Rackspace acquires ObjectRocket - <AUTHOR> http://www.rackspace.com/blog/why-mongodb/ <comment><USER2> Title is misleading. This isn't an article about why one would Choose MongoDB, it's purely a Rackspace press release.

<comment><USER3> It's not just misleading, it is utterly false. There's no "Why" in the article at all.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > 3\. MongoDB is the de facto choice for NoSQL applications

The point of "NoSQL" systems are to use the most appropriate solution for the problem instead of a one-size-fits-all solution, which was the tradition when relational systems were the only choice.

The notion of a "de facto choice" at all seems to be the biggest mistake nearly everyone makes when evaluating such systems these days. People are so focused on evaluating the available systems that they forget the most important step: to analyse their own problem domain.

</comment><comment><USER5> The best marketed database-level locks ever.)

There was a nice article from NYT about an addictive junk food. It should include MongoDB as a use case - lots of hype and crap inside.)

<comment><USER6> Engineers need to be disciplined. You know there's a problem with the culture when things like MongoDB become popular, despite very highly public failures, and fundamentally bad engineering choices.

It shows the power of marketing and ideology (people like mongoDB because it's fast on a single node and they can use SQL rather than having to learn something new, so they become "believers" in it without regard for its lack of scalability, or reliability, etc.)

<comment><USER7> Wow, axe to grind or what? You have three comments on here all belittling something that many people find perfectly acceptable and successful in production. Of all the non-SQL choices, Mongo isn't a terrible one. We've got (along with many other companies) 300gb in Mongo and it's been loads more enjoyable to use in a replica set than MySQL has been in a master/slave architecture, and every bit as reliable. More so if you count the simple live failover that just works.

It's a data model that works very very well for some datasets. We use MySQL for stuff that is obviously relational, but we store a bunch of geo data as JSON for fast serving to javascript etc. It's a perfect fit.

But seriously, if you don't have a backup of any of your data stores, that's a big problem.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> "Instead of using AWS primitives, they built their service on their own hardware in neighboring data centers, and utilized AWS DirectConnect to provide low latency connectivity."

To me that sounds like, "we deploy on SSDs." Which then makes me wonder if the new AWS SSD instances make this obsolete.

<comment><USER9> The High-I/O Quadruple Extra Large starts at around ~$2232 per month for 2tb of SSD storage.

With this kind of pricing you will have a hard time meeting user expectations about price; Even with high multi-tenancy on top, and if you tune up that density too much, you will probably push too much ram, as the instances only have 60.5GB accessible, which with 2tb of disk is pretty unbalanced for many mongodb use cases.

Disclosure: I'm a Racker and worked on this project.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I just wanted to say congrats to the Objectrocket team! Their founder and CEO used to be my boss at eBay/PayPal. :)

</comment><comment><USER11> The performance and tech detail post linked in the general article may be interesting to folks here: [http://devops.rackspace.com/benchmarking-hosted- mongodb-serv...](http://devops.rackspace.com/benchmarking-hosted-mongodb- services.html)

Disclosure: I'm a Racker on the team helping out with the project.

<comment><USER6> I love all these "benchmarks" of "NoSQL" databases running on single nodes. Plus you don't name the competitors or any configuration data so... this is really marketing not engineering.

Not that any engineer worth a damn would use a database that loses data in the first place.

<comment><USER12> I'm pretty sure that Provider #1 is MongoHQ ("Replica Set: Small") and Provider #2 is MongoLab ("Mini"). MongoHQ doesn't show a "Replica Set: Small" anymore, though, on their pricing page - only Large.

Configuration data and multiple nodes would be nice.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Glad to see more support behind MongoDB. I know its popular to hate it, but It still has served me better then any of the alternatives I have tried.

I am hopefully that RethingDB can outdo them eventually, but for now BZ Rackspace team

<comment><USER14> I may be a meta-contrarian but MongoDB is thus far my favorite database, after years with MySQL and Postgres. I spend all day building MVPs and there's nothing better than adding to the schema [sic] halfway through without having to run a migration.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> A data tool should be used for appropriate data. Mongo DB is the best for flexible and loosely coupled data structures.

<comment><USER6> ...where you don't care if you lose the data. So data sets where you are getting a new version of the data every day and so if you lose yesterday's dataset you don't care.

also, datasets that fit on a single machine, rather than need to scale out over many machines, unless you don't mind the intrinsically broken "scaling" solution that is master-slave architectures.

<comment><USER16> Can you explain what you mean by "lose data". I don't know much about mongo, but I thought you could configure the client to wait for the disk write before returning.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Interesting that they chose ObjectRocket over MongoHQ or MongoLab.

<comment><USER18> Take a peek at the article and associated benchmark post. I assume that "Hosted AWS providers #1 and #2" refer to MongoHQ and MongoLab. You'll see why they made their choice.

But as someone else pointed out, it's worth asking whether the new SSD instances will help those other guys catch up or if there's more than disk performance bottlenecks going on.

<comment><USER17> Agreed, I believe that the SSD instances made a big difference.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I hate being NoSQL hater. How to became a lover? Probably I got too much this nosql noise around. Please somebody tell me how to write apps without transactions at all? It solves one problem by adding different headaches.</comment>


Is everyone a litte bit racist? Neuroscience says... maybe - <AUTHOR> http://www.nature.com/news/how-the-brain-views-race-1.10886

<comment><USER2> of course everyone is, it helps nations strive. The question is not whether someone people are racist. The question is why does some racism result in violence.</comment>


Ask HN: Modern C++ Project Template? - <AUTHOR> I'm starting a new C++ project in 2020, does anyone have a starter blank template to suggest, or can you recommend a project I can inspire myself from?<p>I'm particularly interested on how to integrate with tools such as static analysis, code coverage, profilers, address sanitisers etc. <comment><USER2> This is not a specific project per se, but more so a suggestion on how to layout a simple C++ based project and an associated Makefile:

[https://www.partow.net/programming/makefile/index.html](https://www.partow.net/programming/makefile/index.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> same here but i am looking for modern C project template. also what's the best way to manage dependencies in a c project?</comment>


The Drones and Robots That Helped Save Notre Dame - <AUTHOR> https://hackaday.com/2019/04/17/the-drones-and-robots-that-helped-save-notre-dame/ <comment><USER2> while the Colossus looks really interesting, I think the biggest impact was the video feed. I don't have the specs, but just by quick glancing of the video, that small stream of water probably didn't help at all in this particular case. You would have to be way closer for it to be effective, or use a different pattern of water if you're trying to achieve something else (e.g. ventilation or cooling down). In any case, really interesting tech.

Source: firefighter for over 8 years, attend hundreds of structural fires, tens of 5+ alarms, few of them in historical buildings.

<comment><USER3> I've noticed that people have been giving a lot of credit to the fire fighters. It's clear they tried their best and risked their lives to remove the artifacts that they could. But it's also clear that everything that could burn did burn:

[https://images.app.goo.gl/PsAzFTwaz9rRC4Qp6](https://images.app.goo.gl/PsAzFTwaz9rRC4Qp6)

The entire roof is in ashes and there doesn't appear to be anything combustible left.

<comment><USER4> You missed the part about the trusses in the bell tower that didn't burn. If they burnt and the bells fell (13 tons for the biggest one!), then the whole building would have collapsed.

They had guys in the tower, protecting that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > They instead borrowed two commercially available models which were in > service with the Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Culture. [...] > But DJI actually has a system in place where operators can request these > limitations be lifted temporarily, which allowed the manufacturer to work > quickly with the French authorities

Given that both drones were owned by branches of the French government, it's possible that they already had their geofencing permanently disabled, at least within France.

</comment><comment><USER6> My awareness comes from a tragic event, but I still must say that the Colossus is pretty cool. I wonder if the birdlike Boston Dynamics robot could be adapted for indoor firefighting in confined spaces. (Perhaps with a flippable/rotatable 4 wheeled gimbal like the Dean Kamen iBot has, which would enable stair climbing.)

[https://gizmodo.com/boston-dynamics-new-robot-is-a-giant- seg...](https://gizmodo.com/boston-dynamics-new-robot-is-a-giant-segway-bird- that-l-1833666944)

<comment><USER7> Flying drones close to a fire seems like a counter productive idea, flight is achieved by pushing lots of air around, pushing lots of air around increases the amount of oxygen available to the fire.

Edit: Oops - not flying - so this comment makes no sense. I thought you meant some of the bird-like drones we've seen.

<comment><USER8> The bird-like Boston Dynamics bots aren't flying drones, they are more like ostriches in shape, and they balance on two wheels on legs with a neck-like arm for manipulating things

<comment><USER7> You're right... oops. Sorry.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Chinese technology. Designed and built in China.

<comment><USER10> The drones you mean? The Colossus by Shark Robotics is designed and made in France.

Impressive thing. 8h autonomy, can go up stairs.</comment></comment>


Guy builds particle accelerator in kitchen - <AUTHOR> http://pstevensonkeating.co.uk/portfolio/handcrafted-particle-accelerator <comment><USER2> You know LCDs have taken over when people don't know the difference between a particle accelerator and a CRT :-).

Basically the guy uses a 45Kv voltage source to 'accelerate' electrons past a grid which then hit a phosphor and emit light (poorly). If he had used mercury vapor he could have created ultraviolet light and then used a phosphor to convert that to visible light and thus make his very own fluorescent bulb.

Now this stuff used to come out every month in Scientific American's Amateur Science column, these days they are afraid to publish such information for fear of being sued. Sad really.

<comment><USER3> I spent many happy hours reading _The Amateur Scientist_ in my Dad's pile of SciAms. I was never brave enough (or had enough pocket money) to build much, especially the high voltage gizmos that required, as a rule, a "Model T spark transformer." That was just terrifying.

I built a Hilsch vortex tube out of plexiglass, some washers and some extra pipe. Mostly it just whistled obnoxiously; I needed a better source of compressed air than my bicycle pump and a small reservoir could provide.

I also built a spectrometer, with a transmission grating I got from my science teacher. That was nifty.

I miss this stuff. We are a poorer nation for losing it. "Make" magazine might fill in for the gizmo aspect of things, but not so much the science.

Pardon me, I have to chase the kids off my lawn. :-)

<comment><USER4> A neat trick these days is to make spectrometer with a diffraction grating made by removing the backing foil of a CD-R so only the transparent plastic remains (I did it a few years ago so it may have been one of the other CD types. Basically if it looks rainbowy afterwords you should be good to go ;)).

<comment><USER5> Well, you can use the CD with the aluminium as a reflection grating

<comment><USER4> Good point. I used it as a diffraction grating in mine since that allowed me to construct the rest of it like I remembered them from highschool. So long as you can spit the light though there are a lot of options.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I would like to appreciate this more, but the two videos are very lacking. The first one is nothing but loud, overly obnoxious weird music. The second, which seems to detail the crafting and construction of the device, has no sound. A simple voiceover talking about exactly what is being done would have made this much better, and at least slightly interesting.

</comment><comment><USER7> It's cute, but a lot more is doable at that level. Make a Van de Graaff generator, big enough to spew at least half a million volts, or perhaps a tandem generator for a full megavolt goodness. Now connect that puppy to a vacuum chamber. That's a lot more serious stuff than a measly 45 kV thing.

Also, people have built cyclotrons at home. Just sayin'.

<comment><USER8> Meh, if you want to be _really_ pedantic a candle in a strong magnetic field is also a particle accelerator. You can even build a Farnsworth–Hirsch fusor for around 2k or less. But IMO a real particle accelerator need some sensors to find-out what happens after the collision.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> no. he's made a fluorescent tube.

<comment><USER10> No, he's made an X-ray machine, and apparently set it up in a department store.

This is why we can't have cool magazines anymore.

<comment><USER2> You know I hadn't thought of that but at 45kV he probably is generating some soft x-rays. Sort of depends on what his anode is made of. I can never remember how to spell Bremsstrahlung sigh.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bremsstrahlung>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I was hoping for something a little more "Ghostbustery".</comment>


Why doesn't iTunes have a long tail? - <AUTHOR> http://internationalbs.wordpress.com/2009/09/17/why-doesnt-itunes-have-a-long-tail/

<comment><USER2> The author was confused by the term "long tail". IMO this term is best used to visualize how a model works (Amazon's long tail of books, Google's long tail of niche keywords and search results...), but when applying this concept strictly to a specific model to see if it's a long tail business it can yield biased conclusions. He cannot find one specific album on the store doesn't mean iTunes is a no "long tail" store. Or like when I cannot find a book on amazon it doesn't mean Amazon is a no long tail business. So rather trying to conclude if iTunes is a long tail business by looking for one specific item and see if it's available, a better and more precise way to do it is to look at the stats (quantity of "niche" songs sold compared to the more popular ones, revenue earned from those niche songs ...) to see if iTunes selling a large number of unique items in relatively small quantities

<comment><AUTHOR> Good point.Although the lack of specific items that specific consumers may well be interested in purchasing does indicate a failure to capture all of the tail. Other suppliers could potentially pursue said niche.

And it wasn't just one album, but three :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> The article assumes that older releases are unavailable due to laziness. This is not always the case.

Recordings can be deleted for any number of reasons including: infighting, copyright issues, legal issues, embarrassment, ego, lack of interest, changing trends.. you name it.

In some cases the rights, once sold to a label, can exchange hands so many times, that ownership can't even be determined.

In particular, if any of the affected parties go out of business, the songs can end up in limbo for eternity.</comment>


World's Total CPU Power: One Human Brain - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/02/world-computer-data/ <comment><USER2> I find this both article stunningly interesting and also somewhat misleading...

I've know of a fair amount of information theory but never thought about the fact we can use that to say that "a 6 square-cm newspaper image is worth a 1,000 words" by applying the idea of optimal encoding to both and working out the information content. It's also interesting to think that many people consider AI and data compression as highly related fields as to optimally compress data it's generally thought that you need a thorough understanding of the data.

The misleading part imho is the title of the article. It's in reference to the statement "the 6.4*1018 instructions per second that ... general-purpose computers in 2007 (are equivalent to) ... the maximum number of nerve impulses executed by one human brain per second". I wouldn't consider those two equal. A more apt comparison would be something along the lines of the number of transistors triggered per second, putting computers back onto a more reasonable playing field. Admittedly though computers are still so far away from the computation ability of the human mind that this is really a nitpick.</comment>


Twitter's User Problem: Fastest Gains Are People That Don't See Ads - <AUTHOR> http://online.wsj.com/news/article_email/twitters-user-problem-fastest-gains-are-people-that-dont-see-ads-1406924973-lMyQjAxMTA0MDAwMTEwNDEyWj <comment><USER2> Twitter should really allow advertising to _your existing following_.

I have an account for one of my projects that I use to announce new releases and updates. This happens once every few weeks, so I would pay for an option to stick my tweet at the top of my followers' feeds for, say, a week. If Twitter would then also allow people to unstick a tweet after reading it (or opt out of sticked tweets altogether), I think it'd be a great and _welcome_ feature to have for everyone involved - TWTR gets paid, I get more eyes on my tweet and others won't miss my updates, which is what they followed me for to begin with.

<comment><USER3> > If Twitter would then also allow people to unstick a tweet after reading it

I really like your idea of a stickied tweet but they should probably automatically unstick it once you've seen it.

<comment><USER4> There isn't really a way for Twitter to know if you've seen it if you don't interact with it in some way.

<comment><USER3> Of course there is (that's how they're calculating the impressions figure in your analytics).

<comment><USER4> How the heck does twitter know if I looked at a particular tweet?

<comment><USER3> They know when it's displayed to you. Let's say that Bob follows Sally (and a bunch of other people)

* Sally makes a tweet at 8AM

* Bob doesn't check Twitter until noon

* Bob doesn't scroll down, the tweet at the bottom of the screen is timestamped 11:30AM

In this scenario Twitter never displays Sally's tweet in Bob's timeline. It is thus _not_ an impression. If Bob had scrolled down to see tweets going back to 8AM Twitter would display Sally's tweet in Bob's timeline, this would count as an impression.

If you're asking if they know that you actually read, parsed, comprehended, or contemplated the text of the tweet then no of course not. Likewise somebody clicking on a link doesn't mean they actually read, parsed, comprehended, or contemplated that content.

<comment><USER4> Of course, and that's how ad impressions are counted. But that doesn't help me as a user, and advertisers pay much less for "impressions" than for an ad that is interacted with in some way. So that's worse for everyone than an ad that you click to dismiss.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is sort of a silly problem since Twitter started at 100% off-Twitter and has exceeded all predictions at bringing people into their own experience.

There are numerous, straightforward solutions to this. Twitter can require third party apps to show ads, for instance. Twitter can continue to copy functionality from third party apps and then squeeze them down. Or Twitter can worry about this once they are monetizing the bulk of their user base at 99% of the potential.

I think this is genuinely a challenge for Twitter to solve, but I suspect (hope!) internally they spend much more time worrying about getting more users, how to meaningfully innovate and how to make Twitter more essential for the majority of their "sometimes" users.

<comment><USER6> The only trouble is that Twitter seems to be taking the opposite approach and blocking third party clients from functioning all together.

[http://arstechnica.com/information- technology/2011/03/twitte...](http://arstechnica.com/information- technology/2011/03/twitter-tells-third-party-devs-to-stop-making-twitter- client-apps/) [http://mashable.com/2012/08/16/twitter-api-big- changes/](http://mashable.com/2012/08/16/twitter-api-big-changes/)

<comment><USER7> Not just do they put severe limits on how many users you can get, they also have strict limits on how you are allowed to display the tweets (most importantly you are not allowed to merge feeds from different social networks into the timeline) which means I can't make the app that I wanted (which would take all the users accounts and merge them together).

Their ability to do this, incidentally, is why I hate oAuth.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> On another note, as an advertiser on Twitter I'm surprised that I'm not allowed to create ads to be displayed to users in countries like India, Indonesia, Brazil, Russia, Mexico, Philippines, Vietnam, Germany, Turkey, Italy, Ukraine, Argentina, Poland, Peru, Saudi Arabia, Chile, Belgium, Greece, and all lesser populated countries.

Since Twitter removed the option to create ads that target users worldwide, it's impossible to create a campaign that displays ads to users in less populous countries.

Has Twitter made a deliberate decision to not monetize their "long tail" foreign users?

<comment><USER9> > as an advertiser on Twitter I'm surprised that I'm not allowed to create ads > to be displayed to users in countries like India, Indonesia, Brazil, Russia, > Mexico, Philippines, Vietnam, Germany, Turkey, Italy, Ukraine, Argentina, > Poland, Peru, Saudi Arabia, Chile, Belgium, Greece, and all lesser populated > countries.

Yet rest (or don't) assured that users in at least couple of those countries do observe promoted tweets, pinned here and there in their timelines. Apparently there is a way.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> In general I have a feeling of unease using "free" services, but it is nice to not have to pay for what I think services are worth (e.g., I would value Gmail at $8/month, Google+ at $3/month, Twitter at $2/month, Facebook at $3/month, Blogger at $5/month).

One real value of Twitter, Google+, and Facebook is the quality of what people you are following post. The other (and larger for me) value is promoting my blog. Every time I write a new blog entry, I shamelessly promote it on social media.

This is probably a crazy idea, but I wouldn't mind if these services had "hybrid" paid services: Pay a relatively small monthly or yearly fee, still see just a few advertisements, but much fewer advertisements than the free versions that are more geared to my interests than those advertisements that might make more money for the companies providing the series.

<comment><USER11> you are an extreme minority, statistically and financially.

<comment><USER12> Why? Paying for the products you used was the dominant way of doing business for the last 5000 - 15 years of human history.

<comment><USER13> Fortunately for businesses that existed those last 5000 - 15 years, copying a document wasn't free. Information couldn't be mass produced at a scale that renders the notion of supply meaningless.

Businesses now have to compete with open source or decentralized services that cut them out. When money enters the equation, people immediately start shopping, they start asking "Is this an expense that is necessary?"

That plus the amount of uncertainty john q public has on transmitting money online (a reticence I share to be honest), makes paying small fees a large barrier to entry.

Besides, if I've learned anything, I've learned that just because you paid a company money, doesn't mean they won't turn around and sell you up the river. The barriers of trust for a service that's free and non-free are exactly the same.

<comment><USER12> > Fortunately for businesses that existed those last 5000 - 15 years, copying > a document wasn't free. Information couldn't be mass produced at a scale > that renders the notion of supply meaningless.

Google and Facebook are not in the document copying business. They index, curate, store and generally make information easy to access. That's a real service which costs real money to offer, and is not going to be just spontaneously overtaken by some FOSS equivalent (whatever that even means). And they could charge real money for it, if they wanted. Personally I would welcome that opportunity if it meant they would treat me more like a customer and less like an ad demographic.

<comment><USER13> There are distributed social networking systems that have being experimented with. HN has stories showing off a few of them. Facebook has real competition from people who don't have data aggregation or advertisement agendas.

Barriers to entry for these tools are: the technical expertise to setup and run the programs (which is low low low, but still enough), and the obvious lack of users to give the system meaning.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> If the official Twitter app wasn't so bad I would use it. Twitters problem for me is how hard it is to browse its content. Its website has the same problem. I think they need to look more in to how people want to use their service. I'm sure its different for different kind of users. Eg some one following celebrities vs some one folllowing businessses vs some one following politics

</comment><comment><USER15> Is there any reason why we can't design a federated (non-centralized) version of twitter that doesn't depend on a business model of monetization? Every ad I see on twitter contributes to (what I assume is) my eventual abandonment of the service.

<comment><USER16> There's no fundamental reason. I think the internet swings back and forth between periods of openness and periods of walled gardens. We're in a walled garden period. My gut says it won't last forever.

Our current walled gardens succeeded by refining the user experience of the open web they supplanted. They made it easy for normal users to do the things that only advanced users were able to do before: easily publish your own stream of content, find other people's content you care about, aggregate other people's content, and then let everybody generate new content that references the previous content.

None of that is new functionality, but Facebook and Twitter fixed the user experience and taught normal people how to do all of that.

But now that the bar has been raised and the average user groks the benefits of "social networking", there's nothing to stop the technology from eventually being commoditized.

As for business models, a decentralized competitor doesn't actually need a business model, because their infrastructural costs could be zero. "HTTP" doesn't have or need a business model.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Twitter… consider this: The 3rd-party experiences are simply better than your native ones, and not because of their lack of ads. Additionally, your own Tweetdeck and (seemingly abandoned) Twitter for Mac don't display ads.

<comment><USER6> Twitter's support for Twitter power users, like those who use Tweetdeck has been abysmal. After buying it out, they turned off a bunch of great features the original client had and now rarely issue any updates. I assume they are trying to drive visitors to use the 'official' Twitter site, but it just doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

No Tweetdeck user views ads, even though Twitter owns and operates the software. The only alternative for PC users is Hootsuite, and it is browser based. For anyone who wants to have multiple columns open at the same time or have notifications of direct messages or @replies, Tweetdeck is (essentially) the only game in town.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I'd happily pay for the ability to use third party clients & no advertising on the main site. Anyone who doesn't want to pay can still use official apps and the website with ads. To me that would be a better solution than just slow killing all the third party apps for everyone.

</comment><comment><USER19> Personally, I don't use Twitter anymore because I don't care for many of the changes they have made. I'm not talking about the advertising but the UI changes that is too busy. And the last time I created an account, Twitter had greatly complicated its settings, not to mention constantly badgering me to follow people.

Twitter, Gmail, and Flickr all followed the same path: nice, functional interfaces that were needlessly complicated over time.

</comment><comment><USER20> Well, if Instagram is making money from Twitter users, why is Twitter not asking Instagram for a share? It's a quite straight forward idea and I don't see why there should be a problem. If so many people share from Instagram to Twitter then certainly Instagram wouldn't have a problem paying for the API, right?

<comment><USER21> And what if they refuse? Is Twitter going to block their links? Sounds like a bad PR move to me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I am guessing Twitter doesn't yet see 3rd party clients not showing ads as a big issue, because if it were, they would've shoveled them anyway through a simple T&C change. For larger client developers it'd be an offer they could not refuse, because they are as dependent on T for their revenue as it gets.

</comment><comment><USER23> Twitter's Users' Problem: Deliberately locking themselves into a monopoly waiting to be abused.

</comment><comment><USER24> It looks like this would imply the next phase will be twitter either killing off third party apps for good (seems like their MO) or creating a federated ad network to insert into these third party streams (they should have done this 4 years ago).

</comment><comment><USER25> Shrug. 'Real' native ads forthcoming, I guess. Or more API restrictions. Or both.

</comment><comment><USER26> maybe its not the best idea to have a business model based on misclicks.

</comment><comment><USER27> I see promoted tweets and I use Hootsuite ...

</comment><comment><USER28> Twitter's User Problem: No smart people at helm!</comment>


Ask HN: Staying motivated, personal software products.  - <AUTHOR>

Often times I find myself quitting in the last mile when working on personal software projects. I'm thinking its a matter of motivation. With personal projects I'll prototype the project, start writing documentation and design documents which help me organize my thoughts. Describing how something will work often helps me spot issues before I develop it as well as fully thinking the operations though.
Next I move on to testing various methods. When should a file be cached to ram, or just dumped in /tmp things like this. What is the pro's and con's of each. I'll learn the technical details of why the operating systems, development environment, etc. works like that. Finally I'll find myself about 50-60% done. Most the decisions are made from a technical level (and justify able with graphs). All that's really needed is some spit shine on the user interface, and some basic error handling in the tools I did the benchmarking and profiling in.
Then normally I just quit. I procrastinate, push the project aside. Slowly forget about it. So what keeps you going after you've solved the interesting technical issues in a software project? <comment><USER2> In style, you're a mathematician (see the third item here: [http://jcdverha.home.xs4all.nl/scijokes/6_2.html](http://jcdverha.home.xs4all.nl/scijokes/6_2.html) although I prefer Scientist to Physicist (perhaps because I was on a chemistry track)). Once you're satisfied there's a solution to the problem, you're happy.

I'd say that as long as you occasionally reify your designs into real stuff so you know you're generally right---I assume you do this at work, as you say they pay you for it---you don't have a real problem. And if you're truly good at this, you should angle for software and systems architect positions.

I certainly find my mental state and motivation shifting once I've found solutions to all the hard problems of a project I'm working on. And I by and large don't do personal projects; unless they're a means to an end, I've had more interesting things to do. (Now that I'm retired I'm working on changing that.)

<comment><AUTHOR> I do actually have a mathematics degree, so your appraisal hits home.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I think you have to define, for yourself, what it means to _finish_. For example, I see 2 forms of finishing here that you may want to consider:

1\. If you are doing this as a learning exercise, and you find yourself quitting when you get to the point where you are no longer learning, then there is nothing wrong with that. You are indeed finishing, in a sense, because you have set your goal as, "I am going to work on this project up until the point that I am no longer learning." So, you tackle the challenges that further and expand your learning. If learning is your desired end result, then you have completed your stated goal.

On the other hand...

2\. If you want to do more than learn, if you want to take your ideas to the next level and put something out there into the world that other people will benefit from and use, then this is a different form of finishing. If this is what you want to do, and you find yourself bailing when you are no longer learning, then you will need to either 1) muster up the power to finish the boring parts yourself or 2) engage someone to do them for you. If you do not have the energy to do those pieces yourself, or engage someone to do them, then you may need to evaluate if you have _passion_ for the particular project that you are working on. I wrote about this previously [1]. On a related note, I have also written about "Doing the Work"; it might be helpful to you as you work through finding your way [2].

One of the biggest challenges in life is finishing as it is defined in point 2, above, because it involves pushing through when the going gets rough and boring, when no one believes in you but yourself, or when things are crumbling around you as you fight to not lose sight of the personal vision that you have to bring your light into the world. Lombardi said:

 _" And in truth, I've never known a man worth his salt who, in the long run, deep down in his heart, didn't appreciate the grind, the discipline. The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather... a lack of will."_

Wishing you the best.

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6122593](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6122593)

[2] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7076143](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7076143)

</comment><comment><USER4> Work with other people. Working alone both removes one of the most powerful human motivators and can create huge blind spots you aren't paying attention to.

</comment><comment><USER5> You might be scared to finish. When a project is incomplete, it still has potential to be world-changing. When it's released, you find out if it is or not.

When I catch myself doing this, what I do is set a deadline + cooloff period. For example, I must ship it by the end of the month, otherwise I must put it aside for six months. Sometimes that creates an urgency to finish, but sometimes it gives me the time off to think objectively about the project. Whereas continuing to poke at it for six months wouldn't get me anywhere.

</comment><comment><USER6> Chose one project you _really really want_ and then continue no matter what.

I'm making a markdown-like format for sheet music in SuperCollider.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's the problem. I don't really _care_ about the end goal. I program to learn things, and when all I'm left with filling in the rote nonsense that completes a project makes it _robust_ , I'm not learning anything. I'm just re-iterating what other people have done, I'm not _learning anything_ just going though motions.

I do it for work, but that's because they pay me.

<comment><USER7> I think it's safe to say that the answer to your original question, "what keeps you going after you've solved the interesting technical issues in a software project?" is care for the end goal, the end goal being a project, not the learning.

Find out if you really don't care about the end goal if the end goal is a project itself. If that's the case, maybe your actual end goal is to keep learning new things for personal pleasure. If you do decide that this is it, no reason to be "ashamed" or worried that you don't keep going after the technical challenges.

Just be honest with yourself to see if you _really_ don't care about the end goal or you are not very familiar/comfortable with what comes after the technical challenges and are rationalizing ways to keep in this comfort zone.

If you do realize that you are actually _afraid_ to care about the end goal because of what is needed to get there, then work on learning something you are completely unfamiliar with. Maybe this will 'break the spell' and reduce your fear (that leads to a possible procastination).

If you - after a honest look at yourself - decide that you are _really_ not afraid, and that you _really_ don't care, then the next step is to ask yourself if you are happy with it. If you are, problem solved =).

<comment><AUTHOR> Honestly as dumb and petty as it sounds. The only goal I see to finishing software projects is to be able to say with confidence that your implementation is better then somebody else's code or project on a technical level.

To have a project as a proof of understanding. Its one thing to say, "Yes I understand how to do dec64 math." Its another to say, "Yes I understand dec64 math, here's my implementation."

Its kinda stupid I know, but that's literally my frustration with not completing projects. Its petty, so I don't indulge it.

<comment><USER7> That's somewhat competitive, but I wouldn't call it a problem. Maybe you should redefine what kind of projects you tackle? From your definition, you could call a project "done" by the time you implement the dec64 math library, or whatever challenge is in the project.

Why don't you just release the library as open-source? This would give you a sense of accomplishment (because you did _complete_ something), and possibly pride, if the library becomes popular.

A key point is it being open-source, though: so you can focus only on releasing the "proof of concept", but letting other people focus on the details, the edge cases, and the fixes to mundane but show-stopping bugs that make the project battle-hardened, production-ready.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> You have to change your attitude 180 degrees. You sound like 99% of programmers: a techie who wants to get into business. You need to think like a businessman who uses programming to solve business needs. Do you understand the difference?

You talk about file-caching, /tmp, OSs, UI, blah blah blah; all irrelevant. You should be thinking of business needs, attracting customers, marketing, talking to potential clients within your niche. This is the important stuff.

Good luck.

<comment><AUTHOR> I have no interest in business. You missed the part where I like learning about writing software, the underlying system.

Are you literally projecting so hard I could view power points off of you? This literally has nothing at all to do with what I posted.

<comment><USER8> Then why do you care if you finish projects?

Don't need an answer as I don't care. Good luck.

<comment><AUTHOR> >Then why do you care if you finish projects?

Because there is more to life then money.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Crash course in venture capital [video] - <AUTHOR> http://kendallmediagroup.com/samples/20090224SiliconFlatironsCrashCourse2.mov

<comment><USER2> I just talked to Craig (videographer) and the host pulled the video seeing the traffic spike, I'm working on putting it up at another spot.

</comment><comment><USER3> Looks like it's been removed :-(

<comment><USER2> Back up! <http://vimeo.com/4095815>

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Thanks for posting this--great talk!

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> flagged: now hosted here: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=556942></comment>


F-35's gun that can't shoot straight adds to its roster of flaws - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-30/f-35-s-gun-that-can-t-shoot-straight-adds-to-its-roster-of-flaws <comment><USER3> Butler Lampson, in his lecture _Hints and Principles for Computer System Design_ [1], has the following anecdote:

 _I remember hearing from the chief program officer for the software of the new joint fighter the F-35, in the US, five or so years ago. He said "I'm the chief software program officer, and I'm absolutely certain that the approved requirements for the software for this plane cannot be met, and there's nothing I can do about it because there are so many forces being brought to bear on these requirements."_ (45:45 - 46:18)

[1] [https://www.heidelberg-laureate-forum.org/video/lecture- hint...](https://www.heidelberg-laureate-forum.org/video/lecture-hints-and- principles-for-computer-system-design.html) (27 August 2015)

<comment><USER4> The Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS) system determined essential to keep F-35 flying and maintained is now scrapped and they start from beginning.

<comment><USER5> _and they start from beginning_

It sounds more like they switch to an existing system that works.

[https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa- pentagon-f35/f-35-log...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa- pentagon-f35/f-35-logistics-system-to-be-reinvented-and-renamed-official-says- idUSKBN1ZE00D)

<comment><USER6> > works.

I wouldn't be so sure:

"ODIN will be based in the cloud and designed to deliver data in near real time on aircraft and system performance under heightened cyber security provisions, Lord said."

Independently of that "cloud based" ODIN as a replacement of ALIS (" _Autonomic_ Logistics Information System"), the mentioned ALIS doesn't seem to me as what Lampson's source worried about.

<comment><USER7> I do not want to hear the phrase "cloud computing" anywhere near a fighter jet, unless they're talking and the plane (a computer) flying through clouds.

<comment><USER5> It's a ground based logistics program for scheduling servicing etc.

<comment><USER8> Ground cloud, got it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The F-35 project is a stealth Jobs program that pretends to be a stealth airplane program. Seen through this lens, things are actually going ok. It concentrates incompetence in the defense sector, where it can do less harm. (as long as we dont get a real war)

<comment><USER10> What does a competent fighter jet program look like?

<comment><USER11> The F-117. Great story, was finished in budget and ahead of time. But then it was a _black_ program without any political oversight. Basically a couple of brilliant engineers closed into a room with the sole task to built a stealth plane.

EDIT: They used components from the F-16 and F-15 programs. Being a black program, this was hidden in spare parts needs for these other planes. I have congress report lying around somewhere which complains about excess spare needs for the F-16 from that period. So, maybe some of the F-117 costs are driving costs of other programs.

<comment><USER12> The F-117 had very limited requirements compared to the F-35. What's killing the F-35 is the extreme complexity of the program.

The requirements for the F-117 were basically that it had to be stealthy, and had to be able to carry a minimal payload a reasonable range. There was no radar, no vertical takeoff, no carrier landings, no air-to-air, no sensor fusion, no datalinks, no cooperative engagement, etc etc etc.

It's poorly understood how the combination of high performance requirements, complexity, and flexibility mix. Optimizing a system for performance generally requires cutting across domains. Subsystems need to be designed jointly to wring out performance. This means there are many dependencies between the subsystems, so if one thing changes on one subsystem, it may affect a number of other subsystems. If you then add flexibility to the mix -- you want a modular system like the F-35, all of this optimization work has to be done on every combination of parts. Now combine this with a complex set of mission requirements -- every change has to be optimized for multiple missions and multiple aircraft variants. Due to the optimized and complex nature of the aircraft, each change will also affect many subsystems.

Because the system is so complex, no person or even a small group of people can have the entire system in their head, so it's hard to know exactly what will be affected with a subsystem change. Subsystems affected by a change will furthermore not even be built by the same company. This all means that each change has to go through very slow formal processes to make sure it keeps working.

All of this is to say that layering on all of these categories of requirements has an exponential effect. If the F-35 didn't have to be high performance, or if it didn't have three variants, or if it didn't have to perform multiple missions, the project would have been much easier.

<comment><USER13> So does it follow from that that the entire concept is flawed, and what should have been designed instead are multiple different aircraft?

<comment><USER12> Yes, it should have been multiple aircraft, or the scope should have been reduced. It's hard enough to make an aircraft that's good on an aircraft carrier and on land. Adding the vertical landing (B model) version compromised the whole program.

VTOL is a very specialized capability, and there's never been another airplane that has VTOL as an optional feature. You have to design the plane and its engine around this capability, and you compromise on many other things to get it. The A and C models then have to live with many of these design compromises. Even the basic shape of the aircraft, with such a wide front fuselage reduces the performance of the F-35, even though on the A and C models there's no need to be so wide since there's no lift fan.

Meanwhile, it's not even clear that the Marines need a VTOL airplane. The B model has the ability to operate off Navy helicopter carriers, which gives them significantly more punch, but there's basically no real scenario where a helicopter carrier would need it. In a real war, there will always be full deck carriers anywhere a helicopter carrier is. In theory the helicopter carriers would offer additional capacity, but carrier air wings have been scaled back, and full deck carriers only go to sea with 60-65 aircraft even though they have the capacity for 90. If the Marines wanted more of their own air assets they could have just bought C models and operated them off the big carriers like they already do with the F-18.

The B model is also significantly lower performance. It has to takeoff at lower weights, and it has the huge extra weight of the lift fan. This means it has a much shorter range and carries less weapons. If they had simply bought C models and put them on the big carriers, the overall capability would be greater.

<comment><USER14> Maybe someone more knowledgable about the history can chime in, but the first thought that entered my mind when you were discussing full deck carriers is that the F-35 was designed from the very beginning for international sales. Only a few nations have full deck carriers, while many more have helicopter carriers. It's not surprising then that there are 2 allies with F-35Bs, 3 allies with plans for the F-35B, and none for the F-35C: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_F-35_Lightning...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_F-35_Lightning_II#F-35B_2)

<comment><USER12> Yes, that's true, but look at the F-35 orders. There are 563 orders for the B model out of 3200 total. The foreign customers are the UK with 138, to operate on their Queen Elizabeth carriers, 30 for Italy to operate on their small carriers, and 42 to Japan for the same.

In 2010, the UK decided to make the QE carriers ski-jump and operate the B model for cost reasons, however they considered making them CATOBAR and operate the C model. If the B model had not existed, they would have simply spent another couple of billion dollars to make them CATOBAR.

It's probably not practical from a budget and political standpoint for Japan and Italy to make CATOBAR carriers, but does it really make sense to compromise a 3200 aircraft program that's the backbone of the USAF and USN's fleet so that Italy and Japan can buy 72 aircraft? Italy and Japan could just buy tanker aircraft for long range power projection.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_F-35_Lightning...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_F-35_Lightning_II_procurement#Planned_purchases)

<comment><USER15> Your comments make up the most competent and comprehensive analysis I've seen on the F35 program; way more thorough than those presented in Congress or by the various involved aerospace companies. Are you involved in the project in any way?

<comment><USER12> I'm just an interested observer, but my observations are hardly unique. The same points have been made in many forums including congressional hearings.

<comment><USER15> Much of what I've seen in congressional hearings is so watered down and blame- shifted it is difficult to assemble into a coherent story. You did a great job of the spark notes version

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I'm writing a post on software estimation, how it's difficult to estimate things correctly. One of the arguments that I want to make is that estimating poorly is not restricted to the software industry (obvious in retrospect). Military and public infrastructure projects are an excellent source of poorly estimated projects.

I've been collecting data about F35 specfically, 'cause it's so recent and the cost overruns are just mind boggling.

Anyway, here's an article from last year [0] that discusses how project management for the F35 prorgram reclassifies "blockers" and "criticals" into "major" and "medium" (severity levels of the issue). Especially like how the IFF transponder fails to send out a distress call if a pilot ejects, or how the arresting hook (for carrier landings) bends the airframe.

[0]: [https://www.pogo.org/investigation/2018/08/f-35-program- cutt...](https://www.pogo.org/investigation/2018/08/f-35-program-cutting- corners-to-complete-development/)

<comment><USER17> Just be careful what generalizations you draw. I've been in enough proposal development meetings to know that the estimates that make it to the client/government entity aren't always the _actual_ estimate. In many cases, one or more persons provided a pretty good estimate and it got shot down immediately because if the proposal included it, it would be rejected. Basically, if there's a good chance the client will eat the cost overruns (as governments usually do for military/space/infrastructure projects), there's a big incentive to deliberately underestimate even when you know the actual number will be significantly higher.

<comment><USER18> I was about to say, estimates better be aligned to the sales team expectations or they'll be changed so that they do align. It's only after the project is sold do you get a chance to look at the reality of the situation.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> The project was doomed to this fate from the moment the requirements document was handed down, much like the Space Shuttle's last minute redesign. The F35 is 3 different planes crammed into one airframe.

<comment><USER20> Ironically so they could save money by not developing 3 different aircraft!

<comment><USER21> I don't have raw numbers, but last I checked the cost estimates of maintaining these aircraft over the long term is still projected to be cheaper than the alternative.

Some of the aircraft flown by the USAF and the US Navy have higher annual operational costs than the sticker price of those same aircraft. The F-35 is an attempt to avoid repeating the same mistakes, but obviously, easier said than done.

<comment><USER22> The operating costs for air or sea going vehicles is a lot of the time - <USER2> minimum - their purchase price, per year.

Buy a kayak for $100? You need around $100/yr in storage, cleaning and upkeep for it.

Buy a glider for $10k? You need around $10k/yr in maintenance, hangarage, taxes, insurance etc.

Buy a jet for $1M? You'll spend that much on a hanger, crew, fuel, taxes, mechanics, parts, insurance etc etc.

Get an aircraft carrier for $1B? You'll spend that much on crew, ports, maintenance, munition, training etc etc.

Sure you _can_ do it cheaper, but it's a good rule of thumb from a budgetary point of view.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Canada is currently going through a competition to replace its (non-Super) Hornet fighters:

* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_F-35_Lightning...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_F-35_Lightning_II_Canadian_procurement)

The two main candidates are the F-35 and the F-18 Super Hornet (the Saab Gripen is unlikely).

There was much drama with this because the previous government announced a sole source contract. Then there was confusions as to how much it was actually going to cost. The original plans got cancelled, and now we have an RFP.

Of course the F-35 is a so-called fifth generation fighter, and there's already sketches about six generation stuff:

* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixth-generation_jet_fighter](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixth-generation_jet_fighter)

Soemtimes I think Canada should skip the 5G, buy the Super Hornets (and perhaps some Growlers), and then leap frog to 6G.

<comment><USER24> Sweden has just this week decided it needs to own some proper firefighting aircraft.

I suggest we trade SAAB Gripen aircraft for Bombardier Super Scoopers at a 1:1 ratio. List prices look roughly similar.

<comment><USER24> Bonus video: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNmenvJ_FKM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNmenvJ_FKM)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Related movie recommendation: The Pentagon Wars (1998). The one where "Toby" from "West Wing" (Richard Schiff) is put in charge of product managing the Bradley Fighting Vehicle that eventually tries to address every single need from every part of the army.

<comment> maze-le Absolutely. This film is a "must-see" for every aspiring project manager. It is very much on point with my experience on projects for big clients:

* Continuously changing list of requirements

* Incoherent decision making process

* Unrealistic deadlines

* Upper management that pats itself on the back for ridiculous decisions

It really is a good case study for failed communication in big organizations.

<comment><USER24> Besides all of that, it's also a really well-crafted movie.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Being in the process of reading The Machine That Changed the World (a book about the development of lean production in Japan in response to the shortcomings of mass production in the United States), I can't help but see the parallel between Toyota's ability to quickly adapt to the changing demands of different export markets with an industrial process that creates variations on a theme in direct response to the demands of the customer. Contrast this with Ford's approach of throwing all resources into the same identical product, depending on the sheer scale of the production to absorb the inevitable defects in quality and supply-chain timing.

</comment><comment><USER26> While the A-10 is not comparable with the F-35 playground, it was a plane that saved the budget and fit well into the military. The service made, the capabilities and the cost was really good. Same with the F-15. I think the F-35 is the result of hubris.

<comment><USER27> The A10 is only viewed as successful today because its very old.

Back in initial production in the Carter years they discovered awful metal fatigue problems in the wings. In the early Reagan years they bolted on braces to toughen up the joint. Still kept failing. Around the turn of the century barely before the GWOT the air force realized the wings were failing so fast they'd run out of replacement wings around 2010, so right after the GWOT started (which is getting to be one human generation ago...) they rushed a contract thru to slap repairs on the existing wings and then replace entirely with new wings. As of late 2010s the wing replacement project (about $2B) and the air force desire to get rid of the A10 were dueling with each other, kinda crazy. AFAIK that battle continues today. With new wings we'll be flying those things into mid century.

There's never been an engineering project that hasn't had teething problems.

Currently, the F35 does not have its wings falling off, the gun mounts merely need beefing up. Thats better than the A10 track record. If thats the worst problem the F35 has, that's pretty good!

There's also a lot of irony in that the A10 has been under seemingly continuous avionics upgrades for its entire life; you could probably build a F-35 with 1970s avionics for an 1970s price.. so unfair to compare a price tag for a 1970s plane that's been infinitely upgraded since, with a 2020s plane and its 2020s price tag. Also the leadership of the air force has been trying to get rid of the A10 for some decades now. Some doctrine insists close air support should be an army helo job, not an air force strategic bomber job.

The problem with the A10 is if you don't expect soviet tanks to pour across Germany there's no point in a giant flying gun. And if you need air launched anti-armor, the army does a better job with human on board helos and the air force does a better job with drone launched missiles. It just doesn't seem to have a point anymore. It can be made to work, and has worked, but the alternatives are a better match. The troops can and have been supported with a A10, but they'd be better and more quickly supported with multiple apache helos or a swarm of existing drone platforms for the same cost and effort.

<comment><USER28> > The problem with the A10 is if you don't expect soviet tanks to pour across > Germany there's no point in a giant flying gun.

You should check out some videos on YouTube of the A-10 in action in Afghanistan and Iraq - particularly the ones from soldiers on the ground. It's a devastating and effective weapon. The only thing that delivers comparable capabilities is the helicopters (and maybe the AC-130), but none of them have a gun like the A-10.

I'm not military, but know plenty of people who are (and I've read a lot about this). My understanding is that ground forces love the A-10 for what it can do for them. They can communicate with it and give the pilots precise instructions about where to deliver the rounds. Drones can't do that.

<comment><USER29> Ground troops do love the A-10 but there's plenty of reasons the brass has decided to retire it.

The A-10 was specifically made for CAS against Soviet armor. It's essentially a 30mm cannon with wings. The nature of warfare has made that role much less feasible, though; armor is more effective, anti-aircraft weapons are more deadly, and detection methods are more accurate. There isn't a lot of room for big, slow, low-flying planes like the A-10 in modern warfare.

Nowadays it obviously isn't used against mass formations of Soviet armor. Drones are capable of delivering the same kind of support that the A-10 is used for, just not necessarily the drones the US military uses today.

<comment><USER30> The thing is it was ineffective against Soviet Armor within a few short years it reached active service. It's 30mm was of little to no effectiveness against T-72's. It would instead have to use it's Maverick missiles against tanks. But at that point why not use something which can carry more Maverick's instead of a flying 30mm?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> The F-35 is doing excellently at it's actual engineered purpose, which is to extract the maximum amount of money from the DoD and into the hands of contractors while at the same time being completely unassailable politically. Better than digging ditches and filling them back in, I suppose.

</comment><comment><USER32> This is the problem with pouring all of the requirements into one bucket. A single plane that does air superiority (F-15), stealth (F-117), naval air superiority (F-18), ground attack (A-10), vertical/short take off (Harrier), etc - it's just not going to work.

What the US really needs are a small number of stealth fighters (F-22), a larger number of air superiority fighters (F-15 silent eagles), a whole bunch of light attack aircraft (A-29s), and something to replace the A-10.

Sure, an A-29 is a prop plane that stands no chance against an F-15, but it is phenomenally cheap to operate, and fits a very large number of mission needs that the high performance jets are too expensive for.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embraer_EMB_314_Super_Tucano](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embraer_EMB_314_Super_Tucano)

</comment><comment><USER33> Are US Air Force F-35s expected to be engaging ground targets with their guns?

<comment><USER34> Yes; by comparison, Vulcan rounds are extremely cheap versus guided rockets (tens a dollars per round versus hundred thousand dollars plus per missile), so if you have a low threat engagement like a sniper in a house in Afghanistan it is very effective to shoot 50 cannon rounds at it. Same for a small truck convoy, a plane can get on the target faster than an attack helicopter just because it is 3 times faster at low altitudes.

It is not meant to replace an Apache or Cobra helicopter, but to occasionally take out ground targets.

<comment> Brave-Steak How long can a plane like the F-35 fire on a target with the cannon before it passes over it?

<comment><USER34> The time is not the important factor, the number of shells on target is. These guns have very high rates of fire, dozens of shells per second. A plane can empty the entire cannon load in 5-6 seconds.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> only 800 issues for software of this scale? That's not too bad actually.

<comment><USER36> Depends on the type of issues. For instance a "module x won't boot" issue is pretty severe, and it means that there is likely a ton of new issues surfacing once you fix that. Also, for an adequately broken piece of software the number of registered issues mostly depend on how much work has been put into registering issues.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> How many missile carrying drones do you think we could make for the cost of one $80mm F35?

The next big war is going to be won with a lot of small, disposable vehicles rather than a couple of "can't fail" elite machines.

Kinda like Taranto, where a handful of British _biplanes_ took down three Italian _battleships_

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

<comment><USER38> _How many missile carrying drones do you think we could make for the cost of one $80mm F35_

You can buy five MQ-9 Reaper drones ($16mil each), or three MC-C Gray Eagles ($31mil each). These things have flight performance similar to early ww-2 era bombers but with tiny munitions payloads. That is, they are very slow, high- altitude, high-endurance and non-maneuverable. Their only real plus is that they are small and thus have a small radar cross section. They are sitting ducks for any sort of half-way decent air defense. I suspect that any fighter jet or SAM built in the last half century would swat such drones out of the sky without breaking a sweat.

<comment><USER39> Those are still built by dedicated defense contractors with a military purchasing process. It's like comparing Graf Spee with Vittoria Veneto, not comparing a Swordfish biplane with Vittoria Veneto.

I haven't really seen anyone analyze the threat model of attaching a shaped charge & microchip to a balsa model airplane or plastic DJI drone. The cost of _those_ is in the $1000 range (including the chip and warhead), and they're virtually invisible to radar, or to the naked eye for that matter. Hell, for the cost of a single AMRAAM missile you could field > 1000 drones. You lose on range (~20 miles max) and performance (~200 mph), but for close air support, you probably don't need it: just blanket the whole airspace with tens of thousands of tiny drones so that the whole battlefield becomes a giant no-fly zone.

<comment><USER40> > _You lose on range (~20 miles max)_

Just because it's still a super cool feat 17 years later, from 2003: [https://www.sciencenewsforstudents.org/article/model- plane-f...](https://www.sciencenewsforstudents.org/article/model-plane-flies- atlantic)

> _11-pound Model Airplane Flies the Atlantic_

> _Named TAM-5, the 11-pound plane flew 1,888 miles from Canada to Ireland in > 38 hours, 53 minutes. It set world records for longest distance and longest > time ever flown by a model airplane._

> _[...]To qualify for flight records, a model airplane has to weigh less than > 11 pounds, including fuel. So, TAM-5 had room to carry just under 3 quarts > of gas. This meant that the plane had to get the equivalent of about 3,000 > miles per gallon of fuel, Brown says._

> _The biggest challenge in building the model, Brown says, was figuring out > how to make TAM-5's engine efficient enough to cross the ocean. Most model > airplanes use alcohol-based fuels. Instead, Hill used Coleman lantern fuel > because, he says, it's more pure and performs better. He tweaked a regular > model airplane engine to make the valves smaller and more efficient._

> _The plane also carried an impressive set of electronics. Every hour during > the flight, crewmembers were able to get information about the plane's > location from a Global Positioning System (GPS) device on board. The GPS > device communicated with a satellite orbiting Earth to determine the plane's > exact latitude, longitude, and speed._

> _The route was programmed into the computerized autopilot, which > automatically adjusted the plane's direction to stay on course. There was > also a transmitter on board that sent signals directly to crewmembers on the > ground when the plane was within 70 miles of its launch and landing sites._

So that's 2003-class "impressive set of electronics", with artificial fuel restrictions for record purposes to boot, yet nearly a couple thousand miles of range. Only going about 50 MPH granted, but presumably a weaponized design would only need to burst speed briefly and slow loiter might actually be a strength in some CAS scenarios. Napkin math'ing it, seems feasibly dangerous, 3 US quarts of kerosene is about 5 lbs and a couple lbs of shaped RDX is plenty to do some real damage if a pinpoint strike. Just saying that I think you're even more right than you suggest there! A scenario of fielding thousands/tens of thousands of cheap drones offers chances for a pretty radical rethink in doctrine.

<comment><USER41> Interesting read, although the derived applications are not great. ^^

Now for more military applications, I think some of the calculations might break down due to weight. Missiles/shell can be in the order of hundreds of pounds, with the heavier ones above a ton.

The use case for military being more oriented toward heavy vehicles, tanks and buildings, I don't think a few pounds of explosive would be anywhere near enough. The plane would have to increase in size (structure and fuel) in similar proportions to the load it has to carry, certainly negating a lot of the efficiency.

Well, if we streamline a model plane as a one off directed explosive, that will eventually be a missile and long range ballistic missiles are not a novelty.

<comment><USER39> > The use case for military being more oriented toward heavy vehicles, tanks > and buildings, I don't think a few pounds of explosive would be anywhere > near enough.

That describes a bazooka warhead perfectly, and they had no problem penetrating tanks. More recently, TOW anti-tank missiles are used to great effectiveness by many armies (including us) and their warhead is only 13 lbs.

One of the amazing things about shaped charges is that penetration depends only on the diameter of the charge, not its weight or velocity, and it can penetrate 7-10x its diameter in armor. So a 4-inch diameter shaped charge can blow through a meter of solid steel.

The other interesting development is that nearly all the advances in armor designed to defeat shaped charges (ceramics, Chobham armor, reactive armor) have an assumption that the same spot will never be hit twice in battle. The first shot basically destroys the (roughly 1 sq. foot) armor tile, which is useless for further protection, but this doesn't matter because in a traditional gun/missile tank duel the chance that the exact same spot will be hit twice is miniscule. This assumption falls apart with advances in robotics and AI. You could imagine a drone swarm where instead of launching themselves at the target, they _land_ on the target, crawl to the most vulnerable parts (on top of turret or on the magazines/engines, for example) or those that have sustained previous battle damage, and then detonate themselves.

<comment><USER41> Awesome, I thought of shaped charges as well, but trying to keep the post short.

I assumed the goal was to have something similar to the model plane and particularly its incredibly range and efficiency. 1 gallon for 1000 miles. The plane shape and aerodynamics certainly help the efficiency.

However if there was an explosive charge to carry, the charge certainly can't improve the plane structure or aerodynamics (hence reducing the efficiency of the plane overall) and I'm not sure the charge could be shaped and mounted in the most optimal way (reducing the efficiently of the explosive itself).

So while the model plane might be incredibly efficient at flying, I question whether it could be anywhere near as good for the new purpose.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> There's a long history of these sorts of things:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasa_(ship)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasa_\(ship\))

<comment><USER43> You mean this part, right?

> Four more heavy guns were intended for the stern, but the cannon foundry > could not cast guns as fast as the navy yard could build ships, and Vasa > waited nearly a year after construction was finished for its armament. When > the ship sailed in August 1628, eight of the planned armament of 72 guns had > still not been delivered

<comment><USER44> Perhaps not quite so bad as the Vasa - [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Rose](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Rose) At least the Mary Rose had served for over 30 years but it seems that upgrades went over the top. A 500 ton ship was turned into a 700 ton ship.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> Considering its primary function is to launch targeted explosives or paint targets for other weapons platforms, without being targeted itself, the vestigal gun being inaccurate seems like a small problem.

</comment><comment><USER46> This thing is right out of the Pentagon Wars. "It. Takes. Teamwork."

I'm not surprised, though; this is typical of defense contracting boondoggles.

</comment><comment><USER47> Incredibly, but not surprisingly, they've already built 450+ aircraft, but I believe just started Operational Evaluation & Testing in December 2018. When more flaws are found, the aircraft will need retrofits. Same thing goes for the Ford Class carriers.

</comment><comment><USER48> Which airplanes are currently supposed to be replaced by the F-35? Everything (basically from the A-10 to the F-22) or only specific (sub-ranges of) models/variants?

<comment><USER49> What was planned in the past, and the reality today, are not the same thing.

There's over 2,000 F-16's in the field, and that qty. of F-35's will never be built because of the cost and mfg. capacity.

So likely the F-35 will be used where possible, backed up by thousands of older planes.

To give you an idea of how serious the cost/mfg. problem is, the late 1950s F-5 is in heavy use for the foreseeable future - training, adversarial Top Gun fighters, research, drones - you name it. The little fighter (4,000 made) is saving us billions now.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_F-5](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_F-5)

<comment><USER48> Thanks about the reminder about the F-16s - wasn't aware that so many were still active.

I think that I remember that the F-5 was in the original "Top Gun" movie, that it was near its end-life when the movie was shown (I investigated after watching the movie), and that in the movie it had the role of a simulated MIG- antagonist. (gosh, I LOVED that movie when I saw it as a teenager)

Maybe the stagnation of engineering/production of F-35 and/or alternative models is caused by Russia/China not pushing for similar capabilities? There have been news about some new fighters but I didn't read anything about them being mass-produced... .

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> F-35 is a popular bashing target on Hacker News. I think this is unfair.

Yes, the program is worth $1.5TN, the most expensive procurement program in history. But that's for its entire lifetime, of about 60 years. Per unit, an F-35 will cost about $100MM (even less than $80MM for the main version, F-35A [0]). A few days ago we've seen the first Boeing 777X taking a test flight. That's a commercial aircraft with a list price of $400MM per unit. It's essentially a big long tube with wings and engines. Yes, the tube is carbon fiber, the wings are foldable, the engines are the newest crown jewels of GE, but it's not a fighter aircraft designed to withstand 10G acceleration, be subject to catapulted take-off and arrested landing on an aircraft carrier, be able to go supersonic, and well, obviously it's not stealthy. So, given all that, the cost of an F-35 is not exorbitant.

Oh, and you bet the F-35 is a huge jobs program as well. But it's not minimum wage jobs we are talking about. It's high end jobs. And the F-35 is a profitable export as well. An export that will benefit the US, but will benefit the buyers too. Poland will buy F-35. Poland is looking nervously at Ukraine, and how Russian troops and tanks are occupying big chunks of it. The day they get some F-35s in their hangars is the day they'll start sleeping a bit easier at night. Japan has some nice naval ships that are aircraft carriers in all but name [1]. But to be meaningful, they need aircraft, and F-35B will do the job. UK's Queen Elizabeth class aircraft carrier will also use F-35B. No other fighter jet will fit the bill, either for the Japanese or for the British aircraft carriers, as they are somewhat on the short side and F-35B can take off on short runways. Israel is already using F-35s for combat missions.

For those who think manned military aircraft are a thing of the past, take a moment to remember the drone that Iran captured a few years ago [2]. Drones can be hijacked, or rendered ineffective via electronic warfare. Manned aircraft less so. The US is not shying away from heavily investing in drones, but manned aircraft will have a place in the military picture for decades to come.

[0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_F-35_Lightning...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_F-35_Lightning_II)

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Izumo- class_destroyer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Izumo-class_destroyer)

[2] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93U.S._RQ-170_incid...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93U.S._RQ-170_incident)

</comment><comment><USER51> [http://archive.md/S8WAg](http://archive.md/S8WAg)

</comment><comment><USER52> The Bradley fighting airplane.

</comment><comment><USER53> at what point will we be willing to accept that this is a failed project?

</comment><comment><USER54> good news for people all over the world, i guess

</comment><comment><USER55> Right now, there is a post on the front page about an American community that is flooded with sewage every time it rains. Reading about the F 35 makes me so incredibly frustrated when I think about all the good we could do with even a small portion of its budget.

<comment><USER56> You have a lot more faith in the ability of government to turn money into progress than I do. The exact same corrupt policies of farming out money to political connections for the F-35 program, resulting in marginal services/products, is what will happen in nearly every local government.

I'm becoming more and more convinced that we're coasting on the infrastructure of the past and aren't really capable of organizing successful new projects that aren't destined to fail from all the corruption.

<comment><USER57> Faith in _the US govt_ , I think you mean. Government is remarkably effective at turning money into progress in the Netherlands. (Not that citizens don't complain incessantly)

<comment><USER58> I assume this is a snark, more than 300 mayors to govern 1 city the size of New York doesn't seem like an effective government to me.

<comment><USER55> Is the correct effectiveness metric the number of people involved or the outcomes for the people served by that government? I don't really care how big/small our government is if everyone is experiencing a high quality of life.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER59> $1.5 trillion for an inferior plane. The sunk cost fallacy is amazing.

<comment><USER60> The oft touted 1.5 trillion figure is the total estimated cost of the program over 55 years.

[https://www.aviationtoday.com/2018/09/04/f-35-program- update...](https://www.aviationtoday.com/2018/09/04/f-35-program-update/)

<comment><USER61> Is that taking into account inflation? ~20 million per year 40 years ago is comparatively a lot more money than it would be today.

I can't tell if the 55 year period should make the total program cost seem better or worse to me.

<comment><USER62> Yes, it is in 2020 dollars and future costs are adjusted for expected inflation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER63> This reads like a hit piece on Lockheed Martin Corp.

<comment><USER64> I think the abysmal record of the plane and the huge amount of money spent on it are more likely why it seems that way. It's really hard to say nice things about people who actually shine turds for a living.

</comment></comment><comment><USER65> The whole program is just a nightmare which kind of seems inevitable when you're trying to make a plane to replace every other (edit: small) plane in the US fleet...

</comment><comment><USER66> You need to remember that F-35 is a peace project. It is supposed to suck up money from the military industry that would otherwise be employed to do much more harm to the humans than F-35 would ever be able to.

<comment><USER67> That sounds like a symptom of a hideously corrupt country.

</comment></comment><comment><USER68> As long as people take pride in being #1 in military spending rather than actual results, these problems will continue to exist.

I can spend 500 trillion dollars in an armored rubber duck with an attached gun to it, that does not make me the strongest superpower on earth.</comment>


ENERGY: It's time to wheel out a really "green nuclear" solution - <AUTHOR> http://lessthunk.com/2015/06/05/energy-its-time-to-wheel-out-a-really-green-nuclear-solution/

<comment><USER2> We should propose Kirk Sorensen for a Nobel peace prize if Thorium takes off !</comment>


Stop Creating Content You Evil Bastard - <AUTHOR> http://www.whattofix.com/blog/archives/2012/02/the-immorality.php

<comment><USER2> This is nothing new, really. The greater the fame, the greater the number of haters. All they need is some kind of semi-plausible drum to beat. You either need to accept that these people are irrational, won't listen, and won't leave, or you need to step out of the spotlight.

<comment><AUTHOR> Agreed, and people tell me that all the time.

I think what's missing on the internet is a real feeling of just how many people your work is touching. You can see server statistics that say 10K readers, but it's very difficult to really imagine that many people consuming your content, at least for me.

In a way, it's amazing that people don't get more negative feedback. I think the reason for this is general apathy and the fact that most people don't even consume the things they surf over to.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> initially i misread this as "The Immortality of Creating your own Content", which is quite another angle :D

<comment><USER3> well, the new title certainly leaves no room for errors</comment></comment>


Freemium Services: What To Charge For - <AUTHOR> http://blog.jasonshah.org/post/23459121060/freemium-services-what-to-charge-for <comment><USER2> Why?

Not to be intentionally blunt, but your argument seems to be structured around attaining the highest userbase possible, rather than the highest revenue possible.

The natural followup is that a higher userbase begets a higher revenue, but why -- and how? I think that's certainly true with companies such as Facebook or Pinterest, where a) higher userbase equals stronger value proposition and/or b) advertising is a primary revenue source, but neither of those seem applicable to Instapaper.

Frankly, I don't think Instapaper needs to revolve around a Freemium model at all. It's a high-quality, standalone app. I don't understand the trend in the tech world that tends to demonize paying up-front for an app (and hell, Instapaper's online version is free); frankly, I'd rather know what I'm paying up front than be saddled with IAPs or subscriptions down the line.

<comment><AUTHOR> I think adoption is key, ESPECIALLY when you're only earning from subscription fees.

Only charging for a service and not offering a free version can kill adoption. I know very few online services, especially consumer-facing services, that don't give you SOMETHING for free.

You and I may know it's high quality. But if you're a skittish consumer and there are free or freemium choices, I think it's unlikely that a paid-only option will thrive.</comment></comment>


Traveling to the world's least-visited countries - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/least-visited-countries-travel/index.html <comment><USER2> This is nonsense. San Marino is almost entirely dependent on tourism from Italy, and is very, very heavily trafficked. This list seems to be based on some arbitrary absolute value and not on rate.

<comment><USER3> Similarly, I noticed at least 3 of these are US territories, and are heavily traveled to by Americans, though that may cause the "foreign visitors" to be quite low.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> While the CNN list feels somewhat variable, I'd highly recommend visiting countries that aren't on any "top destination" lists. I just got back from a trip that included Kyiv and Minsk, and I'd have to say that Minsk in particular exceeded any expectations I had. Clean, beautiful, a feeling of safety in the downtown, and plenty of sights (and alcoholic beverages) made for a great visit.

<comment><USER5> Arguably May is the best time of the year to visit Kyiv. This chestnut bloom!

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> population of Anguilla: 14,764; 2017 tourist total from article: 68,000

Using absolute numbers for this sort of list doesn't work.

</comment><comment><USER7> it's just a list of the smallest countries with lowest populations masking as if it's a different kind of data.

What utter crap.

</comment><comment><USER8> +1 for Vanuatu and specifically the volcano mentioned in the article in Tanna. Absolutely phenomenal experience in an almost entirely undeveloped island. We spent 3 days in a tree-house handmade by our local host facing the volcano (think of sleeping and seeing lava chunks flying in the night sky from your window). Also you can literally walk up to the caldera and watch for hours while the volcano is erupting and molten rocks are falling a few meters from your head. Absolutely mind-blowing.

</comment><comment><USER9> So these are all remote islands, microstates, two west African countries and one east African countries that all have U.S. State Dept. travel warnings, and Moldova.

<comment><USER10> As a Moldovan citizen: There's _nothing_ [1] to see in Moldova (even if you get a good local guide [2], and are willing to travel to the country side and outside the capital).

Watch Eurotrip instead, and you'll get an accurate depiction of a yet another poor post-Soviet East European country.

[1] Well, there's something to see, obviously, but you need to know exactly what, and where, and it will be overwhelmed by, well, how poor, bad and shoddy everything else is.

[2] If you _are_ going, ask Azbuca Travel on Facebook, they specialise in local tours. Sorry for advertisement :D

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> >From civil war to Ebola outbreaks, this west African country has faced hard knocks in recent decades

Sometimes countries are not visited a lot for good reasons. Hemorrhagic fever outbreaks seem like a very good reason.

</comment><comment><USER12> It reminds me of this guy: [https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wnDxHTaeNX0](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wnDxHTaeNX0)

<comment><USER13> Not sure how to feel about it. Goes to a poor country, complains that it's poor.

<comment><USER14> Yeah, I thought that at the beginning but he makes a point at the end saying corrupt politicians have messed up the country and fled leaving the people to deal with it.

I don't think he's trying to insult the country, just saying how it is. I think he speaks fluent Russian so must have at least some interest in this part of the world.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I expected to see some countries in NE S. America like Guyana and Suriname.

<comment><USER16> I expected Uzbekistan and maybe Georgia and Armenia.

I became fascinated with these places after watching their Lonely Planet guides in the 1990s. But they are so far away!</comment></comment>


Five Great Cyberpunk Novels Tron Should Inspire You to Read - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2011/04/five-great-cyperpunk-novels-tron-should-inspire-you-to-read/ <comment><USER2> This list totally lacks True Names by Vernor Vinge (1981).

It is considered by many the seminal work on cyberspace, years before the term 'cyberspace' was coined.

And IMHO, it is a very good read, even more relevant today than when it was written.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Any other recommendations? I'm in need of a few good books to add to the queue.

<comment><USER3> The Difference Engine by Gibson and Sterling. It's got mixed reviews, though.

<comment><USER4> I got this book a good few years ago. Most of the book is really good and interesting, but overall I'm not sure I liked it, but maybe I missed the point or something. I should reread it sometime and see :)

I did love the setting though - a world where Babbage had completed the analytical engine and computers (mechanical, steam powered ones) were unleashed on the world a hundred years early. Some interesting ideas are explored.

As for other books, I actually enjoyed some of Gibsons newer stuff (The Bridge Trilogy: "Virtual Light", "Idoru" and "All Tomorrows Party"), though I've seen a lot of people say non of his other stuff was as good as Neuromancer.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Mercurio, the deployment black box - <AUTHOR> http://madewithbytes.com/writting/mercurio-the-deployment-black-box/ I built mercurio the deployment black box. It is meant to be easy to assemble, reusable between projects and fun! <comment><USER2> Love it. Great job!

I can imagine you coding furiously and quickly pushing the button...tack..tack..tack...push!

By the way did you have to order/make the box to the specifics you wanted or was it ready-made?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you! Hearing the click on the button is really fun.

The only bits that are made for each other is the vinyl base that keep the arduino and the bread board next to each other.

I had to cut the holes in the box myself, that bit was interesting, because I am not a great at that, but the whole process was fun!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> This is fantastic, do you plan on extending perhaps with a nuclear-submarine style master key for production deployments?

</comment><comment><USER4> How much did the hardware set you back?

<comment><AUTHOR> I already had a few bits that I needed for building it, but doing some quick maths that you should be able to build one from scratch from around £65 (including the black box).</comment></comment>


Using the Old Mac OS Is Pure Zen - <AUTHOR> https://www.fastcodesign.com/90170255/using-the-old-mac-os-is-pure-zen <comment><USER2> Unless of course you had to use it really for work. Little cartoon bombs, "error type 11", duck sound for no reason : when I started my job in a newspaper Mac OS Classic was a nightmare not a zen experience ...

</comment><comment><USER3> Use Linux and you have a wide array of choices when it comes to graphical user interfaces. Some are extremely clean, fast and efficient.</comment>


Paid for Stripe - <AUTHOR> https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paid-for-stripe/id643322635

<comment><AUTHOR> Conversation at <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5674406></comment>


Tor Attack Could Unmask New Hidden Sites in Under Two Weeks - <AUTHOR> http://motherboard.vice.com/read/tor-attack-could-unmask-new-hidden-sites-in-under-two-weeks <comment><USER2> I suppose it is prudent, then, that most Hidden Services last less than a day. (I can't find the talk which is my source, but I'm fairly sure it was connected to this paper: [http://ieee- security.org/TC/SP2013/papers/4977a080.pdf](http://ieee- security.org/TC/SP2013/papers/4977a080.pdf))</comment>


Scoble: Twitter etc are the next email - <AUTHOR> http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/118/the-next-email.html?partner=rss

<comment><USER2> god i'm fucking sick of people who claim they have a crystal ball, especially when they don't write code.

no file extensions, no privacy/crypto, no room to actually develop an idea, doesn't plug and play with other services (web apps like highrise, scripts that process mbox files, cellphones, ...). yeah, it's an email killer alright. especially when you go to send a message and you're greeted by a LOLcat that says you can't do what you want to do because they're dumbasses who don't know how to make a rapidly growing service scale.

</comment><comment><USER3> Personally, I don't think anything will truly replace email (at least not for many many years). Twitter is a nice fringe communication tool but simply that. Hopefully what Twitter and the new communication apps will contribute to is a reduction in the number of pointless short emails I get. Perhaps the article should be titled, Twitter is the new IM.

<comment><USER4> Absolutely. Twitter is _asynchronous_ IM.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Given how much noise Twitter generates in the Valley ecosystem, I was surprised to find out it only has something like 300-400K users (I can't find a reference right now, please correct me if I'm wrong - Compete seems to support that number though).

To me Twitter is the perfect example of the echo chamber.

</comment><comment><USER6> Anecdotally, Scoble once linked to a blog post of mine in his twitter linkblog and I think I got only two or three clickthroughs from it. So even though he may have 4000 users, measuring the value of a twitter follower is very different from measuring the value of a pageview. What exactly does it mean for one person to have more digital presence than another? What exactly is that worth? It seems like it will take a few years for these questions to get fully worked out.

</comment><comment><USER7> Nonsense!

</comment><comment><USER8> Twitter is the next distraction.

</comment><comment><USER9> business memoranda:email::twaddle:twitter</comment>


Show HN: House on Fire, Who Would You Save? - <AUTHOR> http://houseonfire.co Hi HackerNews,
I got fairly bored last week and decided to use my spare time to create a social experiment where theoretically there's a house on fire and you have to save one of your friends.
I created it pretty quickly so the code may be a bit heavy but it works pretty well (I'm sure one of you will be able to break it though!).
Hopefully the homepage is self explanatory...
If you login via FB (I'm adding Twitter shortly) you will be able to play the House on Fire game--it basically loads two of your Facebook friends and you have to choose who you would save.
It's pretty fun and I hope a few people enjoy it (if any). Feedback is welcomed too. Thanks! <comment><USER2> Well, you have a start, but I don't see where it's headed.

(1) Does it ever ask anything other than the David-Cameron-vs.-George-Osborne question?

(2) Why would I want to sign in with Facebook? (Actually, I wouldn't. Why would _someone_ want to sign in with Facebook?)

<comment><AUTHOR> 1) That's just an example.

2) If you with in with Facebook you get to play the actual game, where you have to decide between two friends, likewise, if your friends were signed in, they can play it too. If you get saved or you don't, you can actually see that in your feed.</comment></comment>


Insider's view of what Startups Need to Know about Patent Law - <AUTHOR> http://www.slideshare.net/JSchox/what-do-startups-need-to-know-about-patent-law

<comment><USER2> What does it mean on slide 18 that you lose protection if it was described in a printed publication?

<comment><AUTHOR> Y I wonder what constitutes "printed" in the eyes of the law. Web only has no bearing?

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Patents cost as much as 1/2 an employee. Which one gets you more value?</comment>