"Quantum supremacy using a programmable superconducting processor": supplement - <AUTHOR> https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vReCUoN9oOGGybt2TbzJBdPyALafyUND/view <comment><USER2> Thanks for posting this document. I love the detailed description of the experimental setup. Waiting on bated breath for Scott Aaronson to post about this on his blog so I can know how excited to be.

(Not enough of a Quantum Information Theorist to reliably seperate hype from substance in such a complex field.)

<comment> core-questions The gist of it is that they've been able to simulate a very small number of random quantum gates faster than a classical-compute simulation of the same thing. It's not useful for anything, and it's at the level of things that D-Wave was doing for processor calibration over a decade ago.

Claiming this as "supremacy" is premature.

<comment><USER3> "Quantum supremacy" is a technical term that simply means demonstrating that a quantum computer can in fact perform _some_ computation (something artificial like sampling from a certain kind of distribution) faster than a classical computer, not that the computation is useful for anything rightaway. This has not been achieved so far, but is expected to be around the corner. See this article from July: [https://www.quantamagazine.org/quantum-supremacy-is- coming-h...](https://www.quantamagazine.org/quantum-supremacy-is-coming-heres- what-you-should-know-20190718/) and some of the better-informed comments on these other threads: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21047804](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21047804) [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21043659](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21043659)</comment></comment></comment>


Family resists Google's campus sprawl despite offer to buy farm for millions - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/dec/15/google-campus-silicon-valley-farm-martinellis <comment><USER2> Well, there money offered aren't that much considering the growth in the area.</comment>


Douglas Model 671/684: The X-15's Shadow (2012) - <AUTHOR> http://falsesteps.wordpress.com/2012/08/11/douglas-model-671684-the-x-15s-shadow/

<comment><USER2> Alloys containing thorium were quite popular at one point - the B-58 Hustler used Mag-Thor and apparently their airframes gave off more radiation than the nuclear weapons they carried.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mag-Thor](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mag-Thor)

<comment><USER3> >>The Model 684 would have used HK31, an alloy of magnesium, thorium, and zirconium which is no longer in use since the three percent that is thorium makes the alloy radioactive.

Nice I had no idea. There's a B-58 on display at Whiteman AFB, I thought it was production model, but maybe it's a mock up?

I love reading about these old projects, it was a different era for sure.</comment></comment>


Content is dead - <AUTHOR> http://veekaybee.github.io/content-is-dead/ <comment><USER2> I know these anti-ad posts are a dime a dozen here, but this is one of the more self-entitled pieces of dreck in the genre. She spends the first part of her essay slagging on WIRED ( _" Wired has dabbled in and eventually succumbed to the technology it once skewered and analyzed. Its latest efforts inevitably include pandering to the Instagram crowd."_), implying that she's too good for their lowbrow content, and then the rest of it is about how dare they have the temerity to make her resort to using cURL to read their content. Or is this post supposed to be a sly retelling of the joke in Annie Hall? [1]

What's so difficult about just opening an incognito window and suffering the couple of seconds it takes for a computer halfway across the world to deliver you content while you sit at your desk? The WIRED thing annoys me too but when they've got a good story, I'm willing to give them the adnetwork revenue. Forbes, on the other hand...that whole thing with their infected ad network, I've just stopped going to Forbes articles, period, even when they're posted here. It's been a long time since I can remember Forbes exclusively breaking a story...most of the time, it seems their articles are from their "contributor" network just blogspamming someone else's story.

[1] [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0075686/quotes?item=qt0373261](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0075686/quotes?item=qt0373261)

<comment><AUTHOR> > What's so difficult about just opening an incognito window and suffering the > couple of seconds it takes for a computer halfway across the world to > deliver you content while you sit at your desk?

The whole point of the post was that I'm doing something inordinately ridiculous to access a little bit of good content. Scraping and incognito browsing are both anti-patterns that are symptoms of a sick media industry. A media that is sick cannot provide us with good news and content that we can use to further our critical thinking, and we should be worried and thinking about how we can possibly solve this problem instead of trying to bypass it.

<comment><USER2> > _Scraping and incognito browsing are both anti-patterns that are symptoms of > a sick media industry._

No, the cause (and, well, symptoms, too) is lack of revenue, something which was set in motion long before ad networks came into play and were the devil that many publishers felt they had to sign with.

It's worth noting that in the early years, publications just threw up their content for free and went within the flow [1]. Within the industry today, it's (pointlessly) debated whether that was the right thing to do [2], as now everyone comes to expect the content to be free (nevermind the problem of other sites just copying-and-pasting entire articles).

Either way, readers weren't offering to pay up back in the heyday when news outlets had plenty of money to do indepth journalism and offer it for free. Now news outlets have neither but they continue to offer their content for free. And apparently, those years of free, good content wasn't enough to convince consumers, years later, that it'd be nice to get financial support (via subscription). And so now the mechanism that many of them resort to to capture revenue -- third party ad networks -- is odious to people like you...and I sympathize...so you should do what you would be doing if those places threw up a hard paywall that requires a subscription: don't read their content.

Instead, you go out of your way to take their content for free. Then you complain that the content is shit, and finally, you complain that publishers should be making it easier for you to take their shit. OK, sure, whatever. But at least recognize that there are business mechanisms more complicated than "stupid publishing company is using stupid ad network to get money"

[1] [http://www.niemanlab.org/2016/01/20-years-ago-today- nytimes-...](http://www.niemanlab.org/2016/01/20-years-ago-today-nytimes-com- debuted-on-line-on-the-web/)

[2] [https://gigaom.com/2012/02/06/debunking-the-original-sin- of-...](https://gigaom.com/2012/02/06/debunking-the-original-sin-of-online- newspapers/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> We'll know that ad supported content is dead when AOL, or "Aol.", or whatever, and Demand Media, go bust. They will not be missed.

Micropayments are going nowhere. As I've pointed out before, the enthusiasm for micropayments comes from people who want to collect them. There's very little consumer demand for the ability to send somebody a dime.

Subscriptions work only for very high quality content. The Economist, yes; Wired, no. Newspapers with big reporting staffs, yes; pundits, no.

The trend we're seeing in advertising is that only Google and Facebook really matter to advertisers. The third-party ad industry is mostly bottom feeders, and it's getting worse. (See earlier article today about Forbes distributing malware.)

<comment><USER4> Just a small point about micropayments. The current system is not micro. Micro is hundredths of a cent or less. At that price point it might be possible to use them. Sadly not even bitcoin (afaik) can handle such transactions. Transaction costs are too high under every system. Even IBM's research- a few years ago, bottomed out at 25 cents.

<comment><USER5> Seems awkward (and pricey, as mentioned) to handle an actual transaction each time. Why not just have a browser extension that aggregates and bills monthly? Like the opposite of an ad-blocker, an ad-unlocker.

This has probably been discussed somewhere...

<comment><USER6> How would you do that without needing a way to deal with many of the same issues: to authorize every pageview, track account balances, deal with fraud, and correct errors?

You definitely couldn't afford to interact with the financial system (ACH, credit cards, or even Bitcoin) for every pageview, but you'd have the same challenges to solve.

<comment><USER5> It's all done client side? Except auth.

<comment><USER6> The client can't be trusted.

<comment><USER5> Not 100%. But what about 80%? Even 50%? Is it still worth it for publishers? The greatest cost of digital fraud in a case like this would be perceptual... given the current paradigm.

<comment><USER6> The cost of fraud would be roughly the same as browsing with an adblocker now.

But probably the hardest part of creating any system like this is getting everyone on board at once. There's a big incentive not to join the system. (People who don't want to or can't be bothered to join will visit your site instead.)

<comment><USER7> I think it would be quite straight forward to develop an extension that does client-side analytics of your browsing history, just to show you which sites you visit and how much time you spend per url/ TLD. It would be on your honor to choose to give 'patronage' and the code is auditable as a browser extension.

<comment><USER6> If it's "on your honor", why not just ask for donations?

<comment><USER8> frictionless. if i had an extension that let me put an amount into it at the begining, and then let me divide up who i thought was worthy of my pledge at the end of the month... no need to find tip jars and make a bunch of payments

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Let's be honest, why they shouldn't block adblock? The ads bring them money. And they need money to survive and, if they lucky, develop. The writers have families or plan to have ones, they need to be rewarded for their work. It may be their main or only source of income. Now, if they also provide a valuable information for you, I think that trying to trick them into giving it for free (ad free) is wrong. I think and it may controversial here, but every valuable site that lives on ads should block adblock. And don't get me wrong, I actually use adblock myself, but I'm more than happy to add exceptions for the sites I need or value.

<comment><USER10> Just remember that "adblock" doesn't block ads - it blocks ad networks. If publications ran their own ads (like they do in print) the ads would likely a)be of much higher quality, and b) not be blocked by "adblock"

<comment><USER11> Adblock can (and does) block ads that are not a part of an ad network.

If you're thinking making publishers handle ads will bring them back to the "good ol' days" of static print ads, you're mistaken. The only reason we haven't had these types of ads in the past is because the medium (print) didn't support it.

1\. Most times, bad ads aren't written by the publishers at all-they are written by the advertiser. The flashing/movie/360/ugly ads are shown because they convert at a higher rate than "nice" ads.

2\. Forcing publishers to run the ads would be even WORSE for for privacy since they would be considered "first-party" and have access to much more information.

3\. Print publications that currently run ads don't even control 100% of the ad content. The only ones they control are the ones that look like text. Everything else is supplied by the advertiser.

<comment><USER12> 1\. The ad network permits the bad ad, regardless of who writes them. If the ad network didn't drop 400 domains worth of 3rd party cookies, with tracking, and give me such shite as autoplaying video, maximise on rollover and the like, I'd whitelist them. Or more likely never have blocked them in the first place.

2\. They'd not be able to follow me around the net though, repeatedly showing me some car ad I accidentally clicked because it maximised on me.

3\. Every print display ad I've ever run (quite a few) has been proofed by the publication prior to run. I'm not Pepsi so perhaps different rules apply?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> the possibly naive pr{e,o}mise of the early web was that it would be a place for people who created content for the joy of creating it to share said content with people who would discover the delights of gatekeeper-free media consumption. "premium" content, that people were trying to make a living from selling, could go behind a paywall or into subscriber-only emails, the way books and magazines worked pre-web.

sadly, the implicit contract was broken on both sides. people didn't want to pay for content, but they also wanted to consume (pirated) premium stuff, rather than commons material, so there was never a concerted push to have better discovery mechanisms atop the freely-provided web. likewise, producers wanted to impose user-hostile measures like drm and geographic segmentation on a medium that was not conducive to them, making piracy the more attractive option even if you didn't care about free-as-in-beer.

professional producers had to go free because it was not a case of paid professional content competing with free amateur content; it was a case of paid professional content competing with free pirated professional content. that also sucked a lot of the oxygen out of the amateur ecosystem; who wants to dig through the virtual slushpile when you can get pre-curated professional material for free?

i'm sad about the whole thing because i was really looking forward to seeing if the creative commons would compete on its own merits as a mass entertainment option. once the reward of putting something up is not people reading and appreciating it, but money from ad clicks, though, the producer's incentives are suddenly misaligned with the consumer's, and we end up with the web of today :(

<comment><USER14> @zwm so i partially agree with you. there are few other reasons why both the content and ad industry is in a funk.

Married to Business model not their consumer: most of the content producer (music, video, tv, books, news etc) were trying to hold out with their old business model (think: buying album only or newspaper subscriptions). As new platforms emerged consumption patterns changed yet the model did not changed. In a leaked email by Jobs to Murdoch regarding e-books publishing, Jobs clearly warned that if books were not made available at price points, delivery methods and platforms to today's consumer behavior, we shouldn't be surprised to see a Napster moment in publishing industry. Those who have held stedfast in their old ways have suffered. Only now we can see some revival of music thru subscription via Apple Music and Spotify--but it took years and a lot of failed startups to get here.

Ads: Head in the sand moment: Having worked in this industry i see a few common occurrences: 1_ ad agencies have made it a point not to learn about emerging tech, actively invest in them or be the agent of innovation. Just like content industry they are happy to pick u 15% of cut from the buyer and the seller of ads, just b/c they can 2_ over last 20 years there is a steady increase in marketing budgets as a % of revenue by everyone in some cases up to 20%. Obviously CEOs will expect the CMOs to be accountable and present a ROI model vs the traditional 'sunk marketing costs'. Thats where data came into play. However, in actuality data is really being applied with very little thought.

Combination of laziness and apathy are some of the reasons for shitty ads.

What i find it intriguing if the quality of ad content is good and delivered in a meaningful ways then people wouldn't mind it (eg: Super Bowl ads).

But then again it takes a lot effort and thinking. I'm however, hopeful.

<comment><USER13> agreed. another problem with the ad industry is that it has almost universally succumbed to the lure of tracking. tracking and targeting ads has a very high return on investment, but i have to wonder if it will ultimately be a case of killing the goose that laid the golden eggs.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> This +1000. The guardian, a paper I used to buy regularly, has transformed itself comprehensively into a hell of lazy ill informed clickbait, uncritically repeating unsupported conclusions from nonsense science and refusing to differentiate their serious analysis from crappy user generated content. Now I can't even bring myself to pay the 3 quid a month subscription even though the crossword alone would probably be worth that.

<comment><USER16> I saw a talk by a product manager at the Guardian, and as I understand it, that transformation was a reaction to declining print sales, shaky ad revenue, the rise of Facebook & Google, the success of sites like Buzzfeed & Vox, etc. They've been losing money for a long time and have been slashing costs as much as they can, but that doesn't make a business sustainable.

Nowadays, most people will get to a news article from a friend sharing it on facebook, or from reddit or hacker news, etc, not the Guardian homepage, and that means clickbait pays the bills.

<comment><USER17> I say let them crash. Let them ALL crash. We don't need no stinking news!

<comment><USER18> Certainly if that's what they call news and that's how they want to deliver it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I agree with the author concerning content and ads, but find it ironic that the article's title is so click-baity and misleading (considering she never implies content is actually dying, just that its business model is).

</comment><comment><USER20> We need a Netflix for content. You pay a (reasonable) monthly subscription and they pay each content provider depending on number of views.

<comment><USER21> [https://blendle.com/](https://blendle.com/) is attempting just this. They have a beta service available now, and its rather nice. You pay a few cents per article and you can easily get refunds if you don't like the article or if it isn't what you expected.

<comment><USER16> I think the pay-per-article model is still worse than a single flat fee. Because there's a marginal cost per article, each time you have an article link you have to ask yourself "do i definitely want to read this?" Even if there are refunds and stuff, this has a psychological cost. It makes sharing content harder too. It also might be weird to say even more directly that "this article produced exactly X dollars of profit," or "this journalist's articles produce X dollars of profit on average."

Also, one of the best things about the Internet & the ad model is that it made content available to everyone. Someone from a relatively poor background, or someone who's just strapped for cash at a certain time, will still have equal access to information.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> So, the author didn't even think to question her assumption that she is entitles to get the content for free, without paying dorectly or through being subjected to ads?

</comment><comment><USER23> > today can't epxect to put out mostly junk filler

I wonder if that's a litmus test to see if people finish reading. Great article, perfect sentiment, last paragraph has the only typo in the entire thing.

And I totally agree. There are _shitloads_ of people on the internet making money from content. Hell, I make some sometimes. If you build a real audience, listen to them, then solve _their_ problems. Then content isn't dead.

If you're trying to be mass media that appeals to everybody and nobody at the same time. Then content is dead.

I mean, shit, look at someone like GaryVee or Casey Neistat, or even Kim Kardashian. They all make shitloads of money from content.

And if you're looking for examples closer to HN home. Look at Amy Hoy, Brennan Dunn, or even Ramit Sethi. They might not make tens of millions, but they def print millions of dollars with their content businesses.

<comment><USER24> There is a typo in the first line as well.

<comment><AUTHOR> Fixed, thanks.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> (Disclosure: I write full-time for Wired, but I'll try to leave my feeling about our content aside here)

Even if you pay for a subscription to The Economist, you're still going to see ads, both on their website and in their apps. Even though I'm a subscriber and logged in, Ublock Origin is showing over 100 blocked requests on an article I just pulled up there, some of them coming from the same third party ad networks everyone else uses. And my $1 a week subscription only buys me access to three articles a week.

So while, as the OP points out, The Economist's Tom Standage [1] believes that ad revenue isn't a futureproof business model, they still appear to be heavily reliant on it.

I don't know anything about the Economist's overhead, but the reason subscribers are still subjected to ads is very likely that subscription fees come nowhere near covering their costs. The truism in newspaper publishing is that subscriptions don't even cover the cost of printing and delivering the paper to a subscriber.

Subscription-only business models have historically been tough.

A lot of people ask "why can't all advertising be like The Deck," but the trouble there is that The Deck probably doesn't bring in enough revenue for publishers to operate a large newsroom [2]

Personally (not speaking for my employers) I like Brave browser's idea, but they're already facing legal threats. And while they're promising publishers 70 percent of their ad revenue, but even if that's a larger percentage I don't know if that will work out to more than publishers get through the third party networks they use now.

[1] [http://www.niemanlab.org/2015/04/the-economists-tom- standage...](http://www.niemanlab.org/2015/04/the-economists-tom-standage-on- digital-strategy-and-the-limits-of-a-model-based-on-advertising/)

[2] [https://www.quora.com/How-much-do-content-producers-who- are-...](https://www.quora.com/How-much-do-content-producers-who-are-apart-of- The-Deck-ad-network-make-monthly)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for reading. The Economist ads are a great point that I didn't address, and makes me even more worried for the high-quality news and content industry than I initially noted.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I've said it before and I'll say it again. Adblock is going to cause ads to become MORE invasive, not less. Native ads, native content, and other "partnerships" are going to drive revenue-all of which are much worse that what we have now, privacy-wise. Adblock is only fueling an arms race between consumer and publisher.

In the future, we might see a viable micropayment solution but there are some fundamental problems with this approach.

<comment><USER17> I disagree. Sure, we'll see promoted content as norm, but those wise enough will shy away from those sources entirely.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I can't remember the last time I read an article and thought it was worth paying for.

Even a fraction of a penny. That's the sad truth.

</comment><comment><USER27> Why not just open firebug and delete the ad overlay? The author is either trying to 'show off' or is just genuinely oblivious that there's a much easier way.

I'm not against ads per se, I have quite a few sites 'white listed' but when they beg for ads like Wired, then it's an automatic nope!

</comment><comment><USER28> Wired has always been garbage. You're just getting old enough to realize it.

There's always going to be garbage content sources that are more popular than the quality content sources. If you appreciate quality content, your duty is not to bitch about the garbage content but to support quality content.

</comment><comment><USER29> Comparing the Economist to an iPhone to Android switch article is not a fair comparison.

The Wired iPhone2Android article is and was never designed to be content. You shouldn't expect it to be either honestly.

Apple has great content on the subject for free [https://support.apple.com/en- us/HT201196](https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201196)

The 3rd party link bloat however is spot on

<comment><USER15> And yet that was the article the author valued enough to bother fighting through the adwall for. Everything else on wired was _really_ bad

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> A couple days ago I ran into Wired's ad-blocker blocker so I just clicked my Instapaper toolbar button. Worked like a charm. I wonder if or how often Wired makes an effort to block Instapaper.

<comment><USER31> This might come in handy for you then. An anti-anti-adblocker.

[https://github.com/reek/anti-adblock-killer](https://github.com/reek/anti- adblock-killer)

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Content is not dead. Our current content delivery mechanisms have failed.

</comment><comment><USER33> The trick is to open the link in incognito mode.

</comment><comment><USER34> Long live content.

</comment><comment><USER35> There are a number of tools built to extract the content from those kinds of pages, did the author try any or just start YOLOing Python scripts?

<comment><USER36> I don't think that's the point of the article though. The author is criticizing the rise of bloated webpages with very little good content.

<comment><USER37> Or not so much that, but the practice of putting terrible content up and funding it by selling someone else's soul to the advertising apparatus. And then demanding that _you_ give up that soul, in order to fund "high quality content".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> I look forward to the day when media outlets start dying due to lack of ad revenue. 99% of news content is rehashing of existing content done by someone else. Remove the noise and the few real contributors will be easily recognized and supported. Also helps lessen organizational bias when content creators are less beholden to the whims of their billionaire employers.</comment>


Why is HNs numbering of user posts a client side / server side interplay? - <AUTHOR> https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=TekMol&n=1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 <comment><AUTHOR> When you click the 'more' button on the bottom of the list that shows a users posts, it adds a parameter called 'n' to the url. Which contains the number of posts on the current page.

The server then seems to use that parameter to output post numbers on the page it returns.

Is that a common pattern? Why not simply count the posts of a user and put out a normally numbered list? Is it for performance reasons?

<comment><USER2> Uninformed speculation:

\+ "showdead" affects which thirty posts get displayed next.

\+ a user may have added a post since the current page was displayed.

\+ Reverse chronological numbering would require renumbering all posts each time a post is added...or deleted.

\+ No dependency on Javascript when browsing HN.</comment></comment>


Optimism in Evolution - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/13/opinion/13judson.html?partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&pagewanted=all

<comment><USER2> Why is it that science writers for the New York Times seem unable to grasp basic concepts like eugenics? (I'm speaking of course of the claim of evolutionary proof in human hunting of bighorned rams resulting in rams being born with smaller horns. No shit, sherlock, if I took over Sweden and began hunting down and killing the blondes there will be a whole lot fewer born as the gene markers are winnowed from the available pool.)

Has the New York Times joined American police forces in setting a limit on the IQ of their employees lest they be too intelligent?

(Just to forestall argument all the mentioned case actually proves is that traits are inherited, and that the subset of rams less desirable to human hunters have outbred the more desirable ones, which is basic common sense. Their greater numbers assure greater numbers of offspring and that their genetic traits will predominate.)

<comment><AUTHOR> The writer is a evolutionary biologist.

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

<comment><USER2> So? The case is still one of eugenics and inherited traits and not really related to evolution. (Unless she's making the claim that "Evolution predicts that genetics works", except that I doubt that even the most moronic of creationists would deny that.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Agreed. Also, evolution should be taught because it's rock solid fact.

<comment><USER4> I think evolution should be treated as an approach for understanding a type of complex system. Take collage football over time several ideas have competed and while talent and drive are always important the top team's strategies have clearly spread around, competed, and mutated. No single approach is always optimal the top team today would still crush the top team 30 years ago because changes in the quality of the players alters optimal strategy etc. Anyway, as a framework it helps to explain how things are going to change from year to year which is useful outside of biology.

PS: It also works the other way it's easy to see how a successful strategy (single play) only works within a framework which helps people understand the creation of new species.

<comment><USER5> Evolution, change we can believe in!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> As usual, people talking about evolution are unable to distinguish from macro- evolution and micro. One evolves one species to another, then other basically amplifies changes that are already there, but doesn't create them/say where they came from.

No one has any problem with talking about micro-evolution, so the article is basically a straw-man argument, and thus pointless.

Macro-evolution is much more controversial.

<comment><USER7> I don't think that a tolerance for high levels of alcohol, or the ability to spread among humans, could be considered an 'amplified' trait. I also don't think it's useful to argue that there is a difference between believing in small changes from one generation to the next, and the large changes that result from the sum of this process. It's like saying that you believe in counting, but there's a big difference between that and believing that 41,217 comes after 41,216.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: A month to learn a new programming language - <AUTHOR> I find myself with one month of free time between jobs and I've decided that I want to learn a new programming language and implement a small ray tracer in this.
I'm familiar with imperative and OO programming models, so I was thinking to dive into something completely new to me like Standard ML, Ocaml or Haskell.
I would love to hear your suggestions about what new programming language to learn (as long as it is not a paradigm that I'm already familiar with).
Thanks <comment><USER2> Scala ? OO/Functionnal JVM based language. Not the purest FP language ever, but it is used a lot (Finance, web...).

Any lisp (Scheme, Closure...)

Prolog: logic programming. Tell the computer what you know, ask a question and let it compute the answer for you.

</comment><comment><USER3> Elm might be a good choice. It's a simple but useful functional language. From there, Scala, Haskell and Standard ML will be much easier to grasp.

</comment><comment><USER4> Erlang.

</comment><comment><USER5> dlang.org

<comment><USER5> Look at this [http://h3.gd/ctrace/](http://h3.gd/ctrace/)</comment></comment>


The Swiss town that taxes its wealthy without scaring them away - <AUTHOR> https://www.ft.com/content/87ccaf2e-2ddd-11e9-8744-e7016697f225 <comment><USER2> I'm confused by the comment "also confiscates a fixed portion of its residents' net wealth every year" that is followed up by "each additional SFr1m ($997,000) the richest Zug residents put in the bank incurs an annual tax bill of SFr3,000". So...is it based on net wealth or how much is in your bank account. Most of the article seems to revolve around net wealth. Most billionaires don't have billions in a bank account, it's in stock. The actual net worth calculation is non-existent in the article.

<comment><AUTHOR> Switzerland wealth taxes are on all wealth (real estate, assets, financial instruments, etc.) held worldwide.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> With all the wealth tax conversations, I feel like the most obvious solution is to just raise the capital gains rates, or ideally, just tax all capital gains as income, which is already progressively taxed.

What am I missing? Is it just that it's politically impossible?

<comment><USER4> There is a good argument for treating income earned over a period of greater than one year, even if realized in one moment, differently than income earned within a year in a system of progressive annual taxation, which is (inasmuch as there is one) the fairness argument for favorable treatment of long-term capital gains (it misses other kinds of extended payoff income and is not perfectly targeted in the case of LTCG, though.)

So, yes, you _should_ treat capital income the same as other income, but you should also address the fairness issue.

The best way I see of doing that is replacing favorable treatment of long-term gains with (1) unlimited ability to recognize gains in advance of realization for tax purposes, and to apply any such unused advance-recognized gains against current income for tax purposes, and (2) generous, but limited, ability to defer recognition of "windfall" gains for tax purposes. This would also avoid giving the favorable treatment appropriately due to non repeatable income to those with large capital assets that they can structure to provide continuous stream of "long-term" gains if the system is going to give them a tax break to do it that way.

And, unlike throwing a wealth tax on top, this would be an overall _simplification_ of the tax system compared to the status quo.</comment></comment>


If You Build It, the Dutch Will Pedal (2017) - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/06/world/europe/bicycling-utrecht-dutch-love-bikes-worlds-largest-bike-parking-garages.html <comment><USER2> > The city recently surpassed Amsterdam in a widely respected ranking of bike- > friendly cities and is now second only to Copenhagen, which is more than > twice its size.

I visited Copenhagen last year, and while it's a lovely city I have absolutely no idea how it is ranked number one cycling city in the world. Mark Wagenbuur, cited in this article, is also sceptical: [https://bicycledutch.wordpress.com/2018/11/27/is- copenhagen-...](https://bicycledutch.wordpress.com/2018/11/27/is-copenhagen-a- city-of-cyclists/)

</comment><comment><USER3> As someone who bikes to work most days and thinks cycling infrastructure like this is great, what do the people profiled in this article do when it rains?

<comment><USER4> Rain? I'd be more worried about snow. Looking at climate data just on Wikipedia, the Netherlands gets about the same number of 'snowy' days as Denver and it gets more total precipitation. It's winter average temperatures are also a tad lower which really makes me wonder what they do when there is snow & ice on the streets. I'd certainly wouldn't want to be riding my bike in Denver today (the front range got >1ft of snow over the past few days).

<comment><USER5> Usually the government is pretty good at clearing the snow and ice. Small roads you have to cycle carefully. I have slipped and fallen on icy roads numerous times when I was younger, just part of the cycling deal is what I always thought.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Outline: [https://outline.com/unsh8n](https://outline.com/unsh8n)

</comment><comment><USER7> > "These old cities weren't made for cars," Mr. Wagenbuur said.

Kind of the key issue with applying this to new, post-car cities, unfortunately.

<comment><USER8> Which largely don't exist. With the exception of like, Phoenix and greater Los Angeles, US cities were also not designed for cars.

Even Western cities that are famous for sprawl like Denver and Houston, their streets were laid down in their modern form in the 1870s, decades before Karl Benz first had the idea of attaching a motor to a wagon.

Cars are recent invaders to our cities, and retrofits were made to accommodate them (thanks in part to massive lobbying from auto makers and hostile takeovers and subsequent shutdowns of private mass transit). There is almost no such thing as a "city designed for cars"

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> > Utrecht, like many other European cities, spent several postwar decades > trying to make automobile use easier.

> The effort included building a four-lane highway over centuries-old canals, > making space for parked cars on its narrow cobblestone streets, and planning > for a highway that was to cross the medieval city's cathedral square.

What better to do with history than learn from it?

Next step: see the similarities of our focus on airplanes to that view on cars and how it's not improving our lives, environment, or communities, but rather hurting them all.

</comment><comment><USER10> "Cycling is like a piece of magic: It only has advantages," said Ms. van Hooijdonk . (who never cycled into gale force winds in freezing cold and rain ;'D... wtf)

<comment><USER11> He also has the chance to be fit enough to bike regularly and to live in a place where it's feasible to do a lot of trips on bike, with shorter distances than what you'd find in the US

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Not so friendly anymore, as you're not even allowed to put your bike on many places.

</comment><comment><USER13> Why is cycling sexy but public transport not so much?

</comment><comment><USER14> Can we flag paywalls?

<comment><USER15> "FF reading view", it's really nice.

<comment><USER14> Fast forward reading view?

<comment><USER15> firefox

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> In an alienated society where everyone lives in his own bubble, biking and not having a car is an easy proposition. No need to drive your sick parents to the hospital, no need to help a friend with moving the furniture, putting your child on the backseat of a bike on a rainy day is not frowned upon. Almost every aspect of social life is handled by a company in the private sector or by a public institution.

The majority of people in the world do not share those views of the Dutch and the Scandinavians, so it might not work elsewhere.

<comment><USER17> > putting your child on the backseat of a bike on a rainy day is not frowned > upon

This is the best thing you can do for your child.

<comment><USER17> Also, recommended: "The Happiest Kids in the World: Bringing up Children the Dutch Way" [https://www.amazon.com/Happiest-Kids-World-Bringing- Children...](https://www.amazon.com/Happiest-Kids-World-Bringing-Children- ebook/dp/B01E7Q3MD4)

<comment><USER15> As a dutch person I can say, as temperatures are dropping on the northern hemisphere, little makes my kids happier that announcing we are taking the car to school.

This book, I wonder, is its only mission to make people feel bad that they are not doing well? My kids are dutch and only play outside by themselves from 6-7 y/o, don't bike to school until they are 10-12 or so usually and they really didn't sleep very well as babies. And I definitely know some 14-18 y/o rebels.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


7 reasons why your startup will not be the next big thing - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/startup42-stories/7-reasons-why-your-startup-will-not-be-the-next-big-thing-657d4a12793a#.3k53l6iwu <comment><AUTHOR> In his book Zero to One, Peter Thiel shares his insight on how to build a unicorn. There is one specific moment where he details 7 questions that are fundamental to any startup.

I thought a lot about these questions since I'm managing a startup accelerator. Now I feel like I understood more to them and wanted to share it.

I welcome any feedback on the questions or on my interpretations :)</comment>


CarbonCalculated - Platform, Apps & API - <AUTHOR> http://www.carboncalculated.com/

<comment><AUTHOR> CarbonCalculated is a suite of industry specific web tools to help organisations accurately measure carbon footprint.

We believe that carbon data should be freely available. We have opened up our large database, so all the sources and formulas are available via our browser.

Our API allows developers to leverage our datasets without worrying about complex CO2 calculations. Access is available on request.

Any feedback is greatly appreciated ;-)</comment>


The Software Engineering of Mathematica - <AUTHOR> http://reference.wolfram.com/mathematica/tutorial/TheSoftwareEngineeringOfMathematica.html

<comment><USER2> "...the user-level design of Mathematica has remained compatible from Version 1 on. Much functionality has been added, but programs created for Mathematica Version 1 will almost always run absolutely unchanged under Version 6."

I wonder if this is the case because of dedication to backwards compatibility or because the original syntax was based on some fundamental mathematical concepts that are sound and thus don't change the same way most APIs do. Can anyone with more Mathematica experience weigh in?

<comment><USER3> The syntax is heavily influenced by M-expressions, which were used for the original version of Lisp in McCarthy's papers [1]. I believe the purity and power of the syntax is a major factor in the stability of the language.

I spent the summer of 2000 interning at Wolfram. I wrote coverage tests for over 60,000 lines of the Mathematica source code in areas ranging from functional programming operations to advanced numerical functions. My experience was that the source code was incredibly clean and well organized across the board.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-expression#Variants>

<comment><USER4> I didn't understand as much as I'd have liked of the linked article. Let me check something. In Mathematica, are the M expressions the internal 'FullForm' representations of expressions? So, for example, I type:

        a = {1,2,3};

Which is represented internally as an 'M expression' of List[1,2,3] (obtainable through FullForm[a], or its head through Head[a])?

Is that it?

I didn't realise that was a named concept. It does make sense to have a completely unified internal representation underneath the syntactic sugar, since you'd need everything to be in that form for the term rewriting system to work.

Thanks!

<comment><USER3> Yes, and for completeness I'd like to point out that this doesn't just apply to the right-hand side of the equation you gave. The "=" is just syntactic sugar to let you do variable assignment using infix notation:

In[1]:= FullForm[Hold[a={1,2,3}]]

Out[1]//FullForm= Hold[Set[a,List[1,2,3]]]

<comment><USER4> Worth pointing out, thanks! I see how that works.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This just one part of a longer series: The Internals of Mathematica [1]. Overall a very interesting read.

[1] [http://reference.wolfram.com/mathematica/tutorial/TheInterna...](http://reference.wolfram.com/mathematica/tutorial/TheInternalsOfMathematicaOverview.html)

</comment><comment><USER6> Mathics has about 25K lines of python of which only about 10 lines are platform specific. There are also about 100K lines of JS, but much of it is automatically generated or libraries. Admittedly it is missing lots of the features of Mathematica, but I think its an interesting comparison to make.

Disclaimer: I'm a developer for Mathics

<comment><USER7> This looks cool. I am a big fan of the sympy's lightweight/modular approach to computer algebra, and so its great to see work on a nice front end. I have one random question. What was the rationale behind having "Apply" overwrite the head of an expression? If a function "f" takes a list to a list and I call "Apply[Plus,f[x]]" I would like the result to have "Plus" as the new head with "f[x]" as the tail. But as it it it feels like mixed semantics. Is there something I am missing?

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> An interesting aspect of this is the "dogfooding" that seems to take place under Mathematica's covers. The internals use many of the same representation and communication techniques as are exposed to users.

</comment><comment><USER9> "Mathematica is one of the more complex software systems ever constructed"

Wolfram, et al really thinks they are hot shit.

<comment> B-Con Yeah, they/he has that attitude. But to be fair, they kind of are. They power the most advanced computing software for the public, and they're a strong dependency for Siri.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is an interesting series. I've always been fascinated with Matlab and Mathmatica ever since I took a class on floating point precision errors in college. I hope one day I get to work on a program that requires those algorithms to be used.

</comment><comment><USER11> +1 for champaign il devs</comment>


Developer uses Uber in product name, people immediately take offense (2005) - <AUTHOR> http://discuss.joelonsoftware.com/default.asp?biz.5.143092.62

<comment><USER2> I'm German and the name "uber" of the taxi company irritates the hell out of me whenever I hear it. What does the company name "uber" mean? The German word or something else?</comment>


The MacBook keyboard fiasco is way worse than Apple thinks - <AUTHOR> https://m.signalvnoise.com/the-macbook-keyboard-fiasco-is-surely-worse-than-apple-thinks/ <comment><USER2> This was previously discussed at: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19547352](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19547352)

<comment><USER3> Personally this is around the 15th MacBook keyboard discussion I've started reading. I'm not sure why I keep coming back. I wonder if the ghost of Steve Jobs experiences schadenfreude.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This issue (and to be fair, the removal of the escape key (I'm a vim user)) have absolutely kept me from upgrading.

I have a 2018 macbook (from work). I love how fast it is, and the touchID built in. Almost everything else is a regression:

\- No USB ports

\- No magsafe connector

\- Useless touchbar (for me anyway). Actually worse than useless as it disrupts my previous workflows.

\- Terrible keyboard even when working to spec.

It's a shame. I still have my 2009 MBP and mid-2013 rMBP and had already budgeted ~$3000 every 4-5 years for a brand new machine. As my 2013 is starting to show it's age I really have no idea what I'd get, but there's no fucking way I give Apple $3000 for a computer I know I don't like.

Wish Lenovo could match up with form factor and screen quality.

<comment><USER5> It might just be me, but my USB-C ports were also physically failing. And since this is also the power port, charging up was becoming trickier

Apple replaced them during my update too

I've not heard about anyone else having this problem with loose USB-C sockets

<comment><USER6> I have had this problem occur with both my MBPros, turned out to be a tiny amount of. lint. that made its. way into. the ports. Now. I use. usb-c port covers to keep it in check.

I. of course have. keyboard. issues. as well – in case the random periods. and multiple spaces thing did not. make it obvious.

Figured this would. be a good time to. not correct the. issues. Along with the space bar my left command key doesn't always register, its shit.

<comment><USER7> Try [https://github.com/aahung/Unshaky](https://github.com/aahung/Unshaky)

<comment><USER6> Thanks for pointing this out. Seems to have instantly fixed my issues!!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I had a MBP in 2017, and then—unsurprisingly—the keyboard began to have issues. I didn't even bother asking Apple for a fix; I knew the new keyboard would have issues as well.

Instead, I got myself a reliable upper-tier ThinkPad for 2/3rds the price of a MBP (and superior hardware), installed GNU/Linux on it, and now I'm living happily ever after.

I don't know if I could go back to a MBP after this, honestly. The ThinkPad is spill-proof, sturdy, has an _excellent_ keyboard, and is pretty much the anti- MBP in every way. And it's been a dream.

This keyboard issue _is_ way worse than Apple thinks. It caused longtime customers (myself included) to entertain the thought of leaving the Apple ecosystem. And speaking for myself, I haven't looked back.

<comment><USER9> The touch pad is what keeps me on my macbook. Has any other manufacturer managed to create something comparable?

<comment><USER10> Researched this for many hours last year before upgrading to the 2018 MBP and the answer is...no.

I was super worried about the upgrade after all the complaining about this latest gen hardware. To be honest, the 2018 is still the best machine I've ever had. My theory is that most people posturing here as if they're going to switch to a ThinkPad or other windows machine _don 't remember how much using windows and non-apple hardware sucks._ I remember quite vividly as I recently switched from a Thinkpad to the Apple ecosystem just a few years ago.

Now if you have the time to fool around with Linux, more power to you, but now that I have kids I've realized spending countless hours fiddling around with drivers and trying to find alternative software was never a good use of my time.

My anecdotal experience: Touch Bar mostly useless but also harmless, the 3rd gen keyboard isn't as bad as people say, USB-C is awesome (buying a replacement USB-C cable for my old external HDD actually gave me better speeds even though the new cable is longer), and I don't miss MagSafe now that I can plug into either side of the machine. Oh, and the audio quality is now good enough for watching movies in bed with the wife w/o an external speaker.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> When you DO a decide to give it to Apple for a week to fix the problem, do NOT rely on TimeMachine as a backup

Mine came back with a new Logic Board, with new SSD, and would not recognize my TM backups at all. (I have 2 separate TM disks)

I decided to rebuild from scratch, and pull down most files from Dropbox, but my Github code will get reloaded as needed, and apps installed when I miss them

Who has time for another 2 days of downtime trying to work through why the TimeMachine backup was "empty" (it still takes 3TB of disk space)?

Not really happy with Apple at the moment

<comment><USER11> One TimeMachine server or disk can be used by multiple computers. TM distinguish between them using computer name (System Preferences -> Sharing -> Computer Name.) If your computer came back with a different computer name then TM would show you no backups for this machine.

<comment><USER5> They matched

I even ran a chmod to remove all old access control data in case it was some internal user id mismatch

Still not visible

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Personal anecdote, but Apple could have made an extra $2-3000 off me in the last few years if there was a MBP with a good keyboard. My 2014 MBP still works well, but I definitely would have succumbed to the temptation of new gear if I wasn't so worried about the keyboards.

<comment><USER13> I have a 2015 MBP. First model with the haptic touchpad and the last model to have a sane keyboard. It has a physical ESC key.

I'm waiting for Apple to get over its design anorexia and fix the damn keyboard. I had a brief stint with a brand new MBP from my workplace. Keyboard broke within a few weeks.

Here's to hoping my 2015 MBP lives a long and happy life.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Top comment there has a 5 year old Macbook he's afraid to replace. My MBP is a late 2011 model, and I'm not sure what to buy when it fails. I'm really not happy with Apple at the moment.

I'll probably get a Thinkpad and put Linux on it, but I'm not convinced any Linux is ever going to be quite as pleasant an experience as OS X used to be.

<comment><USER15> The keyboard is a big issue on Thinkpads as well. I have a X1 Carbon 6th gen and I am on my 3rd keyboard already (also, display has been replaced once as well as the motherboard) - and it's 6 months old and I babysit this thing.

Commonly known as the "keyboard lottery", some units get a decent keyboard and others a crappy one. And it's still a $2k+ machine.

<comment><USER14> Sounds like Thinkpads are not as reliable as they once were. Should I look elsewhere? Is this different for other Thinkpad models?

<comment><USER16> The Dell Precision developer edition w/ Ubuntu from the factory is a great package worth considering.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> > Is Apple going to accept that they're currently alienating and undermining > decades of goodwill by shipping broken computers in mass quantities?

That's exactly what they've been doing for 10 years. iPhone 6 battery-gate. 6-Plus bending in half when you sit with it in your pocket. The 2016 butterfly keyboard, the one with 58 screws holding it in. Firmware that slows your phone for seemingly no reason. Home button's that stop working and a virtual one to replace it. Screens that won't pull down anymore unless they do it by themselves. And getting them to admit a problem exists has ALWAYS been pulling teeth. Lets face it, you signed up for this. All signs for the last 10 years have pointed to a really nice OS with an overpriced, over-rated machine underneath it. Don't get me wrong, the inside of an Apple product is like electronic-poetry, but when something is poorly designed no amount of build quality will make something last.

You got taken. You should have known this was going to happen because they did it to you last year. And the year before. And the year before. Stop whining about your $3k laptop already. You could have bought 6x i7 powered Dells for the price you paid on one Apple. You asked for this.

<comment><USER18> Not keen on the coil whine and Mad WiFi. Put me off the XPS 13.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> A bit off topic, but how do Macbook users perceive typing on their keyboards relative to more business-class laptops? Coming from an older Thinkpad, I genuinely have problems when I type on a friend's 2018 Macbook. There's almost no key depth.

<comment><USER20> i got used to it pretty quick and actually prefer it now

<comment><USER21> Same. The old keyboards feel like they have too much tolerance now.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I thought I would hate the new MBPs and it kept me from upgrading for a while. But after making the switch last year, I'm pretty much fully onboard.

The USB-C ports are great, and I am looking forward to the future where old- school USB ports are dead and everything is USB-C. There's the occasional frustration with not having all cables be equal (you could have a USB-C to USB-C cable that transfers power, slow data, or Thunderbolt-3 data… it's unintuitive).

The lack of ESC-key doesn't bother me as much as I thought either. I finally made the switch and remapped caps lock to escape and will never look back. I use BetterTouchTool to get the ideal touchbar with shortcuts to my 5 most used functions, a Spotify player and a couple system controls. It's perfect, customized to my liking, and beat the previous FN-key setup I had. TouchID rocks. I never see Apple's crap TouchBar implementation.

I have been having the keyboard issues, usually it materializes in the form of double impressions of keys I type. I'll end up with `ee` instead of `e`, and a couple other letters like that. Doesn't seem to be happening as much as it used to (after a "top case" replacement for an unrelated TouchBar issues).

<comment><USER23> I keep forgetting that they killed the ESC-key. Wow. What I never got is: Yea, add a touch-bar if you want, Apple, but why not stick it _above_ the F-keys row? It's standardized for decades, programs actually use it. Why _remove_ the F-keys for it? It's not like on a MBP there isn't enough space for both.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> I just can't believe it. I've been holding on to my 2013 MBP and iPhone SE for years, ready to buy, waiting for the time when Apple comes to its senses, but it looks like there's no upgrade path in sight and never will be.

</comment><comment><USER25> I know this article highlights the problems with 2018+ keywords, but even my 2016 Macbook, which is one of the first with the butterfly mechanisms, has given me plenty of problems: keys sticking, keys not pressing without a tremendous amount of force, double printing characters, etc.

It is frustrating because I love macOS, but having keyboard problems makes me reluctant to get another Macbook in the future.

<comment><USER26> Have you tried getting it serviced under [https://www.apple.com/support/keyboard-service-program- for-m...](https://www.apple.com/support/keyboard-service-program-for-macbook- and-macbook-pro/) ?

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> I wonder what the latency of low quality products is? Apple wouldn't be the first company to go through this - I can think of car and clothing manufacturers which were known for quality only to abuse their reputation and eventually lose sales, sometimes catastrophically. I wonder if there's some B-school stats or case studies which show how long customers are willing to give a business the benefit of the doubt and continue to buy products based on a company's old reputation before their new reputation takes over and sales drop?

</comment><comment><USER28> Yep. I have a 2016 MacBook Pro that's had two top case replacements for bad keys. It's been a year since the last one, and that's because I am EXTREMELY careful with this one specifically around heat.

I strongly believe that heat under the keys is the cause, and not dust. I never, ever let the CPU temp spike (using iStat menus to show the current temp and disabling Turbo Boost).

I also never charge an external device like a phone or iPad using the USB-C ports to avoid creating heat.

Lastly, this computer never, ever sits on any surface that isn't solid. No bed, no couch, no lap. I use a tray or something similar if it's not on a desk.

If you heat the computer to the point that you feel that trademark snapping sound in the membranes of the keys, you are screwed. You might as well make the appointment right then since your keys will fail soon.

I might just fail this one on purpose because I could use a new battery which you get with the keyboard switch. Oh, and my camera no longer works for some reason.

</comment><comment><USER29> I have a 2018 MBP 15" w/Touchbar at work. I have not had any issues but I use the internal keyboard only as a last resort.

I really hate the internal keyboard, and I hate the touchbar.

For my personal use I went and bought a Surface Pro at a way lower price than a MBP and have been happy with that because I hate these MBP Touchbar keyboards so much.

It blows my mind that the "Type cover" on the Surface Pro has more travel and feels better than the MBP keyboard. If I was developing on it a lot I don't know if I'd be that happy with windows but I mostly don't do development on it and for that windows & OSX are basically a wash for me. I do some hack type stuff with it, music stuff, photo/video, etc.. both OSes work fine for me with a slight edge to windows occasionally for some of the hacking projects.

</comment><comment><USER30> I'm wondering if this is going to royally bite them in the ass. I have a Gen 2 keyboard in a 2017 13 MBP that needed an Apple Store visit to remedy the spacebar under warranty.

$700 to replace it out of warranty will mean I relegate it to a desk and NEVER BUY ANOTHER APPLE COMPUTER AGAIN.

Because someone, somewhere in their vast organization needs to find a solution where a stuck key doesn't require brain surgery to replace the keyboard, top plate, and battery.

I was already sore at the dongle requirements, but willing to overlook in light of the dozen or so OTHER dongles they've made me buy over the years. The subtle differences in OSX that sold really expensive hardware are no longer there.

(And don't get me started on the walled garden permanent phone lease they're easing us into.)

</comment><comment><USER31> The keyboard of my sister's brandnew mbp is literally falling apart. She uses a cheap bluetooth keyboard she puts on top of the mbp's keyboard. She still claims Apple makes the best notebooks. I'm totally enthralled by how Apple keeps their users locked in in their parallel universe and pay the premium price.

</comment><comment><USER32> I've never owned a MacBook but I've been thinking of buying one over the last year. This single issue has prevented me from making the purchase. I can't help but think how upset I would be if I bought a MacBook and they improved the keyboard several months later.

</comment><comment><USER33> I have a 2016 MBP that's had one keyboard replacement, I am living with the stuttering that I now have in the replacement. I have refused to upgrade and will continue to do so until they fix this (and the T2 issues, and the audio issues, and the overheating issues).

<comment><USER34> Words cannot describe the level of anger I would have experienced if I had "upgraded" to a new MacBook Pro that had the USB audio glitching.

I'm broadening my horizons beyond Logic Pro for recording music, in case my 2013-vintage laptop fails before Apple fixes that problem. If Apple's hardware can't support typical audio peripherals, they should just stop shipping Logic Pro and Garageband as well.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> The Macbook keyboard problems only have three possible endings:

1) Apple is able to be evasive and dishonest until it goes away, probably days after they cancel the free keyboard replacement program and people buy new computers instead of paying Apple $795 to fix Apple's mistake once or twice a year

2) Apple is able to permanently fix it retroactively, but like the trashcan Mac Pro it seems they have painted themselves in to a corner where they cannot proceed and cannot move quickly either

3) Apple offers to replace the affected laptops when they do have an alternative, this is really the best case scenario except 4th gen is coming and if it doesn't fix the issue then it's a long wait to 5th...

Even if they fix it on the next iteration I don't think they would seriously entertain number three without substantial legal action demanding they do the right thing, affected people should consider the $0 resale value on these turds when they're a bit older and get rid of these devices now instead of wait for a $100 settlement in 8 years.

One thing that's quite funny to see is nobody _else_ is able to fix their design flaw either because of how hostile they made the machines to opening up and repairing things.

</comment><comment><USER36> My rant about the state of Apple: [https://github.com/geophile/reality- distortion-field](https://github.com/geophile/reality-distortion-field)

</comment><comment><USER37> Its way worse than Apple _admits_. Its impossible to believe that they don't actually have a grasp on the scope of the problem; just because they're not coming out in a press release and saying "yeah failure rates are above 30%, we fukd up, sorry team"

</comment><comment><USER38> This.

I have one with a broken keyboard but Apple needs to keep it for at least a week to repair.

Thats a complete non-starter. I dont have backup laptops hanging around to use.

<comment><USER39> They have a 2 weeks no questions asked return policy. Apple store employees usually suggest buying a new one and then returning it once the repair is complete

<comment><USER40> That is... less than ideal

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Had issues issue with the second to latest MBP keys sticking. Got the lates MBP when it was released and keyboard has been flawless since. But imagine there are a lot of scenarios for other people were that could not be the case.

<comment><USER42> Matches my experience aswell.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> As much as it pains me to say this, Apple is having much trouble juggling their endeavors. Apple's website is usually pixel perfect, but look at [https://www.apple.com/mac-pro/index1.html](https://www.apple.com/mac- pro/index1.html) and you'll see it isn't even responsive. Viewed on their own iOS devices renders the desktop nav. No one at Apple even goes to their own flagship desktop marketing page anymore.

<comment><USER44> I think the website is responsive but it may be doing something different than a straight media query like detecting the user agent.

FWIW, it loads and looks fine on both my mobile device and desktop.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> Maybe Apple doesn't really care that much about the Mac. The iPhone ate the company. They're a mobile phone and services company now. Macs are an afterthought.

<comment><USER46> What computers do you think all those iOS apps get built on?

<comment><USER47> But if Apple decides the laptop market isn't worth it vs. IPhone/iPad, then I see no reason for them to continue requiring a Mac to develop iOS apps. Android apps can be developed on systems other than chromebooks, and it's even possible to compile a Linux elf binary from windows (although I don't know why you would want to).

At this point, Apple is expending a lot of effort maintaining a desktop OS, and significant effort designing the hardware. If they weren't making adequate money on that portion of their business, then I see no technical reason to continue to require a Mac to develop for iOS.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> Items I keep on my nightstand:

Phone and charger

Reading glasses

Can of compressed air

<comment><USER49> Choose wisely.

</comment></comment><comment><USER50> I don't get how people don't consider the power cords apple gives also a fiasco. I've literally never seen one last more than a year before the outside rubber breaks. Shortly after the internal wires. Meanwhile I've had the same power adapter for my x220 for nearly a decade now and its just fine, no signs of any insulation breaking what so ever.

<comment><USER51> I've had my original power chord for my 2012 MBP. No wires showing, or rubber coming off. Lasted me through college.

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> It's not a huge problem if you consider the Mac an expendable part of the eco system, as Apple does.

</comment><comment><USER53> I can live with the new Macbook keyboard, missing function keys and a malfunctioning key only because I always use external Apple keyboard.

The only time I use Macbook keyboard is at cafes or meetups. After 2 years I still don't like and I haven't find a single good use for the touchbar.

<comment><USER4> It's not just not useful.

In some applications, like Chrome, I noticed that I rest my hands above the number line on the keyboard when I'm thinking, which sometimes opens a new tab.

It's infuriating. Apple broke keyboards. It feels arrogant.

<comment><USER21> It feels like a move which was completely born out of the business side of the company. Like: how can we make it _more_ expensive to own one of our keyboards? What if it were destroyed by dust and had an OLED display built in?

There's no chance for the touchbar to get developer attention if _only_ people who were able to drop 2K+ on a laptop in the past couple years have access to one.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> I was a mac laptop user. I've now switched to an imac pro and ipad pro, and am much happier for it. My mad has ports and I can use my own keyboard. The ipad is much nicer for work around the house away from my desk.

(Mac mini + the new ipad air would probably work as well for many use cases while being cheaper)

The laptops are a huge error though. They're the most popular type of mac, and they're all flawed. My macbook air from 2011 still runs perfectly. I couldn't confidently tell someone their butterfly keyboard model would last that long, and desktop + ipad is a more expensive, niche combo. Not everyone can do that. Really bad for the ecosystem in the long run.

</comment><comment><USER55> I am very careful with my gear and one of the only people I know who don't fray their lightning cables. So far my 2015 MacBook keyboard is fine, but I am holding on to my 2012 MacBook Pro for dear life. When work issued me a new computer, I asked them for a 2018 Mac Mini rather than a disposable MacBook Pro.

I have also accelerated my Linux migration contingency planning. If I were to get a laptop now, it would be one of the System76 Linux models.

Apple will eventually have to make it right, if nothing else the class-action lawsuits will ensure that, but their complacency and bad faith has already caused irreparable damage to the brand.

</comment><comment><USER56> Could the link be edited to not jump to the #comments anchor in the article?

</comment><comment><USER57> > Apple keep insisting that only a "small number of customers have problems" > with the MacBook keyboards. That's bollocks. This is a huge issue, it's > getting worse not better, and Apple is missing the forest for the trees.

No, Apple knows exactly how bad it is. They _always_ [0] say "a small number of ..." for every[0] issue they have. They're just stubborn. They'll fix a few as they are brought in and they'll continue iterating on this design and letting new buyers beta test it.

[0] Never use a definitive.

</comment><comment><USER58> I can't believe that the 2018 membrane version didn't fix the issue. That was my last hope. Time to look for a Thinkpad alternative. Which Linux should I install? Ubuntu?

<comment><USER51> Install gentoo

</comment></comment><comment><USER59> I would've definitely gotten a Macbook Pro if the keyboard wasn't so terrible. Not only the reliability problem, but the flat keys. Just not good for programming.

</comment><comment><USER60> 1) Bring Matias Tactile Pro keyboard from home.

2) Realize that the MBP _only_ has USB-C ports.

3) Buy or requisition a USB-C combo dongle (i.e., a computer wart).

4) Plug keyboard into computer wart, plug computer wart into laptop.

5) Fixed!

Thanks, Apple!

</comment><comment><USER61> Even if the keyboards weren't notoriously unreliable, I would still hate how they feel to use. My $15 wireless iPad keyboard feels better to use than my MacBook's.

And that's on top of all the other issues that have been discussed. At this point, the only thing holding me back from switching to a Thinkpad is iOS/macOS development. Maybe I should just get a Thinkpad and a Mac Mini. It wouldn't even cost that much more than a MacBook Pro..

</comment><comment><USER62> There's a problem with DHH's survey, which is that nobody whose keyboards are working cares to seek out and vote in it.

Anecdata of course, but my 20 person engineering team has been using MBPs with the new keyboards for the last three years (various models), and so far no one has had a keyboard problem.

I've got a 2018 at home which I hammer pretty hard every day and no issues either.

It's not a popular opinion on HN but I actually like how the keyboard feels.

So I'm not sure the despair is as widespread as it seems on HN. That said it does still seem like the failure rate is unreasonable, and I can easily see Apple losing the class action suits. More than that, this is a PR nightmare, and I'm not sure their "silent treatment" culture is an effective way to handle it.

<comment><USER63> I too know too much about the bias in online polls. But this one touches home.

At my workplace we only have 2 of the new MBP with the new keyboards... 100% of these people have issues with at least one key. They're the most frequent users of the air blowing keyboard cleaner so much that the IT department decided to just leave it out on a counter for us to use without asking.

I'm about to do some moonlighting and cannot use my work computer for this so I'm building a Linux machine to do this. I've been using only Macs for 20 years and I'm going back to Linux for the first time since switching.

</comment></comment><comment><USER64> I gave up on apple last year. I did not buy one for my personal work when I needed a computer. I use an Hp Spectre and ubuntu now. I miss mac os x. Ubuntu sucks majorly sometimes. I may turn my computer into a hackintosh, though I see apple's recent decision to become a "media" company indicative of the reality that apple may soon be going the way of the dinosaur.

</comment><comment><USER65> Absolutely true. I started migrating to Linux when I had to bring an external keyboard all the time. The keyboard sucks, extremely. I loved reading on iBooks, but I even coded its alternative with the identical theme in Emacs. I hate "that" keyboard so much. It's extremely embarrassing.

</comment><comment><USER66> +1

Just confirming the survey which is great, I did exactly like in the article. I primarily use my 2017 MBP at work/home where I have keyboards, so haven't been willing to lose the laptop for 2 weeks to be replaced with a keyboard that is reported to have the same faults.

As such, I actively discourage anyone I know thinking about it from buying an apple laptop.

</comment><comment><USER67> I'm one of those "just plug in a keyboard" folks. Took it to an Apple Store and they couldn't fix it. We have AppleCare and I will send it in, but its such a pain since I have to blank the drive before sending. I guess I will put my stuff on a Mac Mini until it gets back.

Not buying a new Mac until they get this actually fixed.

</comment><comment> black-alert I bought the latest version of the MBP with the 'fixed' keyboard last year September. I have sold it 2 months later because one of the keys didn't work well anymore, I had to push that key hard for it to respond. It is amazing that Apple seem to completely ignore all the issues with the new MBP..

</comment><comment><USER68> I miss the escape key as well, here's one way I addressed it: using BTT I added another button to the Touch Bar. This was a second escape key, placed right next to the original. Now the first two inches from the left are one big escape key, making it easier to touch-type.

</comment><comment><USER69> I just came across this and it sums up what many of us think about Apple.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3iXEMtmITw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3iXEMtmITw)

I wish they did better for us customers.

</comment><comment><USER18> 2011 MBA here. Waiting to buy a new MBP,... but not on your nelly with that keyboard, touchbar, and lack of ram on the smaller model.

Also budgeted for one. I've also become very cautious over Apple, which is a shame.

</comment><comment><USER70> > a staggering 30% are dealing with keyboard issues right now!

I'm guessing this is the effect of hardware monoculture ? If your single- source provider has an issue, there's not much you can do.

</comment><comment><USER71> The macbook keyboard sucks. I have 2018 Macbook pro and i believe 5-9 keys have dust inside them and they behave erratically.

</comment><comment><USER72> Are Hackintoshes still a thing? I remember building one with a friend in the mid oughts (2005 maybe?).

</comment><comment><USER73> The keyboard and the case flex are bad. I like having one USB-C connector for everything.

</comment><comment><USER74> Hey how often do y'all clean your computers?

Like alcohol wipe + vacuum out the keyboard?

<comment><USER75> I have to wonder if cleanliness and care for the device is a big contributor to this issue. The people I personally know that have been impacted by this keyboard problem are the same folks that seem to treat their devices pretty badly: grimy keyboard/trackpad, outer case has all sorts of visible evidence of minor damage, and/or the device is carried around without a sleeve in a bag where it's jumbled up with other misc items and debris.

<comment><USER76> My £400 Dell Latitude is 5 years old, gets 12 hours of use a day and is dragged through some very dusty, dirty environments on a daily basis. All the keys are working.

If you make a consumer product that can't withstand basic consumer use then you're doing something wrong.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER77> I recently bought a 2018 MacBook Air. I don't know if this revision has a different keyboard than the one in question, or what, but I find it totally fine to type on. Prior to this, I was using 1013-2015 era laptops; I know these came before the problematic keyboards and I don't really find the newer or the older ones worse in any real way.

However, that's just speaking of what they're like when they work. The failure rate is a major, major problem and they are not doing enough about it, at all.</comment>


Facebook's Potential Search Power Could Surpass Google's - <AUTHOR> http://seekingalpha.com/article/519251-facebook-s-potential-search-power-could-surpass-google-s

<comment><USER2> The race is on!</comment>