

1\. He's dissatisfied with the rate he agreed to. He's inexperienced and so instead of renegotiating he's just inflating to make it worth his time. If you pushed him down on price he may feel stuck. If you refuse to increase his rate or allow for padding he'll probably walk at some point pretty soon. No one likes to feel taken advantage of.

2\. He might do more work that you're unaware of, like prototyping and research, on his own initiative. It's easier to attribute that time to something you asked him to do rather than something he decided needed to be done.

P.S. Why would it be hard to pay him? International wire transfers are absolutely trivial.

<comment><USER3> Absolutely trivial unless you live in a legacy of soviet union where every person having any business with the rest of the world is considered a spy or a criminal at the very least. :(

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> If you really get along with him and like his work, ask him if he'd rather get payed by the project or task rather than jumping through hoops of filling out timecards.

Also, please pay him ASAP.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks. Yeah, I've actually given him some money already via a mutual friend. Still working out a long-term approach.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I live in Kiev, Ukraine, which is the same cultural environment as Belarus. I perfectly agree with staunch - those two reasons are completely valid.

But he might also get a bad intent for you despite good coding. One doesn't exclude another.

</comment><comment><USER5> The technique I would use is to tell him that someone else (partner, investor, bookeeper) notice "X" and you are passing it to him to clear up any confusion. Hopefully he will get the message. This also brings up another point I often recommend. Don't appear to be the sole decision maker, always have a "bad cop" that you can blame for things you need to do.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> If he is really good at what he does and you want to keep him obviously, it is a little more challenging. You must have a frank conversation with him about this as soon as possible. May be you can arrange a quick call with him and say something like _hey I noticed your time logs might have discrepancies. Just wanted to talk about it and make sure we are on the same page._ Then ask him clearly _Is this a mistake because I was just wondering about this item x that I did not have the specs ready for but your time logs shows an entry for a day earlier etc. I understand that mistakes like this can happen but I am trying to track our efforts into this product and want to keep as realistic as possible. Let me know if you have any questions._ Then let him say what he thinks about it. If he was just trying to test you, he will realize that you are smarter than that and he will probably stop. If he still does not stop this, that is a major red flag for what could come later for you. Good luck!!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for your suggested phrasing. I appreciate it; it helped me think about what tone to adopt.</comment></comment>


Why Leicester City Will Not Win the Premier League (2015) - <AUTHOR> http://harvardsportsanalysis.org/2015/12/why-leicester-city-will-not-win-the-premier-league/ <comment><USER2> (For those who don't follow BPL: LC did indeed win)</comment>


Amazon Wishlist Stats - <AUTHOR> http://amazon.pyralis.net

<comment><AUTHOR> This was a christmas holiday project. Wanted to look at Go from a web development perspective but it actually ended up being more about web page scraping. I am aware that amazon already allows you to see the total but again, this was more an exercise in web development than providing a new feature.</comment>


Hot Denver startup solves GDPR with 4 lines of JavaScript - <AUTHOR> https://www.inversoft.com/blog/2018/05/16/site-lokd-brewery-technology-solves-gdpr-crisis/ <comment><USER2> Ha, this is great.

This is about as effective as Microsoft turning off internet access through IE unless you specifically approve each address.

If I could run this in docker - then we'd really have something.</comment>


Inside Forbes: From 'Original Sin' to Ad Blockers – And What the Future Holds - <AUTHOR> http://www.forbes.com/sites/lewisdvorkin/2016/01/05/inside-forbes-from-original-sin-to-ad-blockers-and-what-the-future-holds/ <comment><USER2> Every time I click on a Forbes link, I'm instantly reminded why I don't bother with it. Straight up asking me to disable my adblocker and refusing to let me progress to the link isn't going to do them any favours.</comment>


We don't allow users to pick passwords so we don't store your information - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/ppentestlabs/status/1202906268991664128 <comment><USER2> Fundamentally, I don't see anything wrong with this. People are already encouraged to use "password managers", which is essentially a workaround for the fact that most sites should not be using traditional password authentication. This system is basically forcing a similar level of security offered by password managers by enforcing the use of autogenerated (and therefore non-shared) passwords.

The main reason you hash passwords is so that if your database is compromised, it's difficult for an attacker to use that information to authenticate to another system. If your system is just an application that manipulates the database, it doesn't make much sense to protect the data from someone who has access to the database.

The main improvement I would make is instead of including the password directly in the email, include a time-limited link that can be used to view the password. This way, a single leak of the user's inbox doesn't provide access to their account on this system.

<comment><USER3> > The main reason you hash passwords is so that if your database is > compromised, it's difficult for an attacker to use that information to > authenticate to another system. If your system is just an application that > manipulates the database, it doesn't make much sense to protect the data > from someone who has access to the database.

The SECOND reason is so that the attacker can't now login as the user and impersonate them.

Also, with this setup it looks like it's impossible for the user to ever change the password, so one accident with that password and it's time to get a new account.

<comment><USER2> > The SECOND reason is so that the attacker can't now login as the user and > impersonate them.

Impersonate them on a service that has a compromised database? Maybe. I think in this particular case, users don't even really lose anything by having someone else access their account. You could argue that the main reason for having any password in this particular case is so that attackers don't get free access to paid course material.

As usual with security, you need to make tradeoffs. They decided that users shouldn't have to deal with having to reset passwords (which is something I personally find quite annoying), and the tradeoff for that is not allowing people to specify their own password.

As a bonus, this means it's impossible for the information stored in this database to be used to access another service (since a hashed shared password is still more useful than a non-shared password).

> Also, with this setup it looks like it's impossible for the user to ever > change the password, so one accident with that password and it's time to get > a new account.

That does indeed seem to be the case, so another improvement would be allowing users to generate a new password.

If we're looking for more realistic attacks, I can see that their site is vulnerable to CSRF logins.

<comment><USER3> > Impersonate them on a service that has a compromised database? Maybe. I > think in this particular case, users don't even really lose anything by > having someone else access their account. You could argue that the main > reason for having any password in this particular case is so that attackers > don't get free access to paid course material.

This lets someone with readonly DB access (for instance, from compromising a backup) escalate to making changes in a user's account. That's significant. Maybe the account doesn't protect anything, but it's still a really bad look - and how much would you bet that they would have fixed this before expanding the site's functionality?

> If we're looking for more realistic attacks, I can see that their site is > vulnerable to CSRF logins.

I mean, they already demonstrated incompetency. Finding more vulnerabilities at this point is very much expected.

<comment><USER2> > I mean, they already demonstrated incompetency. Finding more vulnerabilities > at this point is very much expected.

You mean they've demonstrated that their security model is non-traditional? The point is that the CSRF login is probably a more significant attack vector, and many sites are vulnerable to such an attack.

Did you know the website you're using _right now_ is vulnerable to a CSRF login attack? [0]

[0] [https://maxdamantus.github.io/yccsrf.html](https://maxdamantus.github.io/yccsrf.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Reminds me of John McAfee "There is no RAM" tweet (while pushing some cryptocurency scam) [https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/102574361759866060...](https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/1025743617598660608)

longer explanation "DEF CON 27 IoT Village - Ken Munro - BITFI You Wouldnt Steal My Cloins" [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8bTI7QZI3g](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8bTI7QZI3g)

</comment><comment><USER5> Quite an ironic thread from a security company. "We don't store _your_ password, it's _our_ randomly generated one!"

<comment><USER2> The advantage of this is that they don't even see _your_ password in memory as you log in. They only see _their_ randomly generated one. Forcing users to use unique passwords (that is, not allowing the user to pick one) seems like a pretty good idea to me.</comment></comment>


Penny Auctions – How to sell a $180 tablet for $7,264 - <AUTHOR> http://www.curiousgnu.com/penny-auctions <comment><USER2> "Shockingly nearly half of those bids came from just one person who lost approximately lost $3,500 in just two hours"

Is such an irrational amount of money to lose, i'd wager a guess it wasn't a real user. I'd bet its an automated system owned by the "house" that keeps the auction from ending prematurely.

<comment><USER3> Bingo - this is exactly what I was thinking.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> There's a phenomenon that plays out now and then where people will spend more than $1 to win $1 because they can't abandon their sunk costs. Good money after bad.</comment>


Sleipnir: BDD-style framework for Swift - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/railsware/sleipnir

<comment><USER3> For anyone curious: Behavior-Driven Development (BDD) is a business logic alternative to Test-Driven Development (TDD). It uses more of a conversational tone to spell out tests, so you write what you would like the app to do rather than sitting there scratching your head trying to figure out which tests to write. So it places emphasis on the "what" you want the program to do, and fill in the "how" behind the scenes. You can actually write all of your BDD gherkin and test fly your app with known inputs and outputs and then add the logic for arbitrary input and output later. Here is an example implementation for PHP:

[http://codeception.com](http://codeception.com)

<comment><USER4> Oh, boy. As usual anyone trying to define the difference between BDD and TDD gets it wrong. The difference between TDD and BDD isn't the tone in which you describe your test examples. The difference lies in the depth of the layer you start developing a system (or subsystem) at. Some refer to this as Outside-In versus Inside-Out. BDD and TDD have nothing to do with DSLs or the tone in which you describe your test examples.

As an example, I practice BDD but I use MiniTest, a "TDD" testing library.

<comment><USER5> BDD's difference in comparison to TDD absolutely has to do with tone - <USER2> likely philosophy of how one programs. It's about whether you're more comfortable verifying behavior or state. Mockist testing and BDD is the former , Classic TDD is the latter.

TDD doesn't care how you write the test since it's about verifying states. Kent mostly used it for inside-out testing and never uses mocks, but sometimes plays with middle-out or outside-in interactions using programmer tests, fake objects, and stubs.

Only BDD was about specifying the test as a behavioural description in a DSL, and is always outside-in. It's pretty clear cut.

<comment><USER4> It seems you're misinformed as well.

[http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?BehaviourDrivenDevelopment](http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?BehaviourDrivenDevelopment)

Again, nothing to do with silly syntax. It's about acceptance testing.

<comment><USER5> It seems you're not reading what I (or anyone else) wrote.

I never mentioned syntax. I mentioned a DSL. Using a DSL is about much more than syntax, it is about expressing verifiable behavior tests in a ubiquitous language. I said nothing about any specific syntax of external or internal DSL, heck people contort FitNesse to fit BDD for whatever reason.

I have been on Ward's wiki since 1998, this isn't exactly _new_. It's also not for everyone.

<comment><USER4> Sorry, by syntax I meant DSL.

So by your logic, a language that doesn't have good ability to create DSLs can't do BDD?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I wouldn't call this a BDD framework yet. It's speckled with both standard assertions and semantic assertions, and an "It" function that simply takes a block and a string. I can replicate this with using underscores in my test function names and avoid the complexity. Not trying to be a jerk, but what we should be driving for is something closer to:

        func Describe("The system I want to Test"){
            When("I click the red button")
            Then("I should see the light turn on")
            And("I should see 4 lights")
        }

        func Step("I click the red button"){
           buttons["red"].click
        }

        func Step("I should see the light turn on"){
           lights.on.should().be_true
        }

        func Step("I should see (\d+) lights"){
            lights.count.should().be(4)
        }

<comment><USER7> it depends on what you consider "BDD". The linked library is nearly identical to Cedar ( [https://github.com/pivotal/cedar](https://github.com/pivotal/cedar) ), which is, in turn, nearly identical to rspec ( [http://rspec.info/](http://rspec.info/) ). Both of these libraries are very much considered BDD. You seem to be advocating something closer to cucumber/gherkin?

<comment><USER6> Maybe somewhere in the middle, but fair point. I have my bias for the style change, though that was a distraction from my point. It's premature, and in it's current form, doesn't add much value.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Typo in the page title of "BDD-style framerwork for swift [http://railsware.com/blog/2014/07/04/bdd-style-testing-in- sw...](http://railsware.com/blog/2014/07/04/bdd-style-testing-in-swift-with- sleipnir/")

Should be "BDD-style framework for swift [http://railsware.com/blog/2014/07/04/bdd-style-testing-in- sw...](http://railsware.com/blog/2014/07/04/bdd-style-testing-in-swift-with- sleipnir/")

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you! Fixed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> It's so nice to see how new ecosystems emerge. Looking forward to many more frameworks and tools for Swift.

</comment><comment><USER10> I just want to say: Awesome logo.

<comment><USER11> Agreed. Did you do the logo yourself?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you, guys. Our designer did it ([https://dribbble.com/shagov](https://dribbble.com/shagov))</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: GIF Tracking Protection – Prevent privacy-invasive 1x1 GIFs - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/0x01h/gif-tracking-protection <comment><USER2> This only seems to work against tracking information in parameters. You can put the tracking info into the root URL. For a particularly egregious example of this see the EFAIL attack where entire decrypted messages were being sent back to the attackers in the root URL:

* [https://efail.de/](https://efail.de/)

I doubt that HTML emails can ever be made secure in general. You are likely vunerable to a wide range of attacks and leaks if you allow images to load in your email no matter how much you attempt to sanitise things.

</comment><comment><USER3> Some email clients try to block tracking by not download images unless the user requests images for a specific email.

\- MS Outlook does this. Google gmail does this for some clients.

Other email clients automatically download all image references in email to a proxy server hosted by the email provider. If the user enables images for an email, the images are downloaded from the proxy server, not the sending server. This means that download logs are useless for tracking.

\- Google gmail does this for some email clients.

<comment><USER4> _This means that download logs are useless for tracking._

Depends what sort of tracking you mean. Google still only proxies the image download if you open the mail, so it can be used to track opens (which Gmail _likes_ because they want people to auto delete non-engaging subscribers). You can't track the end user's location or IP though, which may be enough for most.</comment></comment>


A list of swag opportunities for developers - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/swapagarwal/swag-for-dev <comment><USER2> A few years ago, I sent a message to Stripe about a problem with its documentation (they let you switch examples to be in different languages, but at least some Java examples showed up as C++). They not only sent a personal message saying they fixed it, but also offered me a free tshirt. It really sent a message that they cared about documentation.

<comment><USER3> Yes, I got the same when I pointed out an issue with their dashboard when they announced Bitcoin support

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I had some sweet stickers printed by stickermule for whatismybrowser.com which I'm always happy to send to anyone who wants some.

just drop me a line on the contact page with your mailing address

[https://www.whatismybrowser.com/about/contact/](https://www.whatismybrowser.com/about/contact/)

<comment><USER5> Thanks for making me aware of stickermule :) Looks great, think I'll order some for my company :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I like swag with blinking lights. A buddy and I used to go to the big embedded systems conference in San Jose and compete to see who could score the most development kits. You'd have to chat with the reps a bit to show that you knew how to use their gear before they coughed up anything good. We'd walk out with a thousand dollars of free gear on a good year. How loose the reps were depended a lot on the economy that year. It was a lot of fun.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ah. The Good Ol' Days!

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> 90% of startups will eagerly give you a free tshirt just for asking. They love the free marketing. No need to do stuff like submit builds, etc.

I have gotten free stuff from:

\- IFTTT (socks)

\- MixPanel

\- CloudFlare

\- Elastic

\- infochimp

\- pingdom

\- moz

\- rethinkdb

<comment><USER8> Do people really want to advertise tech companies by using their merchandise? You couldn't pay me enough to even entertain the thought.

Lemme just pull up that poorly sitting abhorrent short sleeved Microsoft Office business shirt real quick and we are off.

<comment><USER9> > startups

Snarkiness aside, I'd wear Microsoft gear.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> More infrastructure than dev, but If you manage to reach the Sage level in Hurricane Electric's free online IPV6 certification program, they send you a T-Shirt: [http://blog.he.net/2010/05/28/hurricane-electric-would- like-...](http://blog.he.net/2010/05/28/hurricane-electric-would-like-to-send- you-a-free-t-shirt/)

Warning: It is a time consuming course!

I proudly wear mine, though it's getting a bit ragged now

</comment><comment><USER11> Cheap t-shirts and socks? I'm less than impressed so far. I'm sure corps are still giving out better swag. You who are almost out of runway, salute us! ;-)

<comment><USER12> Beats having to wash used ones though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Meh, the only swag I ever got was one of those 3D hand tracking fancy things whose closed-source license wasn't compatible with blender and didn't work all that well on linux.

Wouldn't mind a pair of socks though...

<comment><AUTHOR> Go for it! :cheers:

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Make a google home app and you get a t-shirt and $300 gcloud credit

<comment><USER15> Source?

<comment><USER16> Looks like it is $200 and a t-shirt: [https://developers.google.com/actions/community/overview#pub...](https://developers.google.com/actions/community/overview#publishing- your-first-app)

<comment><AUTHOR> Added to the list, by @HarrisJT!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Adobe used to do this. They'd send books on (IIRC) any Adobe product to hackers who got patches accepted into Flex.

</comment><comment><USER18> Really like the Alexa skill thing, make me want dig into it. An Amazon echo for only 100 downloads seems easy to reach.

<comment><USER19> Are you figuring in the privacy impact of having a hot microphone in your living space listening in 24/7?

<comment><USER20> You mean like a cell phone?

<comment><USER19> While I appreciate the wit, no.

More "like" an echo whose sole purpose is to listen to you, at all times.

On a cell phone you can still use the phone without enabling the voice activation for Siri or google.

If you're implying that the current iOS / Android devices are set to spy without granting additional permissions, I'd like to see some proof.

<comment><USER20> I don't think that iOS/android devices are spying on us, but I also don't think the Amazon echo is either. In both cases you are trusting a large company to not record you - in one case you trust apple/google to deactivate the mic on your phone when it isn't being used, and in the other case you trust Amazon to only send recordings to their servers when you say the keyword. If anything I would trust Amazon more, since the echo has a physical switch to turn off the mic. So I don't really see the difference between a phone and an echo as far as privacy is concerned.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Cool, I wonder if sending people shirts increases PR engagement in my FOSS.

<comment><AUTHOR> We've tried; turns out people are really into dev swag!

</comment></comment><comment> half-kh-hacker Hey, I'm wearing my Hacktoberfest t-shirt right now!

<comment><AUTHOR> Good for you. I'm still waiting for mine though. :sad:

<comment><USER12> It seems HN is turning into slack with this colon emojis, you should stop using them! :wink:

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Love this idea - it's upsetting to think how much more time I'm willing to put into pull requests when earning "free" stickers

<comment><AUTHOR> Can't help it! #JustDeveloperThings

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> A cool Sammy sticker pack has been added! :D</comment>


Ask HN: How did you come up with a domain name/name for your company? - <AUTHOR> I am really struggling to come up with a name for a new company I am working on. Most of the names I've come up with are taken by squatters asking for a crapton for the url. How did you come up with your company's name/domain name? <comment><USER2> Damn annoying but just keep going through whois, you'll get one eventually.

<TIN-FOIL-HAT>I often wonder that if you do enter a domain name and its free then it gets sent to a list of ones to squat on. Probably just paranoia but it happened once to me several years back and suspicious ever since.</TIN-FOIL- HAT></comment>


Show HN: A minimal calculator app that demonstrates the microservices concept - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/nquocnghia/microcalc <comment><USER2> This might unintentionally be, the funniest satire project I have seen so far!</comment>


Crypko: Cryptocollectible Game Empowered by GANs [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://crypko.ai/static/files/crypko-whitepaper.pdf <comment><USER2> This is by the same people that made the anime girl face generator [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15006552](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15006552)

</comment><comment><USER3> Can't believe someone actually took the time to write this

<comment><USER4> "Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something."

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


Android AOSP Browser stores passwords in plain text - <AUTHOR> https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=52895

<comment><USER2> I'm not a security expert, but I wonder how will it help if passwords will be stored encrypted? I mean if someone steals my phone, he'll be able to decrypt it anyway, right? Since physical device is his hands with keys and everything and not just some database dump.

This also reminds me about pidgin, which does the same thing... just saying.

<comment><AUTHOR> Pidgin is one account, assuming passwords are only used once (crazy I know). The browser however has the potential to store all your accounts usernames and passwords.

If the device is rooted a malicious app could simply copy the webview.db and send off your usernames / passwords. Encryption would at least stop anyone who didn't want to brute force a db. I'm not saying it is impossible but that doesn't mean plain text is the right answer.

<comment><USER3> If you granted the root permissions to a malicious app, you've got much bigger problems than cleartext passwords in private file.

If you didn't grant the root permissions to a malicious app, why do you care, how it is stored? No other app can access it anyway and any obfuscation would be good only for complexity's sake.

<comment><USER4> I would be more worried about a malicious app taking advantage of an exploit to compromise your phone and then reading your passwords without root having root before on your device or without it asking for root permissions. There are known ways out there to get root access without actually unlocking via exploits.

<comment><USER3> Exploits can be used to privilege escalation on all platforms, that's not Android specific thing.

Adding to that, Android vendors are not that bad in fixing exploits. I had two devices (Sony phone and Asus tablet) that were always fixed before the exploit got widely known. I could not root them (yes, I wanted to do it without unlocking) if I updated as soon as the updates were available.

With SEAndroid getting into stock Android, even that is going to be a thing of past.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Green revolution cooling - <AUTHOR> http://www.grcooling.com/ <comment><USER2> In the old days Cray had a fluid-cooled supercomputer. It was immersed in a witches brew called Fluorinert, which if I understand correctly was banned under various CFC-related treaties (edit: no mention of such banning on Wikipedia, I may be thinking of other cooling liquids).

My Dad is a radio man and has been around high-powered electronics for most of his career. He explained the pros and cons of liquid cooling this way:

Pros.

1\. Theoretically very efficient.

2\. Amazing equipment densities.

Cons.

1\. Congratulations! You are now a plumber.

Even purified water is murderously destructive. He told me stories about replacing piping in a water cooled electronics room. Every few months they would have to shut down, drain the system and replace a pipe corner. The vortices of water going around a 90 degree bend caused enough cavitation to gouge out visible shapes on the inside of the pipes. After a few months the copper pipes would crack and leak on the electronics.

Immersion in inert liquids is fine so far as it goes, but you're still going to be a plumber.

<comment><USER3> _Even purified water is murderously destructive._

Indeed, water is _more_ destructive to materials than many other liquids. And deionized water is the worst. It turns out that you have to explicitly _make_ deionized water for a reason: Many of the things that touch water want to dissolve in it! And the fewer ions of, say, copper that are already in your water, the faster a rod of copper dissolves when you dip it into that water.

Think of water the way you think about the blood of the aliens in _Aliens_ – only on a slightly slower timescale – and you'll realize why boat maintenance is better thought of as a lifestyle rather than as a series of repairs.

<comment><USER2> I didn't realise that about deionised water. At least it's not toxic when gaseous (unlike fluorinert) or flammable (like mineral oil).

As for boating ... I vaguely recall the joke that it's easier and more fun just to pour cash into the sea than to get a boat.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I've seen lots of these with single machines dunked in a fishtank.

This is the first I've seen with many machines submerged.

I'd be interested to see the results of long term testing.

I'm guessing that big data centres avoid this because it's just so messy; at what point do cost savings from cooling over-ride inconvenience of dripping oil everywhere.

A final nitpick: the website is a bit frustrating, and could do with some better design, and much better photographs.

</comment><comment><USER5> So if something breaks on a server, like a PSU unit, or a HDD, would you need to shut down the entire server, drain the liquid (or raise the server), and then swap out affected parts? Would that not be very unpractical?

<comment><AUTHOR> they have a video demonstrating how to do server maintenance:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZmm7P1mPZs>

no need to shut down the server. you pull it out and swap the parts (for front-accessible hotswap HDDs you won't even have to pull it out). cabling is designed to accommodate that.

i can imagine, though, that "pulling out" a 4U storage box fully loaded with hdds may become a bit strenuous.

<comment><USER6> Just pulling a 2U system with 2 HDDs out of an ordinary rack is strenuous if you're not it decent shape, yanking a loaded 4U box out in the manner that video shows is a quick path to pain.

I think they need to build a simple pulley or hydraulic lift system for these.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The first thing I saw when I looked at the page was:

"95% Less Cooling Power"

It took me a while to figure out that it _uses_ 95% less power, not that is is 95% less effective.

THis could be a bit more clear.

</comment><comment><USER8> "reducing cooling energy use by 90-95%" seems unlikely, unless you are in a cool climate and you can use outside air to cool. That is, put the radiator on the north face of your data center.

This is exactly where more conventional and less sticky methods can achieve good results, so I'm skeptical of the value.

<comment><USER9> Water has much better thermal conductivity than air so significantly warmer water can provide equivalent levels of cooling. Also, most computer components are designed to be air cooled in an office setting so they can get fairly warm with little damage. In other words to keep an 80w CPU at 45 to 50c might take water at 35c but air at 20c. If the outside air is 40c then then you only need to actively drop the water 5deg where air needs to drop 20deg and cooling systems are much more efficient for small changes in temperature than large ones. You can probably find many cases where air temperature water is perfectly acceptable where you would want chilled air to do the same thing.

PS: 40c = 104f and most cpu's are fine at 50c most are still ok at 60+c. If the outside temperature is more reasonable you can often get away with passively cooling water systems where air needs to be actively cooled. You can also combine this with other methods aka if a local lake can give you water below 30c most of the year you might be able to use a passive cooling system with water even if you would need to actively cool air.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Listeners of the 5by5.tv podcasts will have heard of this concept before. That's where Midas Green Tech advertises their "virtual private servers submerged in oil".

Green Revolution Cooling supplied Midas Green Tech with their setup.

<comment><USER11> Most folks who have lurked on sites like Slashdot, Reddit, and Hacker News will have seen this before. It's a pretty old trick now. (Old in Internet time)

<http://www.google.ca/search?q=computer+oil>

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> just curious: would these machines have non-rotational media only ?

<comment><USER13> SSDs in server farms are the way to go anyway.

<comment><USER14> Wow.. really? Is this a trend with any documentation? Seems to me that there are still a lot of mentions of SSD failures floating around the tubes, and that plus the significant cost for large scale storage over traditional platters would make it a very tough sell to any organization wanting to deploy large quantities of servers.

<comment><USER15> Mechanical disk supply chains are increasing platter drive costs significantly while at the same time improvements in reliability and cost for SSDs are bringing costs lower. And yes, there have been large deployments: [http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9218811/EBay_attacks_...](http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9218811/EBay_attacks_server_virtualization_with_100TB_of_SSD_storage)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Yes, this startup has been working on this idea since 2008/2009. My main fear would be much of a cost benefit this is versus the outcome of a company switching to ARM over the coming years.

</comment><comment><USER17> It seems the servers for this site need some metaphorical mineral oil. The database is not responsive anymore :/

<comment><USER18> google cache for the gallery: [http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?sclient=psy- ab&...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?sclient=psy- ab&hl=ro&safe=off&biw=1280&bih=674&source=hp&q=cache%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.grcooling.com%2Fgallery%2F&pbx=1&oq=cache%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.grcooling.com%2Fgallery%2F&aq=f&aqi=g4&aql=&gs_sm=e&gs_upl=912l2548l0l2600l7l3l0l0l0l0l128l370l0.3l3l0)

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I read the headline as "The green revolution is slowing down".

</comment><comment><USER20> Wonder what the long term effect is on something like polyester caps and delaminating multilayer boards

Fire suppression is going to be fun.</comment>


Minorities victimized by "belief of free will" held in society - <AUTHOR> https://blog.intralizee.com/minorities-victimized-by-belief-of-free-will-in-society/ <comment><USER2> One either masters their inner world or is destined to live a substandard quality of life. Victimization protects people with weak character from having to face their past. That people are encouraging learned helplessness in the face of all evidence that it just makes people feel worse is crazy.</comment>


Where does progress come from? Bill Gates on Africa, climate change - <AUTHOR> http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704243904575630761699028330.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

<comment><AUTHOR> Matt Ridley, author of the book "The Rational Optimist" that gates was reacting to, responds:

[http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870464860457562...](http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704648604575621122887824544.html)</comment>