The difference between DuckDuckGo and Google - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/asg/status/352433914125619202/photo/1 @Asg on Twitter to further the discussion. <comment><USER2> So a link to a cosmetics company and a paid ad for backpacks is better?

<comment><AUTHOR> Paid ads are the only way they will make revenue and you know that. The cosmetics company technically should be the first result. The brand is based around the word.

<comment><USER2> What "should be" the first result is a very subjective exercise.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> @asg on twitter to continue the discussion.

<comment><USER2> Make sure you get your twitter handle out there while you're railing against SEO. ;)</comment></comment>


How I Doubled My Testosterone Levels Naturally and You Can Too - <AUTHOR> https://www.artofmanliness.com/2013/01/18/how-to-increase-testosterone-naturally/ <comment><USER2> And that's desirable...why?

<comment><AUTHOR> As males age Testosterone levels typically fall. The results can cause many problems from obesity, Type II Diabetes, baldness, muscle loss, prostate problems, etc.</comment></comment>


Groupon manager attacks "slavedriver" CEO Daniel Glasner with two leaked emails - <AUTHOR> http://venturevillage.eu/leaked-groupon-emails-slavedriver

<comment><USER2> Third place is "you're fired".

At least Alec Baldwin offered a reward of a car and a set of steak knives for first and second place. Using only threats to motivate and not offering anything for success is usually the sign of an organization circling the drain in my experience.

Granted I do have some reservations about the source here.

<comment><USER3> Yes, the visual I imagined went along with that article was something like this: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-AXTx4PcKI>

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm not sure how this article made the front page. The swathes of awkwardly (machine?) translated German and the fact there appears to be several "CEO"s mentioned makes it very difficult to understand.

<comment><USER5> Plus the spoon-fed excerpts of the emails makes it look like a tabloid article. Show the full content of the emails, so the reader can make up her/his own opinion.

<comment><AUTHOR> maybe it's better to comment below the article that they should show the whole email and not just excerpts. don't think the author of the article will read the comments here ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Any company that allows this:

[http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-08-31/entertainment...](http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-08-31/entertainment/30000786_1_groupon- fuchsia-humor)

...But getting humor writer/editor Daniel Kibblesmith onto the fifth season of The Millionaire Matchmaker demonstrates the group-buying site is as unceasingly resilient in using its savvy to generate interest in its company.

"It came from a really honest place," said Groupon's PR guru Julie Mossler who suggested Kibblesmith for the show. "We knew it would come with some free publicity, but this was about getting him on the show and getting him a girlfriend."

...

"I assumed I was [picked] because I was the strongest person at Groupon, but we haven't actually confirmed that yet." he joked. "They didn't want anyone too intimidating, but I know they were looking at stuff like height."

</comment><comment><USER7> I've always imagined a sweatshop, boiler-room operation when I think of a Groupon office.

<comment><USER8> I'm pretty sure that's an accurate picture of the kind of sales operation that's required to make the magic work...

The key difference, though, is that a stockbroker Boiler-Room is usually operating at (or around) a threshold of legality since making markets in stocks is a highly regulated industry (at the very least there's the threat of sanctions if a salesperson goes too far).

OTOH, the Groupon sales team will have no such restrictions on how they sell the dream of increased customer awareness through the magic of the internet, and their vast mailing list.

</comment></comment><comment> brown9-2 If Groupon is breeching contractually agreed bonuses with it's employees, why wouldn't they challenge that in the legal system?

On the other hand, "Director of Sales" is already one of the most meaningless job titles that exist.

<comment><USER9> you're forgeting something. We're not talking about a Director of sales here. We're talking about a Herr _Direktor_ of sales

<comment><USER9> sorry i wasn't clear: titles like this mean a lot more in germany, where it's much harder to find or lose a job; they also have a record that follows them around, much like your college transcript. being a director isn't like being one in america.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> There's a lot of mention in the article about "McKinsey"; looks like that's a management consulting firm. The impression I get is that they have a bad reputation, but I have no idea why. Anyone have any insight on this?

<comment><USER11> I didn't take that they had a bad reputation; quite the reverse, that people have left their relatively prestigious job there which would look great on a CV, and now that's going to be slightly tarnished by an apparent failure at Groupon.

<comment><USER10> Aha, gotcha; I didn't get that part. Thanks for the clarification!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Don't work at Groupon.

</comment><comment><USER13> There is a history of this kind of complaint from Groupon employees, including a class action lawsuit here in the U.s.

[http://www.betabeat.com/2011/09/09/groupon-through-the- glass...](http://www.betabeat.com/2011/09/09/groupon-through-the-glass-door- darkly/)

</comment><comment><USER14> Thats the typical Oliver Samwer / Rocket Internet style, and thats the culture where those assholes come from. Sad, really, but somehow, this feels very german to me.

<comment><USER15> I ve worked in IT companies like this in Berlin and people coming from the Samwer school. They have very high ideals, which their skills and resources cannot meet, and their goals can be met early as they are clones piggy backing of the original american company.

When they hit a point like i assume now, where they cannot freeload of the original, and real problems that need real new solutions emerge, that can be solved only with brains, and not brutish force, they implode.

Using the old Platonic concepts of the IDEAL " A copy cannot ever be as good as its original". The Samwers exploited that most of the innovative work could be cloned from Groupon hard early but risky phase, and in Berlin you can hire very cheaply and there is a lophole in the German Intern law.

Dont forget most operations are done in Berlin, this is vital for the whole company.

Mason please fix this .. I love your restaurant coupons

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> This is sales. Correct? Aren't all sales jobs like this?

</comment><comment><USER17> Can someone revive Wall Street so it absorbs these kinds of assholes again and we can have only nice people in tech? It was nicer before the likes of Glasner and Pincus got in this game.

Also, threatening to revoke a title is just idiotic. It provides nothing to the organization. (If you need to fire people, just fire them.) Titles only matter when people are leaving, and so the only effect of reducing a title is to (theoretically) make it harder to leave, but people who want to leave will use their old titles and sue the fucking shit out of their employer (libel, blackballing) if contradicted (and win).

A certain large company (name withheld) had a practice of hiring people in between levels and "downslotting" about 75% of new hires to title the level below what they were promised in hiring. It didn't save any money but it flew a fucking plane into morale. That company abolished the slotting idiocy, but far too late, and it's probably a contributor to the cultural mediocrity and general decline of that company over the past 3-4 years.</comment>


Millimeter-wave 5G will never scale beyond dense urban areas, T-Mobile says - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/04/millimeter-wave-5g-will-never-scale-beyond-dense-urban-areas-t-mobile-says/ <comment><USER2> If true it sounds like 5G's going to mostly be useful in very congested urban areas not so much for very high speed for the individual user (which I guess won't be attainable in the kinds of congested areas where it's likely to be deployed) but mostly just to ensure reliable, reasonably fast connections in busy urban areas where you often can't get a good connection with 4G and earlier technologies... provided there aren't any obstacles, at least.</comment>


Missing link between man and apes found - <AUTHOR> http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/evolution/7550033/Missing-link-between-man-and-apes-found.html

<comment><USER2> Sigh, another iPad story?</comment>


Turning Down a Blockchain Job Offer - def- https://hookrace.net/blog/turning-down-blockchain/? <comment><AUTHOR> The danger in a space like this is throwing the baby out with the bath water.

\- Yes, there are an insane amount of scams, and lots of dumb money flowing in

\- Yes, many use cases of blockchains should really be databases

\- Yes, many blockchain job posts are just PR initiatives for companies who want to differentiate themselves

That said, it's an early time to have a tremendous amount of impact.

Don't like "proof of work"? Go hack on various other implementations. Get angry at banks? Go figure out ways to remove custodial risk, so that we may not need as onerous financial regulations that stifle innovation. Angry about security in this space? Go find security holes and disclose them.

Even for fun side hacks, there's a huge app layer that could be built on your smart contract blockchain of choice.

I say this having worked at the World Bank, Gates Foundation, and a mobile payments startup in India: financial services could truly use innovation, and providing safe, secure, broad access can have huge impact, especially in countries with weak legal systems. Blockchains are a "shot on goal" of trying this, though they may also never live up to the hype.

I'm all for calling bullshit on hyped trends ( [https://www.nemil.com/musings/shinyandnew.html](https://www.nemil.com/musings/shinyandnew.html) ), but just because a space attracts snake oil salesmen, "get rich quick" schemers, and cargo culting programmers doesn't mean that there might not still be great opportunities to do good engineering and have huge impact.

<comment><USER2> >Get angry at banks?

I've found in many fields that are as complex as finance, that when I think something in that field is stupid, unnecessary, or onerous, it is I that am wrong because I simply didn't understand the _why_ of how that thing came about.

So I find it fascinating how many people/groups in history have gotten mad at banks/finance, tried to make a "better" product, gotten stung or robbed others, only to eventually re-invent many of the things safe, efficient banking requires.

>I'm all for calling bullshit on hyped trends ... doesn't mean that there might not still be great opportunities to do good engineering and have huge impact

The problem is that as a field gets flooded with bullshit and scams, smart money (and people) turn their talents to other areas the world can be improved, avoiding the crap.

<comment><USER3> This is true of a lot of Silicon Valley startups I've seen lately as well. They make a big show of how they can do things better, faster, more efficiently, and cheaper than existing incumbents, until the government comes in and says "Did you buy your insurance? Are you paying your employees (or treating them as employees in the first place)? Are you providing benefits? Are you certified?"

Then suddenly, the SV companies say "hey, this is BS, we can't be competitive like this! If we have to do all these things then we can't be cheaper than the incumbents!"

Joel Spolsky said it pretty well[0]:

 _There's a subtle reason that programmers always want to throw away the code and start over. The reason is that they think the old code is a mess. And here is the interesting observation: they are probably wrong. The reason that they think the old code is a mess is because of a cardinal, fundamental law of programming: it's harder to read code than to write it._

Now we've gotten to the point where people are taking entire buildings and making them short-term rentals (they're called Hotels), ride-sharing services are talking about multi-person trips to and from designated locations (it's called a bus or shuttle), and so on.

Everyone wants to be Stripe or Square and reinvent and simplify things that people hate, but no one stops to think if this is an area that's complicated on purpose or if people just think they're smarter than everyone else who came before them.

[0] [https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you- should-...](https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never- do-part-i/)

<comment><USER4> Airbnb and Uber going into hotels and public transportation respectively are examples of successful companies diversifying their income. The point is that their core innovation has provided the capital and human resources to tackle higher level challenges. It had to be a substantial improvement on the original problem to get that kind of traction in the first place.

The hotel experience needed improvement. So did the taxi experience. Incumbents were preventing competition through monopoly and regulatory capture. They won, and in doing so they lost their edge.

Some of the regulations Airbnb and Uber skirted have good reasons. Others had good reasons, but new ideas and technologies made these reasons less important. And some were just bad and anti-competitive. The same is true in financial services.

'You shouldn't do that because it is illegal' argument is actually not an argument, it's an appeal to authority. Opening the Overton window to consider why we have the regulations we do, how we got there, and what makes sense moving forward is key to progress. And it often takes unreasonable people (eg: Kalanick) to make that happen.

<comment><USER5> It seems like you're responding to a different argument u/danudey isn't making.

Their point seems more about people getting too caught up in "disruption for disruption's sake".

To a certain degree, watching the evolution of cryptocurrency is like watching techies reinvent banking, one scam or lost transaction at a time.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely see value of many blockchain-related innovations. Distributed ledgers. Decentralized transactions. Smart contracts for IoT.

But, I've also met many folks who are more enamored with the concept of "disrupting banking" without spending much time understanding the what and why of the disruption.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > It seems like people already know that they want to use a blockchain even > before they understand what the problem is, basically a solution in search > of problems.

This is the story with basically any startup in a hot space. This could be just as easily about AI / Machine Learning.

<comment><USER7> I hear you, but I have to point out that ML at least have already shown that can solve problems that need to be solved which had no solution before.

<comment><USER8> So did the blockchain

Edit: not trying to defend bitcoin here, just pointing that the blockchain brought a new solution to a trust issue

<comment><USER9> No, it didn't. Blockchain technology is perhaps the biggest recent example of a solution in search of a problem. It's interesting but still not clear at all what it would be useful for over what already exists:

>"Ten years in, nobody has come up with a use for blockchain"

[https://hackernoon.com/ten-years-in-nobody-has-come-up- with-...](https://hackernoon.com/ten-years-in-nobody-has-come-up-with-a-use- case-for-blockchain-ee98c180100)

<comment><USER10> Huh? It's a trustless timestamping service. That's a thing that some protocols benefit from. Digital notaries, for instance.

That surely justifies a valuation around a few cents per bitcoin.

<comment><USER7> Lets say we agree that this timestampting service is trustless (I don't, but for the sake of the argument lets say I do).

Care to explain how you go from that to "few cents per bitcoin"? I'm asking for an actual calculation.

<comment><USER10> You're asking for "an actual calculation" to back up a Fermi estimate of the true value of an irrationally-priced good?

Of course there isn't one. It's a Fermi estimate. The main points were that the value is greater than 0 but the use is exceptionally niche. Pick any other Fermi estimate you feel is appropriate for those conditions. It doesn't change my point.

<comment><USER7> "Fermi estimate"? You know that Fermi was known for backing up his talk with numbers, right? How can you say that then "surely it's a few cents"?

<comment><USER10> So, you have no disagreement with my actual point?

<comment><USER7> Is your actual point that bitcoin should be worth at last a few cents just because the blockchain can be used for timestamping?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I disagree, although the ecosystem is filled with scams, and evangelists have financial interests in promoting their believes, there are some promising advantages.

Also the energy requirements for PoW systems are cheap compared to its gains as pointed out by Nick Szabo: "We need more socially scalable ways to securely count nodes, or to put it another way to with as much robustness against corruption as possible, assess contributions to securing the integrity of a blockchain. That is what proof-of-work and broadcast-replication are about: greatly sacrificing computational scalability in order to improve social scalability. That is Satoshi's brilliant tradeoff. It is brilliant because humans are far more expensive than computers and that gap widens further each year. And it is brilliant because it allows one to seamlessly and securely work across human trust boundaries (e.g. national borders), in contrast to "call-the-cop" architectures like PayPal and Visa that continually depend on expensive, error-prone, and sometimes corruptible bureaucracies to function with a reasonable amount of integrity."

<comment><USER12> Yeah but... the crypto algorithm chosen for Bitcoin is about as energy intensive as they come. Other algorithms which are more equipment intensive - scrypt etc - provide the same benefits but without the same disgusting externality of power consumption.

I wish I grasped proof of stake better. I'm not yet convinced it can be made to work as well as PoW.

<comment><USER13> The investment in energy-intensive GPUs will also serve as a disincentive for any change to Bitcoin that does not require energy-intensive GPUs, which will lock us into this paradigm until something drastic happens.

EDIT: I stand corrected as to the terminology, but if you replace [GPUs] with [POW hardware], the disincentive will remain.

<comment><USER14> No one has seriously mined Bitcoin using GPUs since like 2013. By 2014, everyone was using FPGAs or ASICs. Now, only ASICs are used.

<comment><USER13> I thought there was a change to the protocol that prevented ASICs from being as effective?

Perhaps I misunderstood in the context of Bitcoin, but in the context of the investment in GPUs providing support to pricing, I think that is validated just from the news a few days ago that GPU pricing because of crypto demand was causing pricing issues in PC-gaming. And the same principle should apply to whatever "effort-based" mining technology is in use; any significant investment in hardware will be a disincentive to allowing improvements in the efficiency of said hardware.

<comment><USER15> A lot of altcoins have come up that are ASIC-resistant. A lot of these use memory as a bound, but GPUs sill have the memory bandwidth to make mining fast.

<comment><USER13> I must have mixed up some notes about ASIC-resistant altcoins with some older info about Bitcoin, its quite difficult to keep track.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> The space really is getting pretty crazy. I feel like my biggest fear these days is getting kidnapped by a van full of venture capitalists and forced to develop cryptocurrencies.

<comment><USER17> it puts the block on the chain or else it gets the hose again!

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> In the US, the financial system is about 10% of GDP. (The number depends on your definitions of financial system, US, GDP, and "is"). It also consumes vast amounts of resources ranging from gasoline to drive mortgage brokers to and from work, to the cost of mailing out free low-introductory rate credit cards.

It's a fair criticism of Bitcoin that it uses a lot of energy, but it's hard to predict whether it will ultimately use more or less than the existing system as a percentage of value created.

<comment><USER19> mortgage & credit generally are bad comparisons, because cryptocurrency doesn't solve this. You still need a credit score or similar reputation metric associated with your real legal name/entity.

In general I agree, though. Turning energy into trust is definitely worth it, and we're in a price discovery phase to find out what "it" is.

<comment><USER20> Bitcoin doesn't solve this, but there are plenty[1][2][3][4] of cryptos that realize this failing in Bitcoin and others and are trying to address it.

1\. [https://www.civic.com/](https://www.civic.com/)

2\. [https://stratisplatform.com/identity/](https://stratisplatform.com/identity/)

3\. [https://whycardano.com/#social-elements-of- money](https://whycardano.com/#social-elements-of-money)

4\. [https://neo.org/](https://neo.org/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> While turning down the job is just fine, here's what happened instead:

\- Someone else with similar capabilities as OP's probably took the job.

\- This person will make significantly more money than what OP will be making (as OP points out)

\- This person will have learned way more about the implication of the technology, whether it actually is as bad as what mainstream media says or if those are all coming from ignorance.

Even if this whole Bitcoin thing comes crashing, accepting a job that's much higher paying, and lets you explore a new edge technology, all while being able to work remotely, all sound like a game you can't lose.

p.s.

All this narrative about how proof of work == global warming, and how bitcoin won't work because of such and such are mostly based on lack of deep knowledge.

Sure, they say "yeah i've read the whitepaper and I totally understand how it works", but that's not enough. I've been there and now that I know more about it I feel ashamed of blabbering my mouth to people about these things because to people who actually know things, these words immediately turn on red flag and they mentally mark you as "don't know what you're saying".

It's funny how most people who criticize bitcoin and blockchain for all these things actually haven't gone deep enough to have the expertise to say these things. They are basing their "opinions" on what someone else--who is most likely also less than enough informed--said.

If you really want to talk shit about Bitcoin, at least spend about a month, learning everything possible. Otherwise you'll be ashamed of yourself ever saying those things (just like I did) when maybe later on in your life you learn more about the technology.

[Edit] To those who are saying: "if you know so much, why don't you just show us what you've got? Prove to us that proof of work can work" or things like that, if it was that simple to explain in a single comment, would I say learn for one month? (Actually one month is not even enough. It took me a full 3 months of doing nothing but teaching myself to get even closer to understanding the landscape) Even if I did my best to explain to you here, I would fail to convince you because it not only involves technology but everything around the ecosystem. I'm not trying to be condescending. I'm saying do yourself a favor and teach yourself wth is going on so that you can make informed decisions about whether you do want to jump in or not. Don't believe what uninformed people are saying.

<comment><USER22> Bitcoin mining uses as much energy as the nation of Denmark. Each transaction confirmation uses as much energy as nine American households do in an entire day. What "deep knowledge" am I lacking here?

<comment><USER23> Thats because the bitcoin network is over relied on and the cyptocurrency space is still infantile and not decentralized enough. Once people realize that bitcoin isn't the only cryptocurrency out there, they will switch to other, less expensive coins and the pressure on bitcoin will, hopefully, be relieved some. Thats the beauty of this space! There can be so many coins and all with unique and improved attributes!

<comment><USER24> Until we have functional decentralised exchanges, using a common protocol would be a nice thing for humanity. Most people don't care about the bigger picture, they just want to get rich quickly, rather than try and make the world a better place by working together.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> The crypto community is the organized religion of tech [https://twitter.com/jakefuentes/status/955151552984920064](https://twitter.com/jakefuentes/status/955151552984920064)

<comment><USER26> I don't see what this has to do with cryptography.

<comment><USER27> Crypto = cryptocurrency. Cryptography = cryptography. We may not like it but the public has decided and there's nothing we can do to prevent it.

<comment><USER28> Crypto still just means hidden or secret though. Both sides here probably ought to increase their specificity by one level.

Interestingly, r/crypto is the cryptography subreddit and has [https://www.reddit.com/r/crypto/comments/7jrba2/crypto_is_no...](https://www.reddit.com/r/crypto/comments/7jrba2/crypto_is_not_cryptocurrency/) stickied.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I don't necessarily disagree with the author here, but I would be genuinely curious if the job offer was for one of the "scammy cryptocurrency ICOs" or for one of the industry use case that seem to be destined to survive after the current round of scamminess passes.

<comment><USER29> His reasons seemed really strange to me. If I was considering such an offer, my decision would be based in large part on what exactly the company was doing in the space and whether I felt it was good or bad.

It's like turning down a job with government just because governments sometimes do bad things.

<comment><USER13> The last phrase about declining it because of the state of the ecosystem was what confused me. There are good parts and bad parts of every system, even when the system is majority bad parts. It seems dismissive to discard both to avoid one.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I accepted an offer to join a top cryptocurrency project recently. I worked for many companies in different industries as a software engineer in the past and this job feels more meaningful than all of them.

Cryptocurrency is like banking, venture capital, social networking and religion all rolled into one.

Before, startups used to get traction by joining popular accelerators like YCombinator, from now on, startups will get traction by affiliating themselves with popular cryptocurrency projects. It's funding by the people, for the people; nobody is locked out, everyone can participate.

</comment><comment><USER31> I liked his comment about trust, it's something that always bothered me with the very radical trust model of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. It is not entirely clear why you have to go all the way and do away with _all_ trust, except for niche applications such as transactions for people in repressive regimes (which are necessary but do not require us to replace conventional currencies with cryptocoins). In normally stable countries and economies, trust works great and makes everything so much more efficient.

If you don't like single central banks or intransparent financial institutions - cool, good thing there are Byzantine consensus algorithms that don't require proof-of-work but simply some known identities (in blockchain lingo this would probably be permissioned blockchains). You can get much of the benefits and build an ecosystem around known, trustworthy actors and don't have to use awkward mechanisms like proof-of-work.

</comment><comment><USER32> I just accepted a generous blockchain job offer with a fortune 500 company. But they are not interested in building a new blockchain implementation, but rather exploring smart contracts and their possible relevance to their business.

<comment><USER33> More likely, they want to be able to show their investors that they're exploring blockchains so that they aren't seen as dinosaurs missing out on the hottest new tech

<comment><USER34> For those of you doubting that this type of market signalling happens, look at Kodak: [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-09/kodak- sto...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-09/kodak-stock-surges- after-announcing-coin-to-join-crypto-craze)

</comment></comment></comment><comment> maze-le >> It seems like people already know that they want to use a blockchain even before they understand what the problem is.

I kind of agree with this notion, but it is not limited to blockchains or cryptocurrencies. I had discussions about using deep learning on a problem that was very ill suited for machine learning approaches (in the end it was solved by regular expressions and some simple statistics). Other overhyped technologies include: microservices, nosql-databases, rdf/sparql/semantic web and IoT-devices. Some items on this list were overhyped in the past, but have found a reasonable technological ecosystem in fields that are suited to it, like rdf. I think the same will happen with the blockchain.

</comment><comment><USER35> > Everyone who is talking positively about cryptocurrencies and making > hyperbolic claims seems to have invested in them.

I thought this was an interesting claim to use as a disqualifier. If you see the promise of blockchain, why _wouldn 't_ you invest in them?

<comment><USER36> Because investing in coins is non-productive, those coins don't generate anything besides demand. If one believes in the technology, one should be investing in companies working on expanding blockchain tech. Also blockchain != coins.

<comment><USER35> many of the teams working on expanding blockchain tech in the most interesting ways are only investable via coins/tokens. in this way, your statement contradicts itself.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> The benefits of blockchain outweigh the initial costs involved in kickstarting the ecosystem. The same initial flurry of investment happened when the internet was created. Look how that turned out.

<comment><USER38> Which benefits exactly? I've yet to see a problem where Blockchain is the best solution except doing ICOs which is not a problem. Also comparing the internet (having utility form the start) to blockchain (since 10 years nothing but gambling) does not make any sense...

<comment><USER39> not trying to assume any position here, just want to point out that you're looking at the world through the gucci glasses of someone who lives in a 1st world country with functional financial and legal systems.

There are plenty of people in the world who live in countries where the legal system doesn't work, the do not have access to banks, their fiat currency gets manipulated by the corrupt government. And these people now have smartphones and Internet.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> I don't understand the high horse.

Accept the offer, rake in the cash, move on.

Whether or not the company eventually becomes a success does not affect the money you have raked in.

Be greedy, the investors are. If you're an engineer, you're the needed fuel they need for their fire.

<comment><USER31> Of course, if you go through the world without ethical concerns, then your plan sounds pretty good.

<comment><USER40> It is sound. Yes. Thanks!

I am advocating it [this strategy] in this instance. It's not like this is weapons/defence, private prisons, tracking or mining.

It's a blockchain startup.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> He's probably trying to not offend the company by not being more specific, but given the information offered -- why even apply/interview for a blockchain job if these are his objections (too much hype, PoW is bad)?

<comment><USER41> He didn't mention applying or interviewing; this could have been an offer more-or-less out of the blue. There usually isn't much harm in at least talking to someone who tries to pay you money for your work.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> This is refreshing to read. I share similar opinions as the author and also do not have any investments in cryptocurrencies. However, the technology itself and the original intent is still very interesting to me.

</comment><comment><USER43> It does suck because blockchain technology does seem intriguing and cool, but there's so much dirty money floating around the ecosystem right now I wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole.

<comment><USER37> Presumably you use cash occasionally? The worldwide criminal cash markets dwarf anything related to blockchain (although they do also utilise blockchain).

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> What I'm curious about is how someone without any blockchain experience gets offered a blockchain job out of the blue.

<comment><USER45> 1\. Integrate donations using a blockchain-based payments API

2\. Mention on your CV that you've integrated with blockchain-based payments APIs.

3\. Recruiter searches for CVs with the word 'blockchain' and finds yours.

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> Like this author and many here I've been dismissive of the blockchain ecosystem as it stands. Especially Bitcoin, for while I appreciate the potential of Ethereum as a platform in itself, Bitcoin seems much less flexible.

However my thinking has begun to change since reading over the technical specs of the Bitcoin Lightning Network.

The basic idea is that open payment channels of liquidity will be part of a payments routing scheme, directed from me to whatever address I want to deposit funds into. You can read about it here [1].

This system is still being developed but if it works it could reinvigorate Bitcoin.

[1]: [https://lightning.network](https://lightning.network)

</comment><comment><USER47> It is interesting how grievance posts have such an easy time on HN, and how willing the audience is to put aside basic cynicism (AMP is another easy target for these sorts of posts).

I am going to be a little more suspicious and say that the OP never had a job offer for a "blockchain implementation", but instead posted the standard, rather empty cynical fare with the job offer justification. Lumping in all blockchain implementations and then trying to hang every possible downside is as absurd as decrying a hypothetical video handling job because pornography exploitation exists. It doesn't follow, and makes the argument asinine.

<comment><USER48> > say that the OP never had a job offer for a "blockchain implementation"

I get at least two blockchain related job messages a week on LinkedIn right now. Started around a month or two ago. Looks to me like a gold-rush, and I totally believe anyone with remotely relevant experience could have got an offer.

<comment><USER47> He has no relevant experience, and claims that everything about the job was dreamy ("significantly higher salary", remote, etc), but they rejected it for some absurdly vague, hand-wavy, message-board type rhetoric that sounds like the standard sort of from-the-sidelines, self-validating fiction. It is absolutely transparent, and if there weren't so many on HN looking to feel less threatened by the whole blockchain thing, or less jealous about this idea that a bunch of people are getting rich (and quick! This is facetious, obviously), this would be sitting in the basement of HN, but instead it's validated as if it has the slightest wiff of truth. It clearly doesn't.

I'm not trying to be overly cynical, but when posts like this top HN I worry that it's less a "hacker" site, and more about a group trying to conjure a reality.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Bitcoin and proof of work consensus is just the tip of the iceberg. Since then, lots of advancement happened in the field. You can easily choose from different implementations of prof stake or DAG systems.

You can have a bird's eye view of most common platforms on this infographic:

[https://medium.com/world-of-blockchains/the-history-of- block...](https://medium.com/world-of-blockchains/the-history-of-blockchain- infographic-900e940ee6ec)

</comment><comment><USER50> The issue is people like him who is right won't be rewarded. Hype and luck sometimes matter more than being right.

</comment><comment><USER51> Misleading title, blockchains and coins are closely related, but you can do blockchain without any coins and PoW.

</comment><comment><USER52> Hi, I'm Max. I gave the talk that this article mentions, and have helped publish papers about BeyondCorp over the last few years. At Google I work in the Cloud CTO Office. I'm eager to get your feedback on what we can explain better, and answer your questions.

</comment><comment><USER53> PoW is not the only algorithm option in blockchain technology.. you have PoS, PoC/PoA, ...

</comment><comment><USER54> As "generous" is subjective, I'm curious what the specifics of the offer were.

</comment><comment><USER55> I have a friend running a cryptocurrency company and wants me to come work for him. I'd be more attracted if it weren't so far away but either way it's still just so sketchy to me.

</comment><comment><USER56> I thought there might be more depth into why this person decided to turn down the job offer. The reader can only try to infer the reason from the author's take on the space.

</comment><comment><USER57> lol another job posting. I like these posts. HN is now LinkedIn.

</comment><comment><USER58> Who is this guy, and why do we care about his life choices?

</comment><comment><USER59> He turned down a much higher salary AND "REMOTE WORK!" just because he didn't want to be "associated" with the current state of bitcoin. Remote work possibilities are extremely rare, especially high paying ones.

My advice would be, take the job and enjoy it while it lasts.

He didn't say much about the company. But, just watch out for scams. If it's not a real company, they might just be trying to get your bank account information or something in which case you definately want to stear clear

<comment><USER38> Or maybe listen to your conscience and stay away if it does not feel right. Working in tech is not completely detached from the rest of the world, so when some people decide not to work for a company with connections to military, maybe you could also stay away from Blockchain jobs if you see more harm than benefit for the world in it.

Blockchain right now is a mix out of super hot and interesting and absolutely shady, so maybe it's not that bad to be cautious about being associated with it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER60> Bitcoin mining will spur competition for the cheapest energy in the world once there is parity with mining chips (12-18 months away). We're hitting the upper limit on what is possible in the ASIC chips.

Every 10 minutes, a $200,000 bounty is given to the Bitcoin miner with the cheapest electricity + computing power. So once everyone has the same chips, what's the advantage miners can use? Cheap electricity.

Bitcoin miners will do more for renewable energy than many governments around the world.

<comment><USER61> Orrrrrrrrr they'll find power without externalities priced in.

</comment></comment><comment><USER62> 99% it was just some marketing drone wanting to find any developers to cut a ECR20 for their scamtoken. You are right to avoid this. BTW if any engineers read this, treat 99% of unsolicited 'blockchain jobs' as the scam that they are.

Cutting and pasting solidity smartcontracts doesn't make you a blockchain developer :-)

</comment><comment><USER63> I'm always curious how blockchain developers make money except for holding coins or doing the one-time ICO...

I started a new thread for this [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16206218](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16206218)

</comment><comment><USER64> OK great. So can you link the offer?

</comment><comment><USER65> what if i told you there are blockchain companies backed by y? e.g. qsp coin

</comment><comment><USER66> Respect!

</comment><comment><USER67> If working for SAP helps with keeping your integrity, you should stick with them forever.

<comment><USER68> Everyone has the right to make their own determinations about the moral quality of different choices. Just because you believe that his decision to work with SAP represents some kind of moral failure (I'd be fascinated to hear your reasoning) it doesn't preclude him from both disagreeing with you and at the same time taking a moral stance on another issue.

The factors at play in such choices are extremely complex for every individual, but we can't just say "Hey you hypocrite you work for a major multinational so you can never ever take a moral position on anything ever again". That's not sensible.</comment></comment>


Social Media Echo Chambers Hurt America - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@nickheiner/echo-chambers-hurt-america-8c5d0307a628#.e2q6vmgbr <comment><USER2> This is definitely a big risk to the country. The way things are going I am having trouble seeing an amicable resolution between the two sides of American politics.

I see this as a problem that is not caused by Facebook or a few other big players. And this problem would be the same with or without Trump. It is just too comfortable and easy to get into the echo chamber. It is almost like people enjoy being angry, because it makes them feel smarter. (I'll be honest, I looked at myself and that is what I saw.)

We need a popular news/information source that both sides can believe in. Maybe there could be some sort of peer review by respected liberals and conservatives?

<comment><USER3> The issue is that tearing down such a "neutral source" by accusing it of being biased is one very effective way to draw attention to your views and gather followers to your opinions.

This can gradually erode the perception of neutrality and foster a slow progression by the neutral source "away from" the group that is claimed them to not be neutral.

<comment><USER2> I think your comment sums up what we have seen happening in general. And it is the physics description of instability - a displacement away from equilibrium pushes the system further from equilibrium.

Is there any way to fix this other than settling at a new, far removed equilibrium point? I think there is, or at least hope there is.

<comment><USER4> One answer would be a collaboration source that was independently edited by ideologically diverse organizations and then compiled into a single publication that reflected multiple viewpoints. Of course, we have the capability to do that with any number of newsreaders, but it would probably need to be selected for balance by editors rather than readers.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Proposed FAA Rule Would Kickstart New Economy for IDing Drones - <AUTHOR> https://www.nextgov.com/emerging-tech/2019/12/proposed-faa-rule-would-kickstart-new-economy-iding-drones/162130/ <comment><USER3> > "As a pilot, my eye is always on safety first," FAA Administrator Steve > Dickson said in a statement Thursday announcing the rule. "Safety is a joint > responsibility between government, pilots, the drone community, the general > public and many others who make our nation so creative and innovative."

How does this make it any more safe? People are still going to fly where they aren't supposed to and in ways that aren't safe, and this rule won't change a thing in those regards.

If you're currently using a drone to fly over downtown LA illegally and take shots, why in the world would you put identifying information on it?

I would also like to know what private companies are getting all this money to implement a new system? Could they have any ties to individuals within the FAA? The Commercial Drone Alliance has also been pushing hard, presumably since it is trying to keep its commercial partners the only operators that can fly.

To me, the fact they are saying this is for safety, is a very VERY thin argument.

<comment><USER4> > If you're currently using a drone to fly over downtown LA illegally and take > shots, why in the world would you put identifying information on it?

Because the proposed regulations make it illegal to sell drones that don't identify themselves.

<comment><USER3> Build your own. It's easy. I've built 2 myself and have learned from/taught some of my friends.

I have registered myself with the FAA for their current program, but I know plenty of people that haven't.

Nor do I want to have to figure out what I need for a TinyWhoop or similar because every little bit of weight is important at that size.

<comment><USER5> You can build your own car and drive it around on the streets without a license plate (or license), but you won't get very far.

<comment><USER3> Yeah if you drive in a busy city. But if you build a car on your farmland and want to have fun, do whatever you want. And in most states, if its private property, that is perfectly legal.

Likewise, if I am flying a drone in middle-of-nowhere Michigan on my own property, why should the FAA care what I am doing?

The problem with the FAA rules is that it is a poorly thought out blanket statement. If you are flying around downtown LA, yes, you should have a license because you are putting people's lives at danger with a "vehicle".

They don't make sense to me on private property, and I think that they should be different depending on city limits.

If we get into some of the autonomous aspects that both cars and drones have, I think we run into some other gray areas where a blanket policy doesn't fit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This seems really contrived... Should be a visual registration number and ADS-B out for everything over a pound or so like every other aircraft in existence (per the ADS-B 2020 mandate[1])

[1]some restrictions apply

<comment><USER7> On page 100 they explain why they do not want to use ADS-B. Basically, ADS-B does not currently have a way to transmit the location of the control station and has trouble at low altitudes. Also they are worried about too many drones saturating the spectrum for manned aircraft ADS-B.

[https://s3.amazonaws.com/public- inspection.federalregister.g...](https://s3.amazonaws.com/public- inspection.federalregister.gov/2019-28100.pdf)?

<comment><USER6> Why are they worried about the location of the control station?

This seems a lot like regulation for the sake of regulation. The pilots won't really have access to this information in flight if it's not broadcast on ADS-B so why even bother? This is an ADS-B problem not a drone one and this is coming from a pilot rather than a drone operator.

If they're really worried about frequency saturation just broadcast at low powers so aircraft are notified through the point to point system when they approach a drone.

<comment><USER4> > Why are they worried about the location of the control station?

So that the cops can find the guy who's buzzing the airport runway with his drone.

<comment><USER6> Which will only effect people who follow the rules?

<comment><USER4> Most people buy commercially available drones rather than building their own, and it will be illegal to sell drones (over 250g) that don't adhere to the regulation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Do these rules make it illegal for hobbyists to fly drones in areas without internet access?

<comment><USER7> There are two types of drones > 0.55lbs Standard Remote Identification and Limited Remote Identification.

Limited Remote Identification will be the cheaper type and can not take off without an internet connection.

Standard Remote Identification will have equipment to radio broadcast location data and can take off without internet connection.

See table on page 98

[https://s3.amazonaws.com/public- inspection.federalregister.g...](https://s3.amazonaws.com/public- inspection.federalregister.gov/2019-28100.pdf)

Your other options are to fly < 0.55lbs or fly in specially designated areas, like model aircraft club airfields.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Joshua Bardwell has a pretty good discussion here: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4E1aEym-1cQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4E1aEym-1cQ)

</comment><comment><USER10> Everything I've read and heard about this FAA rule is that it will more or less crush independent designers and pilots, leaving the skies to commercial companies.

I feel like this title is trying to spin a very, very bad thing.

<comment><USER11> Bad for whom? Aviation was much safer both for the passengers and the poor guy on the ground once it became professionalized.

<comment><USER12> And yet you can still fly under 1,200 feet Above Ground Level (where I am) without being controlled (Class G airspace). I (personally) feel like hobby and personal drones fall into this kind of "general use air space" usecase.

<comment><USER13> That's the part this regulation is taking away, more or less. That airspace is being given to Amazon for commercial operations.

<comment><USER12> Crop dusters, paraplanes, paragliders, kite flyers, and amateur rocket enthusiasts are all going to be mighty disappointed if that airspace is "given away".

<comment><USER13> It strongly appears that the FAA does not care what hobbyists think about it. The feedback has been near-universally negative and I doubt it will make any difference at all, any more than the commentary to the FCC changed Ajit Pai's stance.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Kid: _flies an R /C airplane at a park._

FAA: "You're under arrest for unlicensed drone operation!"

Is this sort of scenario we really want? More government control and monetary extraction from every single, benign human activity? Should kites and paper airplanes require licenses too?

</comment><comment><USER12> Perhaps it's just me, but a set of visual identifiers (letters, numbers) with a certain regulated size seems a lot more viable (and easy to tell if someone is in violation). They've done it with aircraft for decades.

<comment><USER15> Aircraft is a serious industry with serious people. Drones are available in toy stores. With the exception of JANET, every airline in America properly identifies its aircraft both visually and with radio beacon ID. They're two different arenas.

It's harder for the an airspace violator to disable a radio ID beacon on his drone than to just run a Sharpie over a printed identifier.

You'll never stop the hardcore jerks. But you can dissuade the casual jerk from misbehaving. The same way locking your car won't stop a real car thief, but will keep rando handle jigglers from rummaging through your ride.

<comment><USER12> In class G airspace, you aren't required to have a radio beacon ID. Class G airspace corresponds to where most drones fly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Thanks, I think I'll continue to disable any outgoing communications, tape over the lights, and fly from concealed positions.

Just because a government agency that's bought and paid for by rich private pilots and airlines starts making new laws doesn't mean people are going to follow them. I've got just as much right to airspace as some asshole in a Cessna.

<comment><USER5> Do you also drive unlabeled cars on the streets because you feel that you have just as much right to the roads as that asshole in a Ford Fiesta who has a license plate?

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Can we have a bounty program for capturing and turning in transponderless drones? :]

<comment><USER18> Make sure the bounty is less than the cost of the drone...

</comment></comment><comment> jagged-chisel "Identifying" drones. This is not about a technology that rhymes with "Eye Ding Drones."

Edit: I misread - I can't be the only one, so I offered some help.

</comment><comment><USER19> Am I the only one who thinks this kind of regulatory system seems a bit doomed to fail?

<comment><USER5> Why? It's like license plates on cars.

<comment><USER19> Cars are huge machines bound to roadways. Despite this people are constantly driving on suspended licenses, without licenses, without insurance, under the influence, speeding, etc. Regulating them mostly works because they're limited to specific spaces, are a huge time and money investment to construct, and so large they're fairly easy to monitor.

I don't see why the apparent "success" of license plates on cars means something even more convoluted will work for drones, which come in drastically different sizes, and are extremely simple to assemble and use.

We seem to recognize that licensing bicycles isn't really a feasible thing, and licensing tiny objects that move quickly in 3-D space, and which present even less challenge to assemble than a bicycle, doesn't seem all that likely to succeed with actors who want to do things outside the system. Or even cover people who just do stuff without thinking about it.

As technology gets advanced maybe there will be more of a carrot - <USER2> registration gets you access to autonomous navigational beacons and traffic control or something, and you'd prefer to have those things. But operating what amounts to a large cell phone attached to some electric motors unregistered seems like it'll always remain trivial for anyone who doesn't want to cooperate in a way that's not really the case for cars.</comment></comment></comment>


Goodbye Google - <AUTHOR> http://limi.net/articles/goodbye-google/

<comment><USER2> Pretty old article. It's from Feb

<comment><USER3> Yes, it's a few months old. But I find it interesting how prophetic now seem his comments:

"I'll be surprised if they manage to hold on to their top talent in the User Experience division for more than a year or two"

...given the exodus of the intervening months. Couldn't hurt Google to look at how it's hurting itself.</comment></comment>


The TSA Is Bad Because We Demand That It Be Bad - <AUTHOR> http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/the-tsa-is-bad-because-we-demand-that-it-be-bad-1781974113 <comment><USER2> I am in no way an expert on the subject, but a bulk of the TSA/Flyer friction seems to come from bad customer service. The TSA basically only needs to work hard enough to not get fired. They have a 95% failure rate when it comes to their 'primary' job [1]. Recently, Delta airlines designed and built, in only 2 months, a new style of TSA screening points that moves 30% faster [2].

It would be interesting to give them some competition. Imagine if the department was split into the TSA and the TSB. Give them equal funding and presence in the airport. Flyers pay a screening fee and pick A or B, and then are screened by that agency. I bet they would shape up overnight.

[1] [http://www.latimes.com/opinion/topoftheticket/la-na-tt- tsa-a...](http://www.latimes.com/opinion/topoftheticket/la-na-tt-tsa-airport- security-charade-20150608-story.html)

[2] [http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo- way/2016/06/11/481694459/...](http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo- way/2016/06/11/481694459/new-airport-security-lanes-in-atlanta-are-30-more- efficient-tsa-chief-says)

<comment><USER3> I dislike waiting in line (obviously), but I really _hate_ that the wait times are wildly unpredictable. Sometimes it's five minutes, sometimes it's an hour, and the only way to be sure is to arrive at the airport far ahead of time.

This has always struck me as weird since they know almost exactly how many people will be passing through a checkpoint at any given time: the vast majority of tickets are bought >1 week in advance and I'm pretty sure airlines share passenger data with the TSA already. Given this, they should be able to adjust the staffing accordingly to make the wait times incredibly predictable --at least when I fly, all of the lines are rarely open.

Heck, you could even make things slightly better by texting passengers a "security forecast" the night before: "Screening lines are expected to be {short,typical,long} tomorrow. Please arrive {1 hr, 90 min, 2+hr} before your flight.

<comment><USER4> Think about what you just proposed.

A "security forecast" would _completely_ defeat the purpose of the security line in the first place. Who would "attack" if it's a high security day?

<comment><USER5> You misunderstood him. He meant 'low wait time', 'medium wait time', 'high wait time'. Everyone would still be going through the same screening process as usual.

<comment><USER3> Thanks--I thought that was pretty clear, but I guess not....

<comment><USER4> My bad. Misinterpreted the "security forecast".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The most glaring idiotic point I never see raised about the TSA, other than being an abject failure, is that whatever idiot thought up the TSA didn't even attempt to think like a terrorist.

Look since it's inception to stop terrorists getting on board planes with water bottles and nail clippers, and box cutters... if I am a terrorist.. you just made my job 1000 times easier. I don't even need to get on a plane. You just corralled dozens of people into a single slow moving line. Why wouldn't I just strap symtex to my self and ball bearings, go through the security line and as soon as I am the next person to go through the scanners blow myself up. Taking out the TSA agents, the scanners, the security personnel at the checkpoint, the 20 or thirty people standing behind me and those in front putting their shoes on. I mean you just made my job a cake walk. No one who passed legislation creating the worthless TSA even tried to think about how much easier this would make terrorism. Seriously, didn't. even. try. to. think.

<comment><USER7> The TSA was created to stop people from flying planes into buildings. Whatever damage you think you'd do with a bomb at an airport is not much next to what you could do with a plane in the sky.

Additionally, you've just blown up an airport without ever receiving full access to the country. It's easy to attack a country's borders, but that's not where the heart is.

<comment><USER6> I was talking about someone inside the US with a departure ticket outside the US. It is also easy to attack it inside. Timothy McVey, Oklahoma city. The TSA does not magically improve if you are leaving the country.

<comment><USER7> I have no love for the TSA, but it seems ridiculous to believe that threats outside the US are somehow not relevant just because threats inside the US exist.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The article doesn't mention that Israeli screeners are highly trained. There's a term of art in law enforcement, "hinky", which denotes the red flag that LEO's develop with experience. To fly in Israel, one stops in a bombproof room and is merely questioned by professionals, who will pull you aside if you are hinky.

The underwear bomber's father was worried that he was violent and crazy. He CONTACTED THE US STATE DEPT about his son, out of concern. His son the bomber traveled internationally to the US, without any suitcases. He was as hinky as you could hope to find.

Our relatively untrained TSA is nearly useless; at best it is security theater. I would be heavily against the underwear bomber sneaking by professionals successfully.

Also, I don't see how airplanes are not such a rich target any more. Killing a lot of people without access to the cockpit is challenging (they are sealed in the US now). A McDonald's employee could fare much better with a slow poison I suppose.

Credit where due: a great deal of this post is gleaned from Bruce Schneier writings.

<comment><USER9> Thanks for bringing up these points. I think these are common misconceptions among educated people. Mentioning them shows that you exercise a good amount of critical thinking.

1\. Israeli security. While passengers wait in security lines, Israeli security officers ask questions to each individual about their journey. However, these checks only occur at Israeli airports. Board El Al from Amsterdam, and you'll find the same checks as other airlines to non-Israeli destinations. Another point: the "hinky" factor. Ethnic and religious profiling is practiced regularly and overtly in Israel [1]; U.S. law protects travelers from this method of profiling. I do agree that we should increase the amount of specialist investigators available to perform interviews while passengers are in line. I don't agree that Israel is a relevant model for the U.S., which is full of small airports and is less politically centralized. I compare this to the one major airport in Israel (yes there are 5 int'l airports but Ben Gurion in Tel Aviv gets the lion's share of flights).

2\. TSA's uselessness. TSA is an effective deterrent. It increases the risk of getting caught to a nonzero factor. The amount of airplane hijackings has reduced to zero in the United States since the creation of the TSA. Hijackings in other countries' airspace still occurs. Is TSA doing a horrible job? Objectively yes. Is it useless? No.

3\. Airplanes as enticing targets. Airplane crashes target middle and upper class people who politicians care about. The Malaysian Airlines crashes dominated airwaves for weeks. Airplane crashes are sensational and can spur politicians into a course of action (overreaction) favorable to terrorists' agendas. A McDonald's poisoning is difficult to attribute to malice. ISIL might have claimed responsibility for the Chipotle e. coli outbreak, but would that have been credible?

4\. Schneier. Mr. Schneier is a brilliant cryptographer who does not have credible expertise outside that realm. His blog is popular and he is vocal about computer security. However, several outstanding security professionals (Thomas Ptacek, on this site) have noted that many of his statements and predictions regarding computer security are plain wrong, and belie a lack of understanding of software vulnerability analysis. That said, his opinion of the TSA and Israeli security is as valid as any other layperson social commentator; he just doesn't have any expertise in the domain.

[1] [http://www.haaretz.com/in-israel-racial-profiling-doesn-t- wa...](http://www.haaretz.com/in-israel-racial-profiling-doesn-t-warrant- debate-or-apologies-1.261075)

<comment><USER10> > TSA is an effective deterrent.

Compared to what existed before? The evidence on that is...scant.

> It increases the risk of getting caught to a nonzero factor.

The risk was nonzero before.

> The amount of airplane hijackings has reduced to zero in the United States > since the creation of the TSA.

There were no passenger aircraft hijackings in the US for about 18 years _prior_ to 9/11/2001\. So, its really not all that convincing that the TSA has done anything better than what went before by keeping the number to 0 in the less than 15 since it was established.

> Is it useless? No.

Compared to _no_ security, its not useless. But is it meaningful better than what it replaced (which was not "no security")?

<comment><USER9> > "Compared to what existed before? The evidence is...scant."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_hijackings](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_hijackings) look at the number in the U.S. before TSA. Look at the number after.

> It increases the risk of getting caught to a nonzero factor.

The risk of getting caught with box cutters at that time was actually zero.

> There were no passenger aircraft hijackings in the US for about 18 years > prior to 9/11/2001\. So, its really not all that convincing that the TSA has > done anything better than what went before by keeping the number to 0 in the > less than 15 since it was established.

It's interesting that you had to qualify it with "passenger aircraft hijackings" to avoid mentioning the 1994 hijacking from Memphis. Also, as mentioned elsewhere in this thread, airport security improved at many airports in the 1990s. TSA was implemented with the intention to standardize this. The public was incensed (rightly or wrongly) at the failure of the airport security to stop the 9/11 hijackers.

> Compared to no security, its not useless. But is it meaningful better than > what it replaced (which was not "no security")?

Did I dispute this? Please don't attempt to inject meaning in my position that isn't there.

<comment><USER10> > > [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_hijackings](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_hijackings) > look at the number in the U.S. before TSA.

The last passenger aircraft hijacking one on that list before 9/11 was in 1987 (there are others in that period with US, along with other, flags on that webpage, because the plane was either flown to the US or was a plane of a US carrier -- I actually missed the 1987 one in the earlier report, which makes it only 14 years before 9/11 without an attack.)

> It's interesting that you had to qualify it with "passenger aircraft > hijackings" to avoid mentioning the 1994 hijacking from Memphis.

Given that the main focus of discussion has generally been on the TSA security implementation and its application to passenger flights, I think that its an appropriate limitation. But even if you add that one in, the rate is still so low that the confidence that there is an reduction in the rate of hijackings since the TSA was introduced attributable to anything other than chance (much less one _attributable specifically to the TSA_ ) is not particularly high.

> The risk of getting caught with box cutters at that time was actually zero.

The reports from the planes were that the hijackers had a variety of weapons, which included box cutters, but also firearms.

> Also, as mentioned elsewhere in this thread, airport security improved at > many airports in the 1990s.

The federal government set standards for a long time before that, and the federal standards were enhanced in response to the 1990 gulf crisis, true.

> TSA was implemented with the intention to standardize this.

No, it wasn't. It was implemented specifically to negate future liability from the airlines for security failures, because the airlines (many of which were reportedly near bankruptcy) felt that with the need to provide coverage for potential liability for future security failures made evident by the 9/11 events (for which they also sought specific, after the fact immunity from Congress) they would no longer be able to operate profitably.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> From the article:

 _Another reason is that it's much easier for the TSA to screen checked bags than carry-ons, and airlines keep discouraging people from checking bags._

Why is it easier to screen checked bags? 90% of the time I fly, no one opens my checked bag (at least, there's no TSA card inside, and the TSA indicator on my lock doesn't show it was opened), so if they check it at all, they must use some kind of scanner -- can't they use that same scanner for carry-on bags?

If screening for banned items makes it too hard to screen carry-on bags, then maybe they could trim down the list of banned items to a more manageable level.

<comment><USER12> Less rush? More space? Better equipment (enabled because of the previous two)?

I'm not sure.

<comment><USER13> Probably very parallelizable, too - a bag that needs to be pulled off a line doesn't prevent a passenger from going on to their gate.

<comment><USER3> Definitely. If you watch the baggage screeners, they spent a lot of time inching the belt forwards and backwards to get a better look at something. While they're doing this, every other bag is just sitting there trapped in the queue.

On the other hand, a lot of the checked baggage handling is very automated and can probably get a good view into most pieces without fiddling around.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> > _which is based on profiling that's a combination of behavioral and racial > (the latter of which is rightfully officially prohibited by the TSA, though > allegations of racial profiling against it continue)_

TSA being crap aside, I don't see what's wrong with racial profiling.

If a predominant number of actual culprits will be of a certain ethnicity or broader culture (e.g. because the organizations they belong too predominantly operate in certain countries or with certain religious groups), you should definitely that to the things you check for as a statistically significant correlation.

That's a totally different thing from being racist -- which is assuming a certain demographic are inferior humans.

<comment><USER15> Im against it because its insanely stupid, not because its racist.

Lets take Islamic Terrorists as an example, they have a very wide pool of people to choose from, many of whom do not fit any stereotype you could come up with.

As soon as its known that security targets specific profiles, it becomes trivial to bypass security.

<comment><USER14> > _Lets take Islamic Terrorists as an example, they have a very wide pool of > people to choose from, many of whom do not fit any stereotype you could come > up with. As soon as its known that security targets specific profiles, it > becomes trivial to bypass security._

If the "specific profile" is their ethnicity, then it doesn't become "trivial" at all.

It puts them through a huge new cost -- having to recruit and convince to send on missions more people of other nationalities. And while those do exist, they are far rarer than fundamentalist native Syrians or Iraqis for example.

<comment><USER15> [https://www.google.co.nz/search?q=Syrians&safe=active&espv=2...](https://www.google.co.nz/search?q=Syrians&safe=active&espv=2&biw=1277&bih=703&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi94sm_ibXNAhVGG5QKHZylD1IQ_AUIBigB)

Pick out the "true" syrians. Ethnicity is not a good predictor of appearance.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> > Ultimately, the TSA's airport screening exists as the second-to-last line of > defense for a threat that is astoundingly rare.

It didn't used to be that rare before the FAA required screening measures to be implemented: [http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/30/world/middleeast/airline-h...](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/30/world/middleeast/airline- hijacking-history.html?_r=0) ("By the mid-1970s, at least 150 planes had been 'skyjacked' in the United States alone.") The first U.S. hijacking was in 1961,[1] so we're talking roughly 10 per year in the U.S. before modern aviation security.

It would be fair to point out that most of the decrease happened due to pre- TSA screening measures. But it would also be fair to point out that it's hard to separate how much of the delays post-TSA are due to the TSA itself and how much are due to the massive increase in US passengers and concomitant overloading of airport capacity.

[1] [http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/06/20/when- hijack...](http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/06/20/when-hijackers- ruled-the-american-skies.html)

</comment><comment><USER4> Last two times I've flown, the TSA Pre line was longer than the regular Premier line.

Also, it's frustrating to see not more people calling out Pre for what it is: a pay-to-play scheme which I'm very much opposed to. Not to mention the outstanding record of the government keeping such data secure to date.

</comment><comment><USER17> They should've also noticed that you always have to get to Ben Gurion at least 3 hours before the flight because of security. I'm not complaining, but it's probably not what americans would want in a future TSA.

</comment><comment><USER18> The TSA is bad because its visible arms are all cost (government money, passenger time, etc.) and no benefit.

The TSA airport checkers are the worst. If you simply removed the checkers and let the airlines go back to handling security, things would be just fine.

Hijacking and other forms of on plane malfeasance are a solved problem not because of TSA but because passengers won't sit still for it anymore. Of course, reinforced cockpit doors now make hijacking by insiders much easier because the passengers can't fight back through it. Oops.

The problem is that the most effective security measures don't come with multi-billion dollar project budgets. Matching luggage to passengers to prevent non-suicide attacks. Cell phone waiting lots so someone circling an airport is now suspicious behavior. All of these things are relatively cheap but very effective--thus nobody cares because there is no money in it.

</comment><comment><USER19> >if Congress funded the TSA enough

>we created the TSA, tasked it with a massive task, and hobbled it with ..., weak funding, ...

This is a terrible congress, but I'm tired of hearing this nonsense. It's not true. This is simply mismanagement, blame shifting, and parroting of spin. TSA has an increased budget but has voluntarily eliminated screeners. They recognize it and call it a win.

The budget is north of $7.3 B and has increased year over year. Despite this, TSA has eliminated thousands of positions. These numbers are all publicly available and verifiable[1][2][3].

In FY 2016, TSA budget increased almost $49 million to a totally of $7.3 billion. Despite this increase, TSA eliminated 2,860 positions from it workforce. Likewise, the 2017 budget (which is not finalized, of course) has increased upwards of $70 million. They simply can't spend the money fast enough.

TSA sees no problem with this. In fact, they think they're doing a great job. On the elimination of 1,666 screeners, they laud themselves, "[Risk-based security] methods have proven more efficient in moving people through the checkpoint than regular screening lanes and require fewer resources than a traditional screening lane. This reduction reflects TSA's goal to continue transitioning to a smaller, more skilled, professional workforce..." [2-p.62]

1\. [https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/FY15BIB...](https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/FY15BIB.pdf)

2\. [https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/FY_2016...](https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/FY_2016_DHS_Budget_in_Brief.pdf)

3\. [https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/FY2017B...](https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/FY2017BIB.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER20> The TSA does not block terrorists. It blocks idiots. Some terrorists are idiots, but it has also blocked idiots that were not terrorists. Of course, not all terrorists are idiots, and not all threats are terrorists. Which begs the question, who asked for this?

</comment><comment><USER21> Where "we" is a group of politicians who want to be re-elected. If longer lines don't hurt them politically, then they aren't going to worry too much about fixing things to make it faster.

There is a premise here that the wait is an issue, but I'm not so sure a long and bothersome security line is a bad thing from the perspective of our political leaders. I suspect (with complete seriousness) that if airport security wasn't a bother, people wouldn't feel safe.

</comment><comment><USER22> What's the underlying difference which causes a typical European security check to be swift (I don't remember spending more than 5 minutes on a security control for ages) and the TSA one to be awfully long?

<comment><USER23> In China they fool you into thinking it's going to go quick by being low-tech with relatively spartan cordoning, and just a nondescript agent at a metal table. Then suddenly and unceremoniously they dump all your shit out everywhere and wave you through while moving onto the next person, leaving you to spend 10 minutes repacking everything. (Maybe this is only for foreigners though).

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> i'm a bit sad because whenever i talk to someone who went in and out the US they claim to not have had issues with the tsa. it may well be a clustered problem that mostly doesnt appear but since people are sheep i guess they just go with the hassle, don't care and then say "nah, no problems.".

my proposal: don't change a damn thing about the tsa. but introduce a tsa-free line with simple metal detectors. no molesting, no cancer-inducing machinery.

sheep could be free again.</comment>


Why do we need "? extends" in Java - <AUTHOR> http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9810445/listmapstring-string-vs-list-extends-mapstring-string <comment><USER2> There is a good free tutorial on generics: <https://java.sun.com/j2se/1.5/pdf/generics-tutorial.pdf>. It explains the design of generics, and tells a bit about why Sun engineers came up with this implementation.

</comment><comment> guard-of-terra When we hire developers with proficiency in Java that's one of our common interview questions. We also seek ability to figure out what "? super" means.

<comment><USER3> I have a feeling you're going to get a bunch of type theorists instead of programmers who get things done if you ask about Java's syntax for use-site contravariance.

<comment><USER4> Not true. You'll get, for instance, people who read Effective Java [1], by Joshua Bloch (who is, IMHO, THE man when it comes to java), and remembered the PECS mnemonics. PECS stands for producer-extends, consumer-super.

So, to cite the textbook example, say you are implementing a Stack<E>. It will probably have the methods:

      public void push(E element);
      public E pop();

and, for convenience:

      public void pushAll(Iterable<? extends E> elements);
      public void popAll(Collection<? super E> destination);

The pushAll has "? extends" because the elements Iterable will "produce" elements for the stack. The popAll has super because the destination Collection will "consume" elements from the stack. It is not that hard, is it? Let's note that guard-of-terra is talking about proficiency, not mere familiarity. I believe reading "Effective Java" is a nice way to get closer to the proficient level.

Let it be noted that this whole mess exists because generics in Java were implemented with type erasure so their introduction wouldn't break legacy code. I personally think this was a bad idea, but it does show that when a language is evolving, there are a bunch of constraints the designers must be aware of.

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/Effective-Java-Edition-Joshua- Bloch/dp...](http://www.amazon.com/Effective-Java-Edition-Joshua- Bloch/dp/0321356683/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1332688982&sr=8-1)

<comment><USER3> This doesn't seem to have anything to do with type erasure, does it? It's needed for type-safe generics. Even without type erasure, you still need type safety. If your generics are always covariant (like Dart's are), you break type safety.

I think the mistake the Java designers made here was going with use-site variance instead of definition-site variance.

<comment><USER4> Yes, you're right. We're talking about variance when it comes to the "? extends, ? super" situation, not erasure. And you're also right the things would be better with definition-site variance.

On the other hand, sometimes I think an unsound type system with List<String> being a subtype of List<Object> would be better than what we have today, for pragmatic reasons. Of course, I think this makes me a non-type-theorist, as what I'm saying is considered heresy in some circles [1].

[1] <http://lambda-the-ultimate.org/node/4377> (search for unsound).

<comment> guard-of-terra But than you can never get anything from List<String>! Because you never know what type are you getting!

On the other hand, if your structure is immutable it would probably work.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> We had to learn it when doing an oo programming course at university. And I immediately forgot all about it.

I hope when writing Java code sometimes at a job, I can refer to this again.

This is all done in the name of type safe programming (I don't know the exact english terminology).

<? extends B> is called covariance. It helps to access attributes of B and derived classes with get() but prevents to use set().

ArrayList<? extends Number> list;

list = new ArrayList<Integer>();

list = new ArrayList<Double>();

list = new ArrayList<Long>();

list.set(index, myInteger); // throws error

Compiler has to know the exact type to set the value, but Long, Double and Integer are all from type Number, so you can read it into a Number variable.

Is that correct?

<comment> guard-of-terra You describe how it works, but not what it means in simple terms.

List<Shape> is not a "list of Shapes", it's a "list parametrized with Shape"

List<? extends Shape> is a "list parametrized with something that extends Shape"

e.g. you can assign it with List<Circle> (you can't assign it to List<Shape> since Shape != Circle) and then you can do operations on it that would not break List<Circle> (can't put Square in it)

<comment><USER5> Great, thank you. It's interesting to learn, when you don't know how to describe something in simple terms. I blame my lacking college professor and me, not taking enough time to learn it properly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Why do we need Java?

<comment><USER7> Currently, the JVM usually outperforms everything other than C or C++, and those are only fast until they blow up randomly because humans can't write 100% flawless code.

<comment><USER8> I don't know about that. Some of the Java libraries that were written in C were long ago converted to Java and they run faster.

It's hard to say that the JVM is faster or slower than X because it usually comes down to the way in which the application is developed.

If C++ was ALWAYS faster then I wouldn't be using Java for our trading systems. Some of our competitors use C++ and some use Java. We have one of the fastest trading platforms in the world, the only firm to have faster than us are also using Java.

<comment><USER7> Cool. I've always expected JIT could eventually beat AOT compilation, though I haven't heard of that being commonly seen. I'm a little surprised that C++ still tends to use crude vtable dispatch just because that's what Stroustrup demonstrated and it's easy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> All about Java Generics in one big FAQ

</comment><comment><USER10> Wow, I'm so glad that I don't need to worry about such a mess when using duck- typing in Python.

<comment><USER11> I'm glad that when I refactor code in Java, the type checker catches many of my mistakes. Not as many as in Haskell, but still.

In Python, the deploy/run unit tests/spot typo cycle greatly slows me down.

<comment><USER12> Yeah this... I've found out that I subconsciously actively avoid refactoring our (old and in parts terrible) codebase because the tools for it are so bad.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I thought the whole point about Java is that it's supposed to be extra verbose (which is also the reason it sucks a bit). wtf is this shit

<comment> guard-of-terra Let me tell you why everyone is downvoting you:

The "? extends" is not an "extra verbosity". It's actually a sound CS concept, one that you need to make compiler understand how some generic code turns out to be correct while working on partially specified types.

IIRC C# didn't have that "extra verbose" thing in its early versions and the developers weren't very happy because you do need it.

Not being able to separate "extra verbosity" from "solid CS concepts" makes you lousy at reasoning about programming languages. Might as well stop bothering.</comment></comment>


Let G.M. go bankrupt - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/philg/2008/11/08/let-gm-go-bankrupt/

<comment><USER2> I doubt this would happen. Of all the players involved, it's probably the UAW that has the most to loose in a Chapter 11 situation. What's killing GM (and the other American auto manufacturers) is the unreasonably high labor obligations they have accumulated back when the industry was an oligopoly.

The question is, will a president who ran as union-friendly allow UAW workers to loose a ton? GM has a lot of people on payroll earning more than many computer programmers who are simply idle - they don't do anything, don't show up to work, etc. The average labor cost per hour for GM's manufacturing is over $70/hour.

While GM has made significant mis-steps in their management, the fact is that no management no matter how brilliant they were could compete when they have labor costs like that.

<comment><USER3> This is an analysis you won't find outside of the U.S. Typically, the car industry is known for having strong union labors in a lot of other countries (especially in Europe), and while auto makers are always in trouble during recessions, no European one is nowhere near the critical condition of GM.

The real problem is making cars that people want and selling them. I'll give you a clear example with the history of Fiat :

Fiat is an Italian auto-maker that had a very bad decade, the cars weren't selling and their reputation was bad, when you tought about Fiat, the first image that came to you was a subpar car. After they attempted everything else (cutting costs, you guess how), they finally resolved to fire every single guy with a tie in the company, from the simple chief to the CEO, the WHOLE management that was pointing to the high cost workers, unions, etc. as the sole responsible for the demise of the company, all these people that refused to take responsability were fired and replaced by new heads, an unprecedented move.

Guess what ? It worked. Fiat is making a strong come back in Europe and their reputation is building up again. Their cars are not synonymous of subpar anymore, they sell, even if it takes a lot of time to restore confidence and change your image, their strategy is ultimatly working.

I believe GM could take a lesson or two here. The problem is when the management refuses to take responsibility of a failure, they aren't qualified anymore to excercise responsibility, and their real chances of saving the company, bailout or not, are very slim.

<comment><USER4> Sources?

<comment> bjelkeman-again These two stories at the Economist may help:

<http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11090197> [http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=1...](http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11089887)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Let * go bankrupt

That's what capitalism stands for.

Those who kept a well managed admin and saved for the worst should be rewarded, not those who failed.

<comment><USER6> > Those who kept a well managed admin and saved for the worst should be > rewarded, not those who failed.

There's an interesting issue there, though. Given:

1 - in general, higher risk => higher reward (if the risk comes off ok) 2 - fast growing competitors can dominate a market, wage a price war or buy slower-growing companies

Isn't there a potential problem that companies which are sensibly prudent can be simply out-competed by those which don't hedge against low-probability devastating events?

i.e. the natural state of the current economic system could be said to favour companies which grow more quickly by accepting risks which mean they cannot survive in the long term?

<comment><USER7> GM was not ruined by a low-probability devastating event. They made bad management decisions over and over again for decades. This was a train wreck that everyone could see coming from miles away.

<comment><USER8> If anything, GM is a casualty of the huge asset bubble caused by 4-5 years of 1-1.75% interest rates (Greenspan). That bubble had to burst, and when it did, it was obvious that companies in bad shapes would be hit the most.

The fact that GM was in bad shape was its own doing, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> It seems that the first lesson that should be learned from all of these "too big to fail" entities needing bailout is that there are other reasons to prevent mergers than just antitrust. If we prevented corporations above a certain size from growing (by merging), wouldn't these problems with mega- sized failures sending shock waves through the system be fixed?

Maybe it would be less efficient, but it makes me think of a similar situation where pure profit-driven capitalism has lead to a bad situation: agricultural monocultures. Hunting for efficiency has produced a state that is finely tuned to be maximally efficient in the current environment while being dangerously sensitive to changes in that environment.

It's just not prudent to go all out, even if you think you have a good hand... especially if you're gambling with your children's college funds...

<comment><USER10> I don't think they're too big to fail. They are too big to fail without causing a political issue that challengers can use against incumbents. That is not equivalent.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Don't kid yourselves, and don't pity the pigs at the trough. Long ago GM's core business became lending (GMAC), and vehicles the conduit by which they ensnare borrowers. _It doesn't matter_ if they're ugly and unreliable as long as people sop up the 'Buy American!' bullshit and keep borrowing.

They got sloppy with running the business while they were getting drunk over at the debt trough. Don't pity the executives and shareholders, they either knew what they were doing or lied to themselves - both feats worthy of losing their shirts in a bankruptcy restructuring.

They did this to themselves and deserve the consequences. The blog is right, bankruptcy stands the best chance of keeping the right number of people gainfully employed at a new debt-free GM.

</comment><comment> patrickg-zill Does anyone know for sure, what happens to the benefits and pensions of GM retirees, should GM go bankrupt?

My understanding is that the plan is fully funded and is a separate entity at this point; thus no change for those already retired.

<comment><USER12> I believe they would be protected under the <http://www.pbgc.gov/> at the very least. I'm not sure how it is structured in GM's specific case though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Good idea.

GM should accept the fallout resultant from their poor production choices.

American auto manufacturers, GM especially, kept rolling out massive gas- guzzling SUVs, trucks, etc when the rest of the conscientious world was switching to smaller, more fuel-efficient vehicles. GM's production decisions, coupled with their obliviousness to market economics and the shift of tastes in the _world_ economy is what hurt them. A governmental bail-out of GM would be devastating, really. Let the old, tired monolith die so that baby innovations can bloom.

</comment><comment><USER14> If GM and Ford go bankrupt Detroit will resemble that movie "Escape from NY"

<comment><USER15> You've obviously never been there - see <http://www.forgottendetroit.com/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Sure, do just that, but you'd better have a damn good safety net unless you want Detroit in flames. In spite of my libertarian views, this is why I voted for Obama: On the issue of labor. I figured that the economy was already screwed, and we needed somebody who could look out for the middle class that will be left to the wolves.

<comment><USER17> Auto workers are a pretty weird subspecies of the "middle class" though. As far as I can figure out, they're lower-class people with lower-class jobs who get upper-middle-class money.

<comment><USER16> What makes that a lower-class job? The fact that you're not at a desk? However, you make a good point: I maintain that the prevelant college degree requirement for most desk jobs is responsible for the declining middle class. We're barreling towards a two-class system with a college degree as the price of admission into the upper class.

<comment><USER18> _What makes that a lower-class job?_

If you can only get a high salary by joining a cartel, you are in a low-class job. If you join the cartel instead of earning what you're worth or finding a different line of work, you are a low-class person.

<comment><USER16> A union is a cartel now? Are you shitting me? It's amazing how anti-labor people are nowadays.

<comment><USER19> <http://www.google.com/search?q=define:cartel>

s/(firm|enterprise|organization)s?/people/g

In as much as UAW, for example, couldn't be considered a "firm" or an "enterprise" already. In some sense, UAW is a contracting firm whose service is its members' work product.

<comment><USER17> The main difference between the UAW and a regular contracting firm is that if I decide to stop buying labour from a regular contracting firm, that firm can't and won't wind up blockading my factory entrance and trying to stop my new labourers getting in.

Whereas if GM tried firing all its union employees and hiring non-union labour instead... well, I'm sure you can guess what would happen.

If the UAW were a regular firm, it would be unobjectionable.

<comment><USER19> That's good point. However, the UAW's ability and tendency to blockade the factory entrance could be _worse_ than a regular firm or a cartel in some respects.

<comment><USER17> Er, yes, well of course, that was my point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Party at Flint, Michigan?

<http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098213/>

</comment><comment><USER21> My family survives on G.M. salaries.

<comment><USER22> Wouldn't it make more sense to cut out the middleman and help out families in trouble, rather than bail out entire companies that have been declining for years?

Incidentally, this is yet _another_ article that really is just politics/economics. _Sigh_.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> the problem is that GM is just too big to be profitable, and its just not competitive anymore. Hell GM is the biggest manufacturer in the world yet its losing money left and right.

<comment><USER24> It's actually #8 on the 2008 list. Although Toyota is the only auto maker above it (at #5). And my understanding is that Toyota is profitable. I'm not sure that's a valid excuse for GM.

<comment><USER23> Is that worldwide? Just doesn't seem right. I mean they were #1 for 2007 when they did the stats in January. I'm talking about vehicle sales, not profitability.

<comment><USER24> That's the IW global manufacturing (which includes Oil, Coal, etc...) list, by gross revenue. If you're speaking specifically of auto companies, then they're #2, behind Toyota. Last year they were number one, but Toyota beat them in 2008.

<comment><USER23> ah I see...yeah I was talking only about the auto manufacturers.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>