What can a technologist do about climate change? (2015) - <AUTHOR> http://worrydream.com/ClimateChange/?m=1 <comment><USER2> My opinion: There is no solution to this problem without strong public policy. What we have here is a problem of the market to deal with a strong negative externality. There are many ways to deal with this, but they all involve some sort of collective legally binding action. Carbon tax, cap & dividend, outright outlawing of certain industries or activities... these are all possible solutions, each with their own strengths. But individual action is not gonna cut it on this one. So, invent all the technological solutions you want. They will be useful, but only to solve the challenge which the public policy will create. Without the public policy, they're scarcely going to scratch the surface.

<comment><USER3> I've also noticed this when reading about ambitious ideas to solve this problem, they usually assume/depend on a tax on carbon and it reaching something like $150/ton by 2030, eg [1]

That means it is up to us, all of us, to identify the politicians who are delaying this and get them out of office very soon. In my opinion that is the next step in making meaningful progress and that is something anyone can contribute to if directed effectively. It's exciting seeing these kids around the world pressuring their politicians but I want to find an organized, well funded operation with only one objective, to prevent the wrong people from being (re)elected.

[1][https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/12/magazine/climeworks- busin...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/12/magazine/climeworks-business- climate-change.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Like many people here, I am a programmer (in Prague). My job is not particularly meaningful. Is there a way in which I can join the "war effort"? (It seems there really isn't any effort, but still.)

I mean, I understand there are likely technological problems to solve. Is there anywhere anybody who is looking for people to work on these problems, skills notwithstanding (I think I can learn)? Or are we just all waiting for each other to do something about it?

<comment><USER5> I have a wiki page full of practical things here: [http://wiki.secretgeek.net/practical-things-you-can-do- for-t...](http://wiki.secretgeek.net/practical-things-you-can-do-for-the- environme)

...even though they are not specifically for programmers. (A programmer mindset can help with many of those things.)

<comment><USER5> Also, this site has a growing list of practical things we can do:

[https://everydayactivist.org/choices/home](https://everydayactivist.org/choices/home)

<comment><USER6> I don't think this is what the GP post meant. All this is necessary, but as a programmer you can act as a multiplier and do more. (edit: as also the article discusses, at some points a bit vaguely. It also has some more/different points compared to this list here.)

Upcoming challenges, for example, are grid balancing with the increasing amount of constantly changing renewable energy input, maybe to coordinate load on the grid with it (eg only start washing machines during the day when solar is available). Predicting near-future inputs from wind and sun forecast models also plays into this.

You can also always work on making things more energy-efficient or optimize processes so less energy is used (Manufacturing for example uses so much transport for in-between steps. Can we get rid of some of them?).

The holy grail is probably carbon capture. Some people are also working on that and might be able to use your expertise.

Another topic is mitigation. Enabling people especially in poorer countries to withstand increasingly frequent disturbances better - resilience - will help greatly. Many non-profits who work on this would love to have you help with technology. They can also connect you to ongoing state projects I think.

And then there is climate modelling. Some efforts are made to make the models accessible to the public, but it is hard. If someone put some work into this that would help a lot. Additionally, scientists are not the best coders. The best are working on the models, but in general the coding practices are severely lacking. You might be able to come around and just teach about that, and learn which kind of tools would be helpful. But then we know all we need to act at that front.

<comment><USER5> Interesting in theory.

Do you have a list of places where scientists are inviting coders to come and talk to them about coding practices? (Or organizations that can help with this)

What are some non-profits who work on enabling people in poorer countries to withstand disturbances? Are they looking for coders?

Who is working on carbon capture and looking for volunteer collaborators?

<comment><USER7> > What are some non-profits who work on enabling people in poorer countries to > withstand disturbances? Are they looking for coders?

The International Research Institute on Climate and Society at Columbia University's Earth Institute is looking for a programmer to work on their Data Library. Unfortunately I don't see a way to get a permalink to the job listing; you can find it by going to [https://jobs.columbia.edu/](https://jobs.columbia.edu/) , clicking "SEARCH OPEN POSITIONS" in the left nav, and specifying Department 6061.

I'm not affiliated with the group. I actually interviewed for the position last week, but probably won't end up taking it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This is a _great_ presentation.

I wish that he'd said more about 60% of everything used via electricity being "wasted". I suppose that it's largely the Carnot cycle. Given that the major sources are coal, natural gas and nuclear.

For coal and natural gas, that wasted energy means more than doubling CO2 emissions. But there's really no workaround, unless you use those fuels directly, and get all of your electricity from PV and wind.

That would be a major change. Maybe, as he argues for petroleum, it's better to just not use that stuff as fuel. Just as chemical feedstocks.

Edit: grammar

</comment><comment><USER9> Use your rights as a shareholder to push companies & funds to improve on climate.

This tries to make that easy, for example: [https://www.yourstake.org/ask/vanguard-vanguard-tell- compani...](https://www.yourstake.org/ask/vanguard-vanguard-tell-companies-to- have-climate-plan/)

</comment><comment><USER10> Bret should team up with Andrew Yang where he breaks down the Freedom Dividend (UBI) Bret Victor style.

</comment><comment><USER11> A great presentation, but he has omitted a huge area where improvements can be made, if not necessarily directly through software; agriculture.

A large factor in the current ecological crisis is our agricultural footprint, and I think there is a lot of scope to innovate there.

For example one of his sidebar statistics shows that fully 50% of US land is devoted to agriculture. That seems huge, and something to be addressed in itself. I think we should be aiming to return land to nature as far as possible.

Growing rice on floating platforms at sea? Lab meat? underground or tall-tower hydroponic salad farms? Etc, etc.

</comment><comment><USER12> I created a github organization to allow people to choose an impactful area of work that Bret outlined in his presentation to do on a donation basis when they have some free time. The first area I added was Wind Capacity Estimation.

Come join if you'd like to work on this!

[https://github.com/climate- technologists/discussion](https://github.com/climate-technologists/discussion)

</comment><comment><USER13> Vote against those who would destroy the commons in favor of more money.

<comment><USER14> ... because checking the right box with a pencil once in a while is considered sufficient action against a global existential threat?

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Vote

</comment><comment><USER14> Take the Liberation Pledge[0]; join (or start) a Critical Mass[1]; take action against the military industrial complex (Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, ...)

[0]: [http://www.liberationpledge.com/](http://www.liberationpledge.com/)

[1]: [http://www.critical-mass.org/](http://www.critical-mass.org/)

</comment><comment><USER16> Invent better forms of energy.

</comment><comment><USER17> Push for more nuclear power.

<comment><USER18> Nuclear (fission) is the _only_ _ _current_ _ form of technology that can solve the problem.

Side note: anyone know why there's been a recent uptick in nuclear articles on HN?

<comment><USER17> Because more and more people like Bill Gates are pushing for it?

<comment><USER18> He's been pushing it for a decade. Though there seems to be more articles here that are anti than pro (though both exist).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Plants. Plant trees, plant as many trees as possible. The planet is warming naturally anyways, if we are speeding it up (we are, that's like 99.9999% certain, right?), we are heading there anyways. Humans will be fine regardless, the planet will be fine regardless.

Adapt, evolve...and plant trees. Focus on meaning, worrying about climate change is a fools purpose imo

 _the bigger picture is not climate change_ look past it.

<comment><USER20> We are heading into very dangerous territory. While there may be some natural warming, the effects we see now are overwhelmingly anthropogenic, and thus can be mitigated by emissions controls. Your suggestion to the contrary is not at all supported scientifically.

We are probably locked in to 2-3C rise at this point, and realistically we may hit more like 4C or more eventually with politically realistic emissions scenarios.

If emissions go completely uncontrolled in the future, an ultimate warming of 10C or more, while not likely, is not out of the question. That would be completely civilization-ending, and would cause a mass extinction of scale not seen since the P-T boundary several hundred million years ago.

This is a problem we are causing. We need to take it seriously. Anyone who buys homeowner's insurance should agree with that logic.

<comment><USER18> I think what the OP is getting at is that we need to sequester that carbon. I'm all in for reducing emissions as much as we can. But that doesn't take care of the contaminants already in the air and ocean (and what is being released from under the ice). Sequestration is an important step that we need to be taking seriously.

Though I don't agree with their comment about worrying is for fools.

Edit: It doesn't seem that's what OP is getting at. But __ _I_ __ think we need to talk about sequestration in conjunction with radically lowering our emissions.

<comment><USER19> It's because the human purpose isn't to stay on this planet. Depends on your worldview, but yes it is a fools purpose in the greater sense of things.

<comment><USER6> No matter what we do, Earth will stay the most hospitable planet by far for us. Ten degrees more, ten degrees less.. still a walk in the park compared to all other places.

<comment><USER18> I think this is what a lot of people forget. And to get technical, there are places that are (likely) just as hospitable, but we can't reach them in any reasonable amount of time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Have a clear, convincing response for the top 'climate denier' arguments. For experimental evidence, provide all the data in an easily accessible form, explain how to reproduce the compelling results, and provide the software to do so. Also address possible deficiencies in the data and the modeling techniques.

</comment><comment> munk-a Hrm, I have a less traditional approach. Slap a denier, their numbers are few so they'll probably get a good 2-3 slaps each, then we can talk like reasonable people. /s

(Please don't do violence...)

But honestly, at this point, it's futile, idiots are idiots and people who aren't idiots need to fix things within our political system and then send a bunch of the top idiots to jail to teach them a lesson. My patience for gradualism has entirely dissolved. If you're one of the many Californians of HN here please devote some time to kicking Feinstein out of office next round, her continued republican-lite attitude isn't getting anything done.

<comment><USER22> I've been enjoying some success just talking to climate-change deniers. Just calmly, rationally, taking the time to listen to their concerns and ideas (which are crazy paranoid). Not my idea - it's outlined in this awesome TED talk: [https://www.ted.com/talks/katharine_hayhoe_the_most_importan...](https://www.ted.com/talks/katharine_hayhoe_the_most_important_thing_you_can_do_to_fight_climate_change_talk_about_it?language=en)

It takes a lot of patience, but I find after a while they feel like they've been heard and they become more open to learning more about the science behind climate change, feel less threatened by it, etc. The media is doing a poor job of educating the public on the issue. It's also slow, because it's a one-on- one approach that takes a lot of time. But I figure it's worth it if I can change one climate-denier's mind.</comment></comment>


Logjam: the latest TLS vulnerability explained - <AUTHOR> https://blog.cloudflare.com/logjam-the-latest-tls-vulnerability-explained/?

<comment><USER2> A bit off topic, but I find it quite disheartening that cloudflare has regular blog posts about how great their security is and how safe you are with cloudflare, but at the same time offers customers seriously broken SSL options.

2 of the 3 options ("Universal SSL" and "Full SSL") are not "secure" by today's standards. Universal SSL leaves connections to the origin unsecured allowing for passive and active MITM attackers to intercept things. Full SSL allows an active MITM to intercept origin connections.

Advertising these services as "SSL" is misleading and offers a false sense of security to visitors as they will see the nice green SSL lock and think their connection to a cloudflare-protected website is fully protected. Meanwhile their credit card information and other personal details could be travelling over the internet in plain text to the origin.

<comment><USER3> Not to mention their disgraceful Tor captchas.

<comment><USER4> Why do you think they have implemented these? Just to inconvenience you?

<comment><USER5> (Another Tor browser user here.) Yes, it sure seems so. Half the time I visit Hacker News (which is behind Cloudflare) I have to fill in a captcha. I'm logged in with a 3k rep account and I'm not trying to do any action, I'm just trying to see the front page. That is _surely_ suspicious enough to give me a captcha every ten minutes.

Edit: to respond to both comments at once: alright Cloudflare may not recognize my HN cookie and account, but they do have two cf_* cookies, and I am merely loading the homepage. No weird URL parameters, no POST data, nothing.

<comment><USER6> Dude, you're assuming that from that same exact IP address they aren't getting a ton of other traffic that isn't spamming the hell out of them or doing completely sketchy stuff. That's what happens when you share an IP address with other people -- especially those who might be criminals or have other nefarious motives for using tor.

<comment><USER5> And that's why IP banning is a silly thing in IPv4. In Italy there is CGNAT widely deployed for years and Asian ISPs have big trouble obtaining IPv4 addresses as well.

Dude.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Like reported earlier it is quite easy to test if your server is (still) affected. I used [http://security.uwsoftware.be/logjam](http://security.uwsoftware.be/logjam) since it didn't had a cache on it. That makes it possible to fix and confirm fixed. (IIUC most other tools had a cache. So when testing after fixing it was just showing that it was still vulnerable).

</comment><comment><USER8> I wish there were more diagrams (like the one in this article) that explains how specific HTTPS ciphersuites work and how all keys are derived and agreed upon, and not just the initial TLS handshake. I would like to learn why I need to generate an RSA key for my server when it's just using AES in the end. I want to know the steps in the black magic involved in going from an asymmetric cipher to a symmetric one.

<comment><USER9> (Author here.) Beautiful! I'm about to start a strictly technical podcast about cryptography and attacks, and I was planning to do the first episode on all the TLS Key Exchanges. I'm super-happy to see that there might be interest on this in particular :)

Keep an eye on blog.filippo.io maybe, then!

<comment><USER10> Well, you've piqued my interest! :D

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Great article! And shameless plug, my take on the attack which I think complement this article well: [http://cryptologie.net/article/270/the-logjam- attack/](http://cryptologie.net/article/270/the-logjam-attack/)

</comment><comment><USER12> Loved cloudflare idea and used them for several websites driving > 2M views per day, and it's great to see them post things about security, but from my experiences/benchmarks:

        * Inject JS via html packets rewriting
        * High numbers of false positives even on lowest threshold
        * Issues with flash resources for some users
        * Odd price structure (Based on number of domains not traffic)
        * Adsense on error/not-a-bot pages

</comment><comment><USER13> Nice logo.</comment>


Ask HN: Which parts of everyday life are more complex than people expect? - <AUTHOR> I recently appeared on radio to talk about Unicode [1]. In the introduction, I said that Unicode is interesting because text encoding and rendering sounds (at least to Western people) like something that's boring and solved, but then you look at how people actually write across the globe and you go down this gigantic rabbit hole.
Afterwards, I realized that in IT, we touch on a lot of aspects of real life that a layman thinks of as boring or trivial, but which turn out to be surprisingly complex when you look at them in detail. Since my time on radio was quite fun, I'm thinking about maybe making a small podcast series on these surprising complexities.
Now, of course the first step is to actually come up with a list of such things. That's my question for you: Do you know some aspect of everyday life that is much more complex than what laypeople usually appreciate?
I'll start with the first one that came to my mind: time zones. Did you know there are actually two time zones in Germany? The first one covers nearly all of Germany, the second one is for one tiny village of 1,300 people that is one very special snowflake in a lot of ways [2].
[1] Recording is here, but it's German: https://c3d2.de/news/pentaradio24-20180724.html
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%C3%BCsingen_am_Hochrhein <comment><USER2> All of the utility functions: gas, water, sewerage have to deal with surge effects. They have buffering just like internet routing and switching. Time of day effects. It's more complex than you would think. A friend does salt water fish tanks for a reef, he's in a constant battle with dilute chemicals and aeration. Now scale that to a city..

Traffic flow policing is like live operations research: tweak one bit, the others Go bananas. The tail back delay usually outlives the actual blockage by hours.

Supply chain logistics in goods and services. How does a small tire shop in the city get stock to fix that one off car walk in? Milk supply..

Oh dairy: making ghee? In a factory? You have like a 4C temperature window. Colder, try pipe cleaners on twenty tonnes of rancid butter. Hotter? It burns black..

Concrete pouring depends on slump tests done onsite. Watch what they're doing with that two part mould and simultaneously pouring the entire load into a pumper. Now think about it going wrong. Or the concrete delivery itself, that's a nightmare.

</comment><comment><USER3> Coffee. Anyone can make a cup of coffee. Making a good and properly prepared cup of coffee, espresso, etc. is surprisingly complex.

I wanted to make myself a simple cappuccino at home. I now have several pieces of prosumer gear, gadgets, fancy beans, and spend my free time reading up on things like coffee grind distribution methods, hacking my machine to add a PID, and other such ephemera. On the plus side, I'm saving several hundred dollars a year on my coffee habit despite all the toys, so there's that.

<comment><USER4> This goes for homebrewing (beer/wine) too. If you can make oatmeal you can make beer, but if you want to make the same beer exactly the same over and over it is very complex. The fact that Budweiser tastes the same all over the US and is made in 12(?) different locations is a testament to how good the brewers are (even if beer snobs don't like it).

As for coffee, even the foam on top of an espresso is complex.

You might enjoy this paper if you haven't already read it: [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3140933/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3140933/)

<comment><USER3> This paper contains the phrase "Air–Beverage Interface," definitely going on my reading list. Thanks for sharing!

And agreed on the consistency part. For espresso, once you figure out what you like, you begin the endless quest to make it that way consistently.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Almost everything in your home, down to your throwaway plastic bags and disposable napkins, has massive supply chains that led to their production.

</comment><comment><USER6> Judging by your first suggestion, it sounds somewhat like a podcast-version of Half As Interesting, on Youtube (my pet peeve with that channel is it has several "I think I'm being funny" quips interspersed throughout). Regardless, I think there's tons of room in the media space for such an idea. Go for it!

Regarding the question in the title specifically, everything at all times is complex. Now, if we choose to see it that way, that's another question. Ex. A car gets us from point A to point B, and so we see it as such (ie, what it does for us, not what it is). But when that car breaks down, its intricate and endless complexity is revealed to us. All of a sudden, we get a glimpse of what it _is_ and not what it does for us. Which is to say, we look at everyday life at the lowest resolution possible, in order to get on with our day. It has to be high enough resolution to hold some value and meaning, but not so high that it adds unneeded complexity to our life.

</comment><comment><USER7> You might like to check out the BBC podcast "the boring talks". People discussing the hidden complexity behind mundane objects. [https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p05t3gr2](https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p05t3gr2)

</comment><comment><USER2> Analogue TV and radio rebroadcast used to depend on atomic time. The vbi timing stuff needs to be regenerated as it's rebroadcast. Sure.. you can let it slip: what if people set their clocks from the timing pips on the radio?

Likewise mains AC power frequency policing. It has quite interesting set points and limits.

<comment><AUTHOR> Power frequency policing is a great idea! I actually saw a talk about this a few years ago, but it didn't cross my mind yet. Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> The Surprisingly Awesome podcast seems to have done a bit of what you're looking for while it existed. Some episodes more successful than others, but that's a strict topic podcast, with a strict release schedule for you.

[https://www.gimletmedia.com/surprisingly- awesome](https://www.gimletmedia.com/surprisingly-awesome)

You should be able to find audience reaction to the podcast and it's cancellation if you dig around a bit on reddit. Learn from their work and make yours better.

Also, 99% Invisible would be another podcast to research to ensure you are barking up a different tree

[https://99percentinvisible.org/](https://99percentinvisible.org/)

</comment><comment><USER9> It's tempting and perhaps lazy to say 'everything' but it really feels that way if you consider creating a video game about any mundane thing like putting on socks of brushing teeth. With respect to things we use I cherish it all, from the TV, to the wires charging my phone, to the plastic bags in the kitchen. Too many people treat things with disrespect or junk when they could never know how they were made and could never replicate the process themselves. A more interesting question might be what's the most complex single product or service used in everyday life.

</comment><comment><USER10> Breathing. I never think about the fact that I'm able to breathe without issues until that ability is compromised by a cold or flu. The science of breathing is deeply complicated and there are multiple processes that make it possible for you to successfully inhale and exhale as you're doing now. The human body is incredible.

[https://www.unm.edu/~lkravitz/Article%20folder/Breathing.htm...](https://www.unm.edu/~lkravitz/Article%20folder/Breathing.html)

</comment><comment><USER11> Most of the annoyances in my life come from dinosaur corporations who have dumb policies and most likely won't go out of business for it.

Some examples:

1) Banks in the US put the burden of ID theft on the consumer. This is hilarious, because it is the bank who has been robbed, not me. Additionally, why does my bank mail my personal info to my former addresses for a few months? I always ask for web statements only.

2) Why does a passport cost nearly $100?

3) Why can't visas and borders be paperless and less restrictive?

4) Why can't month-to-month leases be easier to find?

<comment><USER12> As for 4) probably because it's a high risk and high overhead for most complexes. How do you see that working out? FWIW I often sign short leases (6 to 12 months) and friends who have gone for internships without provided housing have used airbnb. Seems to be a fine alternative.

<comment><USER11> In my area, I've tried very hard to negotiate leases of less than a year-- they just don't do it, because of our East Coast version of NIMBYism.

Airbnb can be of dodgy quality sometimes, but it has filled most of the demand as you say. There are lots of property taxes and squatter-friendly laws in my area, so I guess thats why landlords feel the need to have very restrictive terms :/

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Dealing with email addresses. Consider this case:

You get two signups on a website. One is for email@example.com and the other is for email@example.com. Is this one person or two separate people? And how do you store them in a database?

Some email systems will treat me and Me as two separate users, so if you change the case there is a chance the wrong person will get the email. So, the advice is that you should never change the case. But if you don't change the case should you treat them as separate users?

<comment><USER14> Yes you should treat them as separate users, because there is less chance of you doing something wrong.

What you need to consider at sign ups are more than just an email to distinguish.

Ex. if name, address and phone are the same, but the emails are different, chances are you have the same person and thus you can assume it is the same person.

<comment><USER13> I know all of this. The query was looking for everyday things that are more complicated than people expect.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> stomach biome and brain interaction (as many neurons in the stomach as in a cats brain).</comment>


Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://www.ohchr.org/EN/UDHR/Documents/UDHR_Translations/eng.pdf <comment><USER2> It is a lovely document, and one we should better adopt in practice.

<comment><USER3> Unfortunately, this document is ignored at will by major powers of the world. And thanks to the current political climate and the Internet which made news and information widely available, propagandists can freely exploit the facts, and push a "human rights is hypocrisy/irrelevant" narrative. Now I see more and more people from various countries genuinely believe "human rights are bullsh*t, the act of becoming a superpower is more important than human rights, and I don't care if some people suffer". The most worrying part is, many are not indoctrinated, but are middle-class people who convinced themselves to be self-interested to the point of ignoring human rights, as long as it can make their life better.

It's definitely something terrible for the world, recognized "universal" values only came to existence by pure coincidence. The beliefs that the system of representative democracy is just, universal and progressive is only an illusion created by a short period of technological and economic boom. Just like the lack of consciousness in the biosphere, the norm of the human history is empires and authoritarianism, returning back to that state is entirely possible if people stop to believe.

<comment><USER2> In my darkest moments, I also think the most high-minded improvements to human well-being and governance of the last 200 years are fleeting and and will soon be lost. Of course, there is hardly a better mission one could have but to preserve those things.

<comment><USER3> My personal impression is, after the continuum of War on Terror, Arab Spring, Syria, and deglobalization, this line of events have already destroyed the moral authorities and credibility of major Western powers (which are established post-Coldwar) in the world for your average Joe, these facts are frequently used by propagandists, the rise of popularity of Sputnik and RT is a obvious manifestation of that.

I'm not claiming that the post-Coldwar world order and globalization was just, of course it was not. But the total collapse of the previous system is not something without serious consequences. I could only hope that the current failures are "only" a temporary stagnation with limited conflicts and damages, that this situation is merely a transitional period, and could be soon solved peacefully by the next technological innovations. On the other hand, if it's not true, I can only hope it's not a repetition of pre-World War I history.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Counterpoint: [http://www.generation- online.org/p/fpdeleuze10.htm](http://www.generation- online.org/p/fpdeleuze10.htm)

Quote:

\----

Desire is not putting something up on a pedestal and saying, hey, I desire this. We don't desire liberty and so forth, for example; that doesn't mean anything. We find ourselves in situations.

Take today's Armenia, a recent example. What is the situation there? If I understand correctly -- please let me know if I don't, though that's not the point either -- there's an Armenian enclave in another Soviet republic. So there's an Armenian republic, and then an enclave. Well, that's a situation. First, there's the massacre that the Turks, or the Turkic people, I'm not sure, massacre the Armenians once again, in their enclave. The Armenians take refuge in their republic -- I think, and again, please correct my errors -- and then, there, an earthquake hits. It's as if they were in the Marquis de Sade. These poor people went through the worst ordeals that they could face, and they've only just escaped into shelter when Mother Nature starts it all up again.

I mean, we say "human rights", but in the end, that's a party line for intellectuals, and for odious intellectuals, and for intellectuals without any ideas of their own. Right off the bat, I've noticed that these declarations of human rights are never done by way of the people that are primarily concerned, the Armenian associations and communities, and so on. Their problem isn't human rights. What is it?

The Armenian problem is typical of what one might call a problem of jurisprudence. It is extraordinarily complex. What can be done to save the Armenians, and to enable the Armenians to extricate themselves from this situation? And then, on top of things, the earthquake kicks in. An earthquake whose unfolding also had its reasons, buildings which weren't well built, which weren't put together as they should have been. All of these things are jurisprudence cases. To act for liberty, to become a revolutionary, this is to act on the plane of jurisprudence. To call out to justice -- justice does not exist, and human rights do not exist. What counts is jurisprudence: _that_ is the invention of rights, invention of the law. So those who are content to remind us of human rights, and recite lists of human rights -- they are idiots. It's not a question of applying human rights. It is one of inventing jurisprudences where, in each case, this or that will no longer be possible. And that's something quite different.</comment>


Show HN: How to make your own glowing notification cube - <AUTHOR> http://achariam.com/prototyping/ <comment><USER2> > After creating the first prototype I realized a number of things. While it > was cool there wasn't enough utility to justify creating another one. The > only way I could have figured that out is by making and using this prototype > for several months.

I did something similar with LEDs [not a cube, just a board with lights] to alert on various things before just having the Pi power an old wall mounted LCD I wasn't using anymore + a dashboard.

It is one of those ideas that is awesome in theory but its really hard to justify the time/effort beyond "FUN!"

<comment><AUTHOR> Exactly, I agree wholeheartedly. There is a limited amount of granularity you can get with using colors. Incidentally, I'm also messing around with tiny displays now. - [https://www.dropbox.com/s/r5993ylrqmjoegn/screentest.jpg?dl=...](https://www.dropbox.com/s/r5993ylrqmjoegn/screentest.jpg?dl=0)

<comment><USER3> Very cool. What I've been really searching for is a large e-ink display. I'd love to do a RaspPi powered "cork board".

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh nice, not sure how large you're thinking but if it's under 6 inches you could probably get one decently cheap from Alibaba(the Chinese Amazon). I think the larger displays (10 inches+) were only manufactured for special use cases like the Kindle DX hence the limited availability. Cool idea though!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> "If you're constantly willing to learn and adapt you can make anything."

</comment><comment><USER5> This looks like a great first project to get introduced to some basic electronics, thanks for sharing.

</comment><comment><USER6> the design of your website is incredible! a little hard to navigate around however, how did you build the cube animation in the top?

<comment><USER7> I think the white text against blue background is a rough choice. On the right monitor and brightness, it's fine; on the wrong one, it's illegible. Text either needs to be thicker or the color schema needs work.

<comment><USER8> I agree. I like the blueprint theme, but those ultra-thin fonts need to go away. If there is a potential for your font to render with sections being only fractions of pixels thick, you get a very illegible result.</comment></comment></comment>


Why Russia should not attack Sweden? - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@alexewerlof/why-russia-should-not-attack-sweden-2061517e7a46 <comment><USER2> Any person with a brain knows that Russia won't invade any country. NATO just needs an arch enemy to justify its existence and it seems everyone want to believe that the Russians are still those evil commies of old.

<comment><USER3> > Any person with a brain knows that Russia won't invade any country.

...like Ukraine over Crimea.

Of course they won't invade Finland or Estonia or Poland or Latvia or Lithuania, because the treaty says NATO _may_ intervene (though it's not guaranteed).

But we still need some international millitary force for stabilization US-or- otherwise invaded regions.

<comment><USER2> Ah Crimea ... explain me why Kosovo can vote for its independence of Serbia and it's OK but Crimea can't choose its fate ?

Can you even find a significant number of Crimeans that are unhappy with the situation ? If Crimea had really been invaded by Russia where are all the testimonials of the Crimeans saying that their life is worse than before and that they wish to go back to Ukraine ?

<comment><USER4> Kosovo independence was not a result of a referendum. It was the parliament's decision. The legality of the declaration is being disputed.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


George Lucas loses Stormtrooper battle at Supreme Court - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14287864 <comment><USER2> Now had the Lucas camp thought to negotiate a license with royalty (smallish) then all this time they would have been making money instead of paying for one loss after another. Not to mention damage to their fan base.

</comment><comment><USER3> (in the UK) Had the artist been based in the US, he'd be paying legal debts and a settlement fee the rest of his life and maybe serve time.

</comment><comment><USER4> The title invokes quite a picture - Lucas' stormtroopers getting defeated in a fierce battle with the Supreme Court as scenery.</comment>


Christians Bailing on GoDaddy Due to 'Immoral' Advertising - <AUTHOR> http://blog.wired.com/business/2009/02/christians-bail.html <comment><USER2> Confession: I'm a christian entrepreneur and I purchase all my domains and SSL certificates from GoDaddy. I never got the memo that I should boycott their services.

I have no problem with groups (christian or not) choosing to boycott certain companies because they object to their marketing practices. But I personally don't have time to cherry-pick these companies myself and make a public statement out of it.

I'm too busy trying to nurture my own family and business to worry about GoDaddy.

One last note: when it comes to watching sports (which my daughters enjoy watching with me), I find ads for E.D. treatments much more uncomfortable than GoDaddy's.

<comment><USER3> _I find ads for E.D. treatments much more uncomfortable than GoDaddy's._

You are certainly not the only one. Sports fan friends with kids mentioned E.D. ads on sports games over the holidays. They like to watch games as a family, but the ads make them think twice. I can't say I blame them.

I see this as part of a larger problem that the only way we currently have to control the ads we see is to just turn off or change the channel.

<comment><USER4> Am I the only confused as to how they can continue to run those ads? Didn't the founders of that company get indicted?

<comment><USER5> Not _those_ ones, the other ones made by companies like Pfizer and Eli Lilly. The "legit" ones.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> How about bailing on GoDaddy because they provide the exact wrong balance between control and simplicity.

Also: <http://nodaddy.com>

And a comic I find particularly funny: <http://echopic.com/gnv>

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I didn't care about the sexy ads, I bailed because of their car salesman interface.

<comment><USER7> I was just on GoDaddy this morning trying to change some DNS settings for one of my domains. I made the changes and clicked 'submit' only to find they pushed an up-sell ad in there and made me click another 'submit' button to make the changes. On a freakin' settings page!

What'd you end up switching to?

<comment><USER8> I'm not the OP, but I switched to namecheap and never looked back. They usually have a coupon for discounted transfers, if you decide to go for them. (Try RetailMeNot or just google "namecheap coupon february 2009")

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm an atheist and a confirmed sexual libertine but those ads pissed me off too. Too tacky even for the Superbowl, which is saying something.

Much worse, though, was the ad for some damn NBC crime drama which showed some pretty young girl falling into the hands of a serial killer, then showed him burying her in a shallow grave down by the river or something. Yet another show about fear, pain and misery.

</comment><comment><USER10> Anytime you take a strong position on anything you risk losing part of your client base. A lot of people (myself included) feel strongly about how portraying sexuality in certain ways can impact a societies attitudes in a negative manner. The fact that those opinions affect purchasing habits stands to reason.

</comment><comment><USER11> No, _some_ Christians are bailing on GoDaddy because of the ads. Many of us just don't care.

A whole lot of Christians are not Fundamentalist Christians who want to control your life and dictate your morals. Unfortunately, the sane ones don't get nearly as much press.

<comment><USER12> Well, if a person's Christianity doesn't affect others, then it doesn't really matter to others that they're a Christian, does it? Someone trying to control my life is exactly the sort of thing I'd want to hear about, if it's happening. :)

<comment><USER11> There are many ways to affect others. You can help them, comfort them, share with them, remind them that not all Christians are fundamentalists, ...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I am unhappy with Hostmonster. They auto renewed my account 15 days before it expired and it cost me $120 for a basic package. Sure, they probably told me in fine print when I checked the renew option, but who can remembers what they read in fine print 350 days ago? At least Godaddy only costs me $4 a month for auto renew.

</comment><comment><USER14> Christian Bale? I can only imagine his GoDaddy rant.

</comment><comment><USER15> who didn't see this coming? it all goes tribal. all of it. read "here comes everybody" and "snow crash."

</comment><comment><USER15> you know when the Christians bail, they say, "professionally, we are fucking OVER."

</comment><comment><USER16> This kinda stuff makes me really cross/sick; as someone _majorly_ opposed to cencorship....

It's a fairly pathetic episode and a sad description on modern religion.

(as an addendum when I asked the Church at the end of the road to stop handing leaflets/preaching to my young cousin as she walked passed I got into all sorts of trouble for religious descrimination.... double standards!).

/rant over (sorry)

<comment><USER17> This isn't censorship, it's a boycott, and it's a perfectly valid way to express your dislike for a company's PR decisions. I don't care about the ads, but I wish _more_ consumers would put their money where their mouth is in dealing with company practices they find inappropriate.

Censorship would be these groups lobbying the FCC to ban the commercials.

<comment><USER18> Censorship 2.0, then. Easier to create an uproar on the internet than bend the FCC to your will.

Personally, I found the commercials stupid and I dislike GoDaddy for reasons beyond their advertisements.

<comment><USER19> Since you consider it censorship, would you prefer that these people continue giving their money to a company they find morally objectionable?

<comment><USER18> They can take their money wherever they want. That's not what they are doing, though. Rather, they would have GoDaddy adhere to their moral standards.

<comment><USER19> What's wrong with that?

<comment><USER19> Why am I being downmodded for asking someone to clarify his position?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I thought the ads were stupid and tasteless... but come on, you're already watching war porn (pro sports) and you are going to get upset about some cleavage?

<comment><USER21> That's rather a sensationalist way of putting it. Different people watch football for different reasons. Yes, psychologically sports exist as a way of channelling male aggression (which is a fascinating subject besides) but people don't _watch_ it as an alternative to watching war. There's an element to entertainment like the Superbowl that nothing else has.

Also, it's an old adage that America's fine with violence but hates breasts and naughty language. See South Park/every anti-censorship comedy ever made in America.

Also also, it;s fair enough to say you don't want to deal with a _domain host_ because they think the best way to advertise services is to _wave tits in your face._ I'm regretting that I use it to register domains, because frankly I'd like to hold companies to a slightly higher level of self-respect.</comment></comment>


It's the Economy, Girlfriend - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/nyregion/28daba.html?em

<comment><USER2> I really want these gals to put together a musical, call it Gold Diggers of 2010 with sad songs about how they can't even get a decent divorce from the bum and such. And a heartwarming story of the one girl with a clear heart whose love inspires solvency in her man.

</comment><comment><USER3> My GF actually sent me a link to the blog the other day ;) <http://dabagirls.com/> Its a great day to be a software developer in NYC, maybe I should head down to some bars in the financial district ;)!</comment>


Harvard study: Computers don't save hospitals money - <AUTHOR> http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9141428/Harvard_study_Computers_don_t_save_hospitals_money

<comment><USER2> Anyone in any hospital could have told them that. At my hospital, no (few?) people find our computer systems efficient for patient care. This study is essentially a formalization of that observation.

For the past 5 years, I've been tempted to start an open-source, highly- modular system for hospitals to use for patient care, administration, and billing. Such a project wouldn't make anyone rich, but would certainly make you famous.</comment>


Show HN: MetaSync – Image Meta Editor, macOS App to Update Metadadata of Images - <AUTHOR> https://appstoreconnect.apple.com/WebObjects/iTunesConnect.woa/ra/ng/app/1469013577 <comment><AUTHOR> Apologies everyone, correct app URL is - [https://apps.apple.com/us/app/metasync-image-meta- editor/id1...](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/metasync-image-meta- editor/id1469013577)

</comment><comment><USER2> I'm pretty sure you've shared the wrong URL.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's a direct AppStore URL. I think need to promotional website URL, right?

<comment><USER2> What you've posted is an AppStoreConnect URL - where you manage the apps you publish. I'm guessing this is the URL you want (although probably for the Thai store since that's where my account is): [https://apps.apple.com/th/app/metasync-image-meta- editor/id1...](https://apps.apple.com/th/app/metasync-image-meta- editor/id1469013577?mt=12)

<comment><AUTHOR> No it's a web link and you can open it in the browser and when opened it will ask you to see app in AppStore app (if you using macOS system). Or you can search for the App in macOS AppStore using name "MetaSync". App is available in all markets.

<comment><USER2> Open the link you posted in a different browser or a private browsing window.

You will be asked to authenticate to AppStore Connect.

Or don't. I've tried to help you, but you clearly don't want help. Do whatever you want.

<comment><AUTHOR> Apologies Stephenr, I didn't mean to that and I guess something was wrong with my browser. Whenever I was clicking it was going to the web version of app info but now when you said to check in private session it was redirecting to login.

Here is the correct URL - [https://apps.apple.com/us/app/metasync-image-meta- editor/id1...](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/metasync-image-meta- editor/id1469013577)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Luamon – Live development utility for Lua - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/edubart/luamon <comment><AUTHOR> I've been using this project for quite some time now, it speed up my development cycle with Lua or even C++ projects a lot. Typically I have a terminal and an editor always showing on my screen then whenever I do a change in the source code I can instantly see the result. I wanted to share as it may be useful and save time for others.

The project is inspired on nodemon. Before this I was using nodemon, however decided to make my own version due to some personal annoyances with nodemon that I would encounter in daily basis and to get rid of nodejs bloat in my setup.

<comment><USER2> Congrats on shipping, this looks really cool. Do you want to write an editorial for the next edition of my Lua newsletter? Would love to feature this project.

[https://luadigest.netlify.com](https://luadigest.netlify.com)</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Algorithm behind Windows thumbnail preview? - <AUTHOR> Hopefully it is not too offensive to the audience. Just aiming to satisfy my curiosity.
I was printing a Word document where I entered a picture with complex patterns. When hovering on the Word icon on the taskbar (windows 10), it shows a preview thumbnail. However -- whatever algorithm is used-- it compressed the image so that the preview showed a remarkably different image. I thought it was neat and wanted to figure out what's behind it, or at least some pointer. For no reason.
Since I'm not even sure where to start finding this out, I thought I'd ask. Is HN the right site for this? I guess I'll find out! <comment><USER2> Do you have a screenshot to show what you mean?

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Alternatively, do you know of a good place to ask questions of the type?

<comment><USER3> Check out Super User (superuser.com), it's from the same people that made Stack Overflow.</comment></comment>


We're running out of water, and the world's powers are very worried - <AUTHOR> https://www.revealnews.org/article/were-running-out-of-water-and-the-worlds-powers-are-very-worried/?utm_source=pocket&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=pockethits <comment><USER2> No we're not. We're running out of ingenuity.</comment>


U.S. Versus Europe: No Winner - <AUTHOR> http://www.nationaljournal.com/njmagazine/wn_20100116_2302.php

<comment><USER2> _For some reason, not many seem to move to Europe. The traffic seems to be mainly in the other direction. A mystery._

Maybe not so much a mystery: the type of people who like the American system are statistically more likely to be the same type of people who are willing to move for new opportunities, while the type of people who like the European system are more likely to want to stay put.

<comment><USER3> Language is a big factor: English is the first foreign language taught in European schools (and the mother language of most UK and Irish citizens); Americans are traditionally poor at foreign languages, so are less likely to move to a country where they need to learn one.

Another factor is culture - America is more "welcoming" to ethnic minorities, and is built more or less on top of recent immigrants. European nations have a stronger ethnic identity which is less able or willing to accept new groups.

Really though you can't compare America to Europe in a single generalization - Poland, UK and Spain, to name a few, are completely different places, more so than, say, California and West Virginia. It will be impossible (and undesirable) to achieve the same kind of unity America has, not in this century anyway.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This guy is delusional. Big time. First of all - what that means?: [level of living standards in United States is still a lot higher.] I never heard about this expression - "level of living standards".Where it is derived from?

Now if we abandon PPP adjusted GDP we'll see that US is not that super-rich country - average GDP per capita places USA on 17th place, far behind many european countries. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28nom...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28nominal%29_per_capita) Even Canada (that has been long time a laughstock of USA), in fact has a tiny little difference in nominal GDP with USA - 1-2k$. So why nominal GDP of Canada is 2000$ less than American, but adjusted 8000$ less?. Because Canada is a lot more equal society: GINI (inequality) in Canada = 34 (little higher than european) GINI in USA = 45 (average for African countries). To maintain equality you need more taxes. So less left in pockets of consumers.

Now, let's move to hallucinations: "European unemployment rate is higher than American": USA=10% Norway=3.6% Netherlands = 3.6% Denmark=4.40% Austria=4.8%

You want me continue?? What about obesity: <http://www.equalitytrust.org.uk/why/evidence/obesity> And social mobility?: <http://www.equalitytrust.org.uk/why/evidence/social-mobility> Infant death: <http://www.equalitytrust.org.uk/why/evidence/physical-health> Child well- being: [http://www.equalitytrust.org.uk/why/evidence/child-well- bein...](http://www.equalitytrust.org.uk/why/evidence/child-well-being)

<comment><USER5> But you can't abandon PPP, our income goes a _lot_ further than the typical European's. From Wikipedia: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purchasing_power_parity>

" _[PPP] equalizes the purchasing power of different currencies in their home countries for a given basket of goods. Using a PPP basis is arguably more useful when comparing differences in living standards on the whole between nations because PPP takes into account the relative cost of living and the inflation rates of different countries, rather than just a nominal gross domestic product (GDP) comparison._ "

And you're cherry picking unemployment figures, from particularly small countries.

E.g. go to [http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/tgm/table.do?tab=table&...](http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/tgm/table.do?tab=table&language=en&pcode=teilm020&tableSelection=1&plugin=1) and you'll see the 2009 November (September for the UK) rates for:

      EU:    9.5-10%

      France:  10.0%
      Italy:    8.3%
      Ireland: 12.9%
      Germany:  7.6%
      Spain:   19.4%
      UK:       7.8%

The above paints a rather different picture, doesn't it?

<comment><USER4> I advised to abandon PPP not because that I think that is a bad meausure, but just to show that Europeans are _not_ making less money. And the reason for higher prices for stuff patially that are paid better salaries., so to produce things you need to spend more money. And also Europe produce more stuff for its own consumption, that makes goods more expensive.

Now it is you who is cherry-picking.

About unemployment: Even if take EU average, we see that it is not higher than American average 10%. It is at _worst_ equal. Now USA often uses creative ways (unemployed but not seeking and all he other odd ways of meausuring) to meausure unemployment, If you read alternative sources, you can often see 17% of real unemployment in USA.

No it is not making meaningfully different picture.</comment></comment></comment>


The Good Employee, a story about how you can explain companies with graph theory - <AUTHOR> https://madeddu.xyz/posts/im-still-learning/ <comment> circles_for-day this post will benefit from heavy editing. Remove sentences unrelated to the main story arc. Introspection and reflection are only interesting to your self. You can remove anything resembling those too. Seems like a cool concept. I look forward to reading it.

<comment><USER3> I agree, the prioritization of humor over clarity creates a wall of distraction and frustration for me.

If you have something important to say, say it as clearly as you can. Use humor sparingly and only when it emphasizes a real point that naturally contains some humor or irony, not as the main ingredient.

The rare exception is when someone has an absolutely wickedly clever sense of humor that is so funny and enlightening you can't help reading, no matter how random the exposition. But that is high art.

<comment><USER4> > an absolutely wickedly clever sense of humor that is so funny and > enlightening you can't help reading

That describes G. K. Chesterton to a T.

<comment><USER5> Yes, but he used humor as an integral part of the explanation, not as an aside. "Dear Professor Whirlwind" is my favourite example of this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This is the kind of project that is going to get upvoted on HN because it's technically "interesting," but not super-deep. Unfortunately it's, in practice, completely worthless. Long post ahead, so apologies in advance.

1) First, let's look at the premise:

> But this time, let's analyze the things from a mathematical perspective - > because today if you don't speak about data and models, nobody hears you. > Let's give the theoretical machine learning definition of a modern AI > company: a modern AI company is a WUG - a.k.a. an Weighted Undirected Graph > - that links at least three different families of nodes - Employees, > Processes and Projects - in a chain of skills, troubles, goals, beers, > prizes, achievements, careers, promotions, pizza, parties, lies and God only > knows what else, with the overall goal to solve (or introduce) dependencies, > investigate (or ignore) consequences but, by the end of the day, feed the so > hungry desire to "change something" - also referred to as "bring something > in production".

This is nonsense, not to mention _completely_ arbitrary. If you're going to do this kind of thing (which game theorists actually do routinely), you need to very carefully define your terms. I have no idea what a process is; I have no idea what a project is; I have no idea what an employee even is (are contractors employees? they naturally have different incentives than full-time or part-time employees). Etc. I could make a just-as-valid post arguing that a company is actually a n-dimensional topological space (and then using vectors instead of edges/nodes, while getting totally different "results"), but what the hell does that mean?

2) Next, we have some (yet again) arbitrary definitions:

I'm especially confused about why things are proportional to other things, namely budget, cost, or headcount. Again, if you're going to try to provide a mathematical model for social behaviors, you better have some solid justification behind your definitions.

3) The assumption that humans are robots:

> Ok, so in a digital Forest like the one just described, you cannot move with > weapons to defend yourself against pumas - or whatever else lives inside a > real forest with the desire of eating you and your backpack full of energy > bars. Instead, the good Employee inside the WUG. Sorry, the Forest. Sorry > again, in the Company, uses his ability and applies the Prim's algorithm. > Now, before going ahead, it could be useful to remind some concepts about > graph exploration.

On the face of it, this _seems_ (?) right, I guess. But when you think about it for more than 30 seconds, you realize what an insane claim it actually is. Humans are _famously_ non-rational agents. The idea that humans subconsciously apply Prim's theorem is experimentally wrong... in fact, people are notoriously awful long-term decision makers, but I digress.

4) The weights table

Listen, I get it. Sometimes, you need to model social behavior. And to do that, you need to assign weight values to decisions. Again, game theorists do this all the time. But there's a few differences from a GT paper you'd read and this blog post. First of all, dude... like 15 weights? Really? This goes beyond speculative.

And second of all, we need justifications! Why is "pizza" -15, but "parties" are -25? These systems are actually pretty sensitive to initial conditions; in fact, the more weights/nodes, the _more sensitive_ we'll be to initial conditions.

> Of course, you can add as many weights as you want.

Yeah, you could, but you _don 't_. In fact, the idea when creating these kinds of models is to try to _minimize_ these kinds of arbitrary weights.

5) People are robots.. again

Author claims "...yes, some of them apply Djistrka[sic]..." \-- again, this is simply experimentally wrong. And hearing it out loud just sound so awkward. I don't even think I "apply Dijkstra" when I walk back to my car.

6) Making policy based on math is stupid

> This state of confusion leads to the fear of hiring people who are not > expert in something, that is not able to solve company's actual problem: > that problem arose yesterday, come out months before, without nobody looking > in the right direction, because the minimum_spanning_tree rules them all

No, the minimum_spanning_tree does _not_ rule them all. Making company (or worse, political) policy based on these kinds of analyses is a plague. And sadly, these kinds of reductive and abstract models (often hailed as "data- driven") are tone-deaf and completely wrong.

<comment><USER7> Best to read this blog as an example of economic behaviour explained through a graph - valuable in itself, as even basic graph theory concepts rarely make it onto an economics curriculum. Which is a shame, given how neatly algorithmic thinking and complexity costs improve a standard rational agent model (e.g. a few behavioural economic concepts, such as myopic discounting, pop out naturally if you assume mental costs to imagining future states).

Conceptually, it's interesting and potentially foreign to the target reader - more formal definitions can wait for an academic paper rather than a casual blog.

<comment><USER6> > Best to read this blog as an example of economic behaviour explained through > a graph

Not sure if this is good company to keep. Generally speaking, behavioural economic models aren't worth the paper they're printed on.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Fucking terrible. Bad ideas multiplied by bad writing.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Hi, all :-) I'm the author. First of all, thank you, everyone, for your comments and interests: they are really appreciated and I think everyone touched somehow different things I thought as well before publishing it.

Excluding the fact that it could be written differently, more concise, more clear, etc - by the way, thank you for links and suggestions as well - <USER2> overall idea behind this post was to provide a 50-50 footprint (both funny and serious) around the human behavior in a complex organization. I think the first sentence that gives the reader an idea of the context in which the post will be placed is in the "[..], because today if you don't speak about data and models, nobody hears you." But... I didn't think a lot about this sentence, I think it was just for laziness, and I don't wanna give my opinion over this topic.

Back to the Prim behavior, I think this is all human and, by the way, shared across all people in every kind of organization, not only inside companies. I mean, not the algorithm, but - bringing it to the extremes - the human nature of being selfish. The idea of providing a high-level formalism to imagine a common scenario we all live every day came spontaneously to my mind, without being so convinced in the beginning. So I tried to figure out if the metaphor would have been a good fit for this idea I had in my mind. And this is it.

When I finished, I read it many times, and I know the feeling like "what the hell is saying? I'm confused" because I felt the same reading my old posts in the past... I'm not 100% sure, but I think I learned from myself that sometimes I feel good in thinking something simply are weird or difficult to understand. I think it has been, as many other times in the past, an unconscious part of my writing process: I like the idea of being a bit wrong, confused, misleading, just a bit, to give more freedom and let the people change their mind while reading. Being distracted, somehow, arise doubts.

I don't know if I could be able to formalize it in a better way like suggested by iciac, definitely, it wasn't my intention to provide scientific proof or anything mathematically correct as suggested by dvt - and I hoped that incompleteness feeling had explained this better than how much it actually had done - but... again, this is it :-)

And I hope you at least enjoyed this flight of fancy. For any questions, feel free to reach me here, by email, twitter, linkedin, etc.

Have a nice day :-)

</comment><comment><USER9> This sounds like it contains some good ideas, but could presented clearer and more concise.

</comment><comment><USER10> i lose the author at the decision to arbitrarily weight the dataset on weak foundations

</comment><comment><USER11> I love this - I am convinced this can approach can tie to Coase's theory of firm and give us ways to evaluate an ideal size of firm (i think you choose the weights that determine the size of the MST)

</comment><comment><USER12> Anyone has a tldr? Topic sounds super interesting and I don't have time to read now.</comment>


How to Recognize Dysfunctional Startup Leadership - <AUTHOR> http://www.caycon.com/blog/2011/06/how-to-recognize-dysfunctional-startup-leadership/ <comment><USER2> The thing is, dysfunctional doesn't mean 'non-functional'.

A company I used to work for had a really great owner/etc, but their HR practices were the pits. Any attempt to tell them so was met with 'That's how everyone does it', even if it obviously wasn't.

The one time I brought something to their attention about someone above my head, I was told I should have taken it to HR instead of the owners. The person in question told me, "That's a serious charge. I could have lost my job." ... Yeah, it was. And I was serious. I still think it was illegal to this day, but I also don't think he's stupid enough to try it again, either, now. Upper management waffled a bit, but in the end, they seemed to settle on wishing I had not told them because they didn't want to do anything about it.

Despite all that, they are wildly successful.

<comment><USER3> What was the problem?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "Advisors and staff hand-picked from friends and connections." Wait, so where are advisors supposed to come from if not from friends/connections? Investors?

</comment><comment><USER5> Two of the six points here translate into "hire an expensive outside strategy consulting firm". Sorry, nope.

</comment><comment><USER6> s/startup//

</comment><comment><USER7> * The CEO's red porsche is paid for by the company

* The CEO, in addition to his regular pay, takes a commission cut on every sale the company makes

* The CIO's new BMW is also paid as an expense of the company

* The CEO shoots down your recommendation for a bonus to one of the best employees in your department and instead offers them a $200 gift card

* The CIO & CEO make uptime a priority objective for the service - but when a plan is presented that shows that in order to meet that goal, funding will be required to bolster infrastructure, they refuse to fund the plan

* The CIO regularly makes changes to the production systems outside of any change control process and brings down the service while muttering things like "Well that wasn't supposed to happen"

* The CEO and C-level execs tell the company the option price is $X - then proceed to sell the company and inform everyone that the option price is actually 20% of $X and that those who have been with the company less than a year get nothing

* There is a foosball table and this is described in any company descriptions as a part of the "Culture"

<comment><USER8> * Your company claims to be a technology startup but has a "CIO" and an "IT department" that does the development.

That's generally a recipe for at best a horrible place to work, but most usually a failure.</comment></comment>


FREE KEYWORD RESEARCH TOOL - <AUTHOR> http://longtailsuggest.com <comment><USER2> This is useless without sorting by popularity and seeing the popularity numbers.

I don't see how "keyword length" or "word count" are of any importance.

<comment><USER3> As a new HN user myself, I'm curious of this post would fall under "spam" on HN? If you look at OP's account they have only made two posts, both linking to this site.

<comment><AUTHOR> you have a very bad understanding of this site.</comment></comment></comment>


SSH Keys on GitHub - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=filename%3Aid_rsa&type=Code&ref=searchresults

<comment><USER2> Personal favourite [https://github.com/valeriangalliat/dotfiles/blob/b227cf9b252...](https://github.com/valeriangalliat/dotfiles/blob/b227cf9b252f3c8c43a776bc20e1f1b5d0acfc13/src/ssh/id_rsa)

</comment><comment><USER3> I feel like this gets posted every other month or so. I appreciate the awareness, but it doesn't seem like there's much new discussion or debate to have on the matter: folks continue to be a bit more careless with credentials than they ought to be / don't think about what pushing something to a public site means / etc, it would rock if GitHub was more proactive about messaging affected users, it sucks that it's hard to safeguard against this via technical means.

If anything, I'd love to see somebody do a blog post instead about how they started scraping these results and/or the commit data firehose and messaging users who posted credentials

<comment><USER4> Wasn't that the point of lulzsec?

<comment><USER5> _Ian Paul of PC World wrote that, "As its name suggests, LulzSec claims to be interested in mocking and embarrassing companies by exposing security flaws rather than stealing data for criminal purposes."[16]_ \-- [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LulzSec](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LulzSec)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Hmmph. I just found a bunch of free AWS keys by searching for amazon.yml, too.

What is the best way to share things like API keys among a team of developers, anyway? I'm surprised this hasn't been solved already (perhaps it has and I just don't know about it). I know you can share passwords with tools like LastPass and 1Password, and I suppose you could use those for API keys as well?

It'd be nice if you could, e.g., include a gem in a Rails project, get a single key/password/token from one of the team members on that project, and use that w/ a third party API to set all the requisite API keys for all the third party services used on a project. You could also rotate the master password when team members leave the group.

<comment><USER7> I'm not sure if there are other ways, better or not... but blackbox[1] can be used to store secrets.

And it might be possible to achieve some success with git filters[2], at least to avoid pushing secrets into the repository.

Still... just my two cents, I'm not exactly a pro-user of those two features

[1]([https://github.com/StackExchange/blackbox](https://github.com/StackExchange/blackbox))

[2]([https://stackoverflow.com/questions/6557467/can-git- ignore-a...](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/6557467/can-git-ignore-a- specific-line))

<comment><USER8> If you decide to take the git filters approach, git-crypt[0] is a good choice.

[0] [https://github.com/AGWA/git-crypt](https://github.com/AGWA/git-crypt)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I see your SSH keys and raise you a .netrc: [https://github.com/search?p=1&q=filename%3Anetrc&ref=searchr...](https://github.com/search?p=1&q=filename%3Anetrc&ref=searchresults&type=Code&utf8=)

</comment><comment><USER10> Does Github have a responsibility to help people out with this kind of thing? What do you all think?

<comment><USER11> No. There are valid cases to upload SSH keys and other certificates or secrets. Preventing it would be annoying, and near impossible to be very effective.

Just my $0.02.

<comment><USER12> I agree with you, but I can't imagine a use case for a secret that's not secret.

<comment><USER13> I believe Vagrant uses (or previously used) an insecure, public keypair[0] to keep things simple.

Aside from things like that, I can't see it being a _common_ use case.

[0]: [https://github.com/mitchellh/vagrant/tree/master/keys](https://github.com/mitchellh/vagrant/tree/master/keys)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> You can search out private GPG keys as well, which is crazy-bananas. [https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=filename%3Aasc+BE...](https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=filename%3Aasc+BEGIN+PGP+PRIVATE+KEY+BLOCK&type=Code&ref=searchresults)

<comment><USER15> So much for no forward secrecy :D

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> And if you want to get the public key also:

[https://github.com/<username>.keys](https://github.com/<username>.keys)

ex.: [https://github.com/avinassh.keys](https://github.com/avinassh.keys)

<comment><USER17> No need. You can recover the public key from a private key using ssh-keygen's 'y' option:

-y This option will read a private OpenSSH format file and print an OpenSSH public key to stdout.

For example:

ssh-keygen -y -f id_rsa > id_rsa.pub

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Looks like they've blocked it now. Searching via Google still works though: [https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Agithub.com+inurl%3Aid...](https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Agithub.com+inurl%3Aid_rsa)

<comment><USER5> id_rsa is being blocked right now, but id_dsa and id_ecdsa still work.

<comment><USER19> adding wildcards works as well, eg: id_rsa?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> They have blocked the search for private keys (id_rsa) but they still need to block the search for public keys (id_rsa.pub); they're usually stored together anyway. I just did this search.

<comment><USER21> I don't think they've blocked it. I can still search on id_rsa without issue.

However, The majority of the keys I'm seeing are either encrypted, test fixtures, or otherwise. There are many unencrypted keys available, though!

It's still surprising that people continue to check in private keys. No one learns.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Update: This is no longer working: [https://imgur.com/uT1fCRT](https://imgur.com/uT1fCRT)

<comment><USER19> adding wildcards works, eg: id_rsa?

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> This is matching both "id" and "rsa" individually as well, so not all results are actually files with id_rsa in the name.

Example: [https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=filename%3Aid_rsa...](https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=filename%3Aid_rsa+whatever&type=Code&ref=searchresults)

</comment><comment><USER24> I'd love to see an open source project around scanning the GitHub API and subscribing to alerts for your org's repos.

</comment><comment><USER25> People always forget about the other keys...

filename:id_ed25519 filename:id_rsa filename:id_dsa filename:id_ecdsa</comment>


Ask HN: How do you share passwords? - <AUTHOR> How do you deal with the fact that some passwords have to be shared?
From less vital services like Netflix to rather important ones like the water and power companies' sites, I find myself having no choice but to share passwords with my wife.
I've gone from wanting to use a simple shared Google Sheets spreadsheet, to considering writing a password storage solution myself (egads), to thinking a password manager would be best. However, I'm somewhat unsure if that's really the best way and don't know which one(s) to trust the most.
What would HN suggest?
(We're both macOS and iOS users, if relevant.) <comment><USER2> I'm sold on Lastpass. It allows sharing of passwords and even will allow you to share a password that the other user doesnt get to see. I pay the $12/yr subscription so I don't know if this is available in the free version.

<comment><USER3> That's what we used at my last job, the enterprise version.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I use KeePass. It's an offline password manager, so you don't have to worry about trusting a cloud provider to have good security practices. You can sync it using OwnCloud or rsync or whatever you do trust. I use SpiderOak.

I secure mine using a unique password and an SSH key. If you do use a cloud sync service, _never_ sync the SSH key. Keep a copy of it on a USB drive hidden somewhere in your home, and then just copy it onto any device that might need it.

(You definitely can use this system on a mobile phone, but I find it too risky. There are probably ways to make it more secure to have these files on your phone.)

</comment><comment><USER5> I use 1password and share on dropbox. Can create vaults for different kinds of passwords etc</comment>


Is Mindfulness Making Us Ill? - <AUTHOR> http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2016/jan/23/is-mindfulness-making-us-ill <comment><USER2> Usually medicine that actually works has some negative side effects.

Commercialization of mindfulness business seems to cause all kinds of bullshit quackery as a side effect. There are plenty of minfulness instructors who don't have sufficient experience and understanding. They just drink the Cool- Aid and brush aside things that don't sell.

I have been training zen meditation for 15 years and many of my friends are long time Vipassana meditators. All experienced meditation/mindfullness teachers know that there can be negative side effects and everyone can't use the same method as everyone else. Meditation can sometimes trigger mental illness or trauma. For many people it's good idea to start going into therapy after they start meditation practice. Unfortunately sometimes people want to use mindfullness as replacement for medical treatment and/or therapy (Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) is just fine. It's actual therapy done under supervision of a therapist)

<comment><USER3> This, 100x. I've meditated vipassana for 10+ years, and am a former monk.

Meditation is beneficial, but it's rarely smooth sailing, and all the breathless news pieces gloss over that fact.

I've had retreats where in trying to watch my breathing naturally, I ended up controlling it and hyperventilating so bad I nearly passed out on the cushion.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I wonder whether negative consequences from mindfulness in cases of depression might provide support for Depressive Realism [1]. If you problem is that you're too realistic and that makes you sad, then training yourself to be more aware of your surroundings might make things worse.

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

<comment><USER5> Self reflection has rather different effects on me personally depending on the source of stress.

Taking a moment to contemplate during a short term stressful episode (losing a wallet, dropping a plate, etc) I find very useful.

For longer term issues, especially those with no clear resolution, I find self reflection to be negative. One example would be e.g. the state of housing in the UK. I just have to live with that - further contemplation makes it worse.

<comment><USER6> mindfulness is usually focused on an autonomic bodily function (breath, heartbeat, etc.. ) as a way of 'being present', if you focus on abstract political issues instead that is not being present

<comment><USER3> You _can_ be mindful of thoughts popping up, it's just harder and requires more practice, which is why most beginning instructions suggest paying attention to the body.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Dynamic pigmentary and structural coloration in cephalopod chromatophore organs - <AUTHOR> https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-08891-x <comment><AUTHOR> 5 spectacular supplementary movies here: [https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-08891-x#MOESM5](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-08891-x#MOESM5)</comment>


Google Backs Farm-Focused Startup as 'AgTech' Blooms - <AUTHOR> http://www.industryweek.com/digital-tools/google-backs-farm-focused-startup-agtech-blooms

<comment><USER2> Not the agro businesses I was hoping to read about.

Improving IT, using IoT, etc. is all well and good, but I would like to see more tech to grow food locally, and using much less water. Using less energy would also be a bonus, but anything that promotes growing food close to where people live is what I would like to see.</comment>


Ask HN: How do you find experts to talk to? - <AUTHOR> Let's say you want to learn about a topic (or industry etc) and that you want to talk to someone who is working on the topic/industry and ask specific questions. How to find such people, without cold calling/cold emailing and without bothering them? In other words, how to find people who are okay with spending half hour to an hour, willingly? <comment><USER2> Don't be afraid of the "cold call" or "cold email" to the expert, it is very different from the cold call to the customer.

If some professor wrote a paper or book about a subject or got their work mentioned in the media the odds are pretty good you can look up their phone number in a campus directory, have them answer, and ask a question about the paper and typically get 10-15 min to talk. Generally people like that are happy that people are interested in their work and you often get a good response.

<comment><AUTHOR> I did cold email a few people once, but it felt very very uncomfortable. How was your experience?

<comment><USER2> I never found it very hard because I spent time in an academic environment where grad students & professors call and write each other all the time. They are not going to research your credential in 15 minute so you don't need an academic affiliation, the fact that you are reading what they write is a good enough connection.

If I have a focused question about their work and have a PMA about it, I would say my success rate is awfully close to 100%, in fact I cannot think of a time where I did not get a thoughtful response.

Anyway, Tim Ferris talks about this in the "4 hour work week" and says pretty much what I told you. It may be intimidating if you are not in the habit, but people who write books and other literature are usually very happy to hear from readers. Getting a whole hour might be tough, but 10-15 min on the phone is not that hard.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I find actually meaningful engagement on Twitter can help ease the "cold call". What is meaningful engagement? It'll depend on the person/industry but something for THEM rather than for YOU.</comment>