To Paul Graham - <AUTHOR> I recently read a short blog article talking about the doom of Digg and the final paragraph caught my eye:
But Digg is in a deadly, unrecoverable tail spin. The fact is, people -- real people -- are beginning to tire. Submit this, upload that, vote on this, "like" that, be my "friend", check in here, suggest this, retweet that ... there's already so much to do. The only thing left to "Digg" is a grave.
It is, precisely, the simplicity and minimalism of Hacker News' feature set that keeps it usable for everyday, busy, -- real people --. Obviously, the culture on Hacker News keeps submissions and comments in check, but that culture would not exist if HN were trying to become a social network for entrepreneurs.
Your continued interaction and consistent fine-tuning makes this a place that I like to come back to. There is a certain social satisfaction with knowing that one is a part of a community in which the creator is still a participant.
I know you are cognizant of what makes this community tick; I also realize it wouldn't be what it is today if your intentions hadn't been clear (and they obviously are) - so I didn't need to say this, but I did want to say this: thank you. <comment><USER2> Thanks very much. I don't think it's really HN's features or lack of them is the attraction for most users though, but the quality of the submissions and comments. So thank you guys.

Ironically I've been thinking of adding some variant of following as a way to deal with the increasing volume of comments. I just haven't had time to yet.

I did recently (about 3 weeks ago) tweak the algorithm for ranking comments, and that has had a noticeable effect. Previously it was the same as the one for ranking frontpage stories. Now it also considers among other things the average comment score of the submitter. With any luck this will keep HN poised in its usual position mid-way over the shark for another 6 months.

<comment><USER3> _Now it also considers among other things the average comment score of the submitter._

Does this create a rich-get-richer type scenario, where users with high averages get more exposure, thus leading to higher averages?

<comment><USER4> It might. But that's only an issue if the rich don't deserve to get rich.

<comment><USER5> Hold on, that begs the question -- how do we know who deserves? that is the problem.

The whole thing has a circular dependency: if ranking acts as a filter, then higher rank means more readers, and that in turn means more upvotes and so a higher ranking. It is probably not so much the top being undeserving, but that deserving stuff gets missed.

This seems to be a fundamental weakness in all similar 'ranking' systems, but I am not sure of the full character and implications...

(There is certainly a substantial component of being an automated system of 'social-proof'. And the filtering can never be entirely effective: if you show everyone only the good stuff, the filtering would not get done at all.)

<comment><USER6> The advantage here is that pg is giving an advantage to high averages, not high point totals. So there's less incentive to be a reddit/digg style poweruser looking for one upvote on thousands of comments, and more incentive to say something truly insightful from time to time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I imagine hn owes a lot of success to its simplicity.

I was always confused by slashdot's filters and the threads in almost every other forum, with Post #18 replying to Post #7 and Post #27 replying to Post #3, but only 10 posts visible per page. Busy people don't have the time to wade through stuff like that, so all you're left with are the trolls.

hn's nested threads built with
 are so simple that they're brilliant. No horizontal scrolling, no flipping between pages, just click "reply" and you're good to go.

I have no idea how much time and effort pg puts into hn, but I'm sure it's nontrivial. Something as good as hn doesn't get that way purely organically. Also, I would guess that more of his energy goes into the software, not the site's output. Why deal with an issue once when you can build something that will deal with it forever?

It goes without saying, but I'll say it anyway: thank you pg!

<comment><USER8> _hn's nested threads built with
 are so simple that they're brilliant. No horizontal scrolling, no flipping between pages, just click "reply" and you're good to go._

I don't think
s should get undue praise. With
s, the code would be easier to read mechanically (for manipulation with Greasemonkey, say) and even though there'd be a little more CSS, the page weight _might_ be reduced a little (I'd have to make a mockup to be sure ;-))

<comment><USER9> I disagree. Tables are still the most reliable way to display content under _nearly_ all circumstances (maybe less so on mobiles, but definitely on the desktop). They've been stable for years and years. I went through the hardcore standards phase where I thought it would be the death of my soul if I ever went back to using tables for layout, but then I read a great article (wish I had the link) that struck a chord with me. It said you don't have to avoid tables for certain small situations where it can save you a ton of time and a few headaches. I would never suggest doing a whole layout in tables, but I think the comments on HN are a good example of something that would have been a pain in the ass to get right across all browsers. Just use tables for layout if it actually makes sense and even then, ever so sparingly.

<comment><USER10> Yeah this could quickly devolve into a flame about divs vs tables. But divs I always saw as a step backwards in one aspect: programmer ease of use. In divs you have to spend time thinking about "float drop", doing math in your head, and getting all the columns to have the same height - things which "just work" in tables. It still surprises me sometimes how quickly they were adopted.

<comment><USER8> _But divs I always saw as a step backwards in one aspect: programmer ease of use._

It's always a lot easier _at first_ to overlook structure in your app/code/whatever. It's when you or others come to work with your code or extend it in some way (with Greasemonkey, say) that all the extra work comes along.

If you have to "spend time thinking about" writing tests, it takes longer to build the prototype of your software but.. that's not a particularly good rationale for not using tests (though it _is_ still a rationale, of course). Same goes for semantic markup in my book.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> If HN ever got as large as digg it would suffer from much of the problems that digg has, and you will not be able to remedy those by 'staying simple'.

Digg is complex because it is that large, and I think that if HN ever got that large it would start to suffer in much the same ways. HN is not so much a reflection of the person that built it (though that definitely does help) as it is a reflection of the people that participate here.

If and when HN gets to the size of digg and it retains its character it will have broken the pattern that any social news site has so far exhibited, until then the jury is out.

<comment><USER12> As long as this document retains the respect of the majority of the users: <http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html> HN will thrive. It's the single best set of "social news" community guidelines I've read.

The triumph of HN has been in attracting an initial audience that agrees with the spirit of that document, and in their subtly but firmly encouraging its adherence in newcomers.

The character of a community is a tricky thing to build and maintain. A community can easily veer into the superficial and glib territory of Digg, the self-referential and jaded territory of Slashdot, or even the sycophantic territory of Wikipedia. HN has been quite fortunate.

<comment><USER11> > the self-referential and jaded territory of Slashdot, or even the > sycophantic territory of Wikipedia

In this thread that's richly ironic.

It's about as self-referential and sycophantic as I've ever seen here.

<comment><USER12> Your criticism is fair, but I don't think it really compares.

Nowhere in this thread is anyone riffing on in-joke memes a la Slashdot, nor is anyone attempting to achieve advancement in rank like at Wikipedia.

There is plenty of self-reference here but it's purely practical, and certainly there's a bit of sycophantic behavior, but what does anyone stand to gain by it at HN? Honestly telling PG you like his site just makes both of you feel good, unlike pretending to like a high-ranking Wikipedia admin in hopes of getting a promotion next round.

Either way, I'd be inclined to agree that love-fests like this aren't particularly useful to the HN community. But they happen, and occasional ones are a good sign (and maybe over-frequent ones are a bad sign).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> As someone who recently discovered HN as an alternative to digg/reddit I am thankful as well.

Things I love: 1) People downvote trolling and negative/witty comments 2) The interface gets out of your way 3) It updates constantly 4) The content is exactly what I'm looking for... and exactly what I couldn't find anywhere else 5) People are genuinely here to help. I am eagerly anticipating launching my startup so I can post an "Ask HN: Review my launch" here!

Ok I wanted it to be 'three things I like' but it turned into 5 :) Thanks to Paul and the community!

<comment><USER14> Yeah, but they need to make votes non permanent. It's a crapshoot if you'll hit the up or down arrow on a mobile device or iPad when you try to rate stuff.

<comment><USER15> I like the permanence, because sometimes I upvote an insightful comment, then read an insightful reply and upvote it too. I think if votes were impermanent, I might be more tempted to null or downvote the original point if the second one is better - not because of evil, just because of the natural human desire to be very consistent. So I like the permanence thing...

...but I understand the misclicks. Maybe an "undo" button for a short time, like 10 seconds or until your next click that just nulls your vote?

<comment><USER14> " I might be more tempted to null or downvote the original point if the second one is better"

Can't both comments be good?

<comment><USER16> Agreed. I upvote contradictory comments all the time. I don't see it as lacking consistency; I'm voting for quality and thought, not necessarily "right" opinions.

<comment><USER17> _I'm voting for quality and thought, not necessarily "right" opinions_

Then you are doing it right.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> One thing that is different here is that this site does not need to generate (ad/any) revenue, so many of the irritating things that will be common in other forums will be absent here.

<comment><AUTHOR> What's interesting, is that Hacker News does generate revenue in a _very_ indirect way. By cultivating a hacker community around his early stage investment company he is ensuring there will always be top-notch thinkers and doers participating in the niche he has created. Whether this was intentional or not, I don't know, but it works well for both parties: he has a thriving community of leading edge people, and the people have a leading edge outlet. It's a well balanced form of co-creation.

<comment><USER11> That's an extremely good point you are making, effectively YC can afford to subsidize HN because of the fact that they make their money in a way that does not require pestering the users of the site.

I'm pretty sure that eventually many more really successful websites will find a way to adopt a model like that, it really is one of the best ways to marry a happy users to commerce, find some side-channel that you can exploit.

Most websites think that the 'data' they have on their users is the marketable good, google has often been said to see you, their user as the end-product. YC does it different, they see a subset of the users as the raw material to drive their bottom line, the rest are along for the ride.

It's a much more direct version of what FB, google and so on do, and it is much better imo because it is more honest and transparent.

<comment><USER19> Will find? The crazyness about "social media" is exactly that, luring users around your product/brand.

<comment><USER11> Not really, in those cases the 'product' is the data about the users, not the actual engagement of the users to create value outside of the forum where the interaction normally takes place.

It's hard to put the difference any clearer than that, but YC engages a small subset of their users in activities that they are peripherally engaged in on the forum. Other 'social' sites sell their users data wholesale, that's a completely different kettle of fish.

Most of the users on HN are not engaged in the revenue stream of YC, directly or indirectly whereas almost all the users of other social sites are directly involved in the revenue stream.

<comment><USER19> There are several websites calling for user engagement where the money source is not user data. It's about "creating a community" around your product.

I can assure you, in publicity and marketing circles, when social media is mentioned it is precisely to attract consumers for your product.

The type of interaction between HN and YC is not new. It's just hard to replicate. Companies are trying this since the dawn of the internet. Think about what is the forum on the World of Warcraft website. The social media craze is an attempt to apply this community feeling to other markets.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I wonder what it says about the human psychology that people feel that they "have to" digg, submit, friend, comment, etc. You can use Digg just like you use HN - just browse for articles, read them, perhaps comment or not. I always found this interesting when points or achievements were in a game - there is a subset of people who feel that they "have to" do those things, even if they are not fun and don't really want to. They get mad at the designers for making things less fun when the entire thing is optional even to the general gameplay of the core game.

Actually the more I think of it, the friend system is the only thing that HN doesn't have that Digg has. Or maybe I just haven't looked that closely when I visit Digg lately.

</comment><comment><USER21> I believe this is the blog post which the original poster refers to:

 _Digg is deadd_

[http://www.websitemagazine.com/content/blogs/posts/archive/2...](http://www.websitemagazine.com/content/blogs/posts/archive/2010/06/01/digg- is-deadd.aspx)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, I should have referenced the original post I derived that quote from (it slipped my mind).

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> This level of ass kissing makes me want to puke.

<comment><USER23> I have to agree, actually. More to the point, this submission violates both the written and unspoken rules of submissions here: "Please don't post on HN to ask or tell us something", and the unspoken rule that content-less submissions are generally frowned upon.

This is something that could have been equally effective as a brief email to pg. As the current top-ranked post here, it's kind of ... masturbatory.

<comment><AUTHOR> I up voted you because you're correct. It would have easily sufficed as an email to PG.

However, the impact of appreciating something and having communal pooling of appreciation affirms the intent. I want HN to remain what it is and I _did not_ want to be "just another email" in PG's inbox; I suppose by submitting this in the first place I contributed to "what HN is not" but I do still feel that my submission was appropriate in the sense that my intent was an intelligent choice and not a "masturbatory" choice.

<comment><USER24> _However, the impact of appreciating something and having communal pooling of appreciation affirms the intent ..._

While I also like the same HN features you like, I didn't upvote your post because it just felt too obsequious.

<comment><AUTHOR> I think there is a defined line between obsequiousness and appreciation. I feel the tone of my post actually leaned on the side of appreciation than it did "obedient or servile". I suppose that any sort of "Thank you" statement could be taken for fawning, particularly in a community that values a karmic rating system; as I said in my reply above, I still think my post was submitted with a clear and intelligent choice.

<comment><USER24> And I guess a lot of folks agreed with you, as your post is at 251 points and counting.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Perhaps audience curation is a big factor in HN's success? HN attracts a very select band of people. I wouldn't say the same thing about Digg or Reddit (perhaps they were the same when smaller, I never used them). Hacker News, by virtue of its name, reputation, and association with YC is not open (not in the literal sense) to anyone and everyone willing to participate.

This, IMO, keeps the quality of posts and comments high and in a way, prevents it from going "mainstream".

<comment><USER26> Hmm.. it might not be "mainstream" yet (and I hope it remains selective).. however, I'm reminded of Groucho Marx's quote: "I don't want to belong to any club that will accept people like me as a member" ...

I used to participate on Slashdot actively, I'm a programmer, yet I've never seen a line of Lisp so far, nor started a Startup - and I saw comments from "old-timers" that said they weren't as interested in some of the kind of articles that interest me and would rather HN had stayed focused entirely on startups and hacking.

Does that mean HN has gone "mainstream"? I don't know. But it's not as select as it used to be :) (and I hope it's a good thing)

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> It's worth noting that hn doesn't aspire to profitability via advertising - <USER2> doesn't have to worry about things like "stickiness" and "reach".

So yes - hn is a great service to the community.

</comment><comment><USER28> This seems like as good a place as any to ask this: Can only some people down vote? B/c I have seen posts with negative scores and as I am only allowed to up vote, I have wondered how someone gets a negative score next to a comment?

<comment><USER29> When you participate enough with quality articles and comments (measured with upvotes) you get a higher karma and at some point this will grant you the ability to downvote.

I am mostly passively participating here (although I see myself commenting and submitting a bit more now) so I didn't reach such a karma yet...

<comment><USER30> I'm another one of the mostly passive readers of the site, mostly because I'm teaching myself to program, rather than actually being a programmer.

HN has raised my awareness, made me more thoughtful about how and what I actually think about things (part of the passivity comes from the idea that any sloppy thought will be immediately shot down (rightfully so)), and overall contributed to an ongoing desire to be a larger part of the overall tech community online.

Thanks to PG (whose essays I often reread -"Keep Your Identity Small" is one I constantly refer to other people - for HN and providing this nonname wannabe programmer a place to learn. And to learn to think. Thank you, PG.

<comment><USER31> > (part of the passivity comes from the idea that any sloppy thought will be > immediately shot down (rightfully so))

You can still make a meaningful contribution by asking questions, if you want to.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> It's not only the simplicity but also the purpose. HN gathers people with similar objectives and interest. Designers and developers who want to experiment with the new technologies and create and share there own business.

</comment><comment><USER33> It's not the interface or features - Hacker News stays interesting by being _mostly_ hacker news. It serves its niche well.

</comment><comment><USER34> this is gold: "the simplicity and minimalism of Hacker News' feature set that keeps it usable for everyday, busy, -- real people --"

Agreed.

</comment><comment><USER35> HN has a secret weapon. If it ever gets too Digg-like, we can always unleash Operation Erlang II: Electric Boogaloo.

</comment><comment><USER36> Or the doom or Reddit. Sugary one-note posts that are just visual jokes or one persons attempt to get another's attention. _cough_

Anyhow, I just hope posts about "do you hate this" start rising to the top of HN.

</comment><comment><USER37> I guess the success of "hacker news" is largely due to:

1\. the name "hacker news" is a cool name 2\. simple hacker-friendly web interface w/o ads.

</comment><comment><USER38> downvote please

</comment><comment><USER39> Hear hear.

</comment><comment><USER40> I almost love HN.

(will remove `almost` if they remove table layout)

<comment><USER41> How does the layout have any bearing on whether or not you enjoy the website, especially when dealing with a website like HN that is basically in tabular form?

I don't know, so if there is actually a good reason, I would love to hear it!</comment></comment>


Show HN: An experimental music visualizer using D3.js and the web audio api - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/preziotte/party-mode

<comment><USER2> Is this your project? I was never able to get the 4th option to look like that grid. I was getting a "falling circle" vibe.</comment>


Moom removed from sale due to patent violation claim - <AUTHOR> https://manytricks.com/blog/?p=4609 <comment><USER2> What's really galling about this particular patent trolling is that Rob Griffiths, principal of Many Tricks which publishes Moom, is one of the original OS X nerd's nerd.

He's done so much for the OS X and the UNIX communities, having run Mac OS X Hints for more than a decade. [0] When pro users were just figuring out best practices for everything from window management to command line AppleScript (osascript) to postfix configuration, Griffiths' tireless and largely selfless (ads were unobtrusive, implemented with a very light touch) support of Mac OS X hints made it the go-to site for how to do all things command line in OS X.

It's a shame this patent troll has chosen to shake down so selfless a member of the OS X community.

[0] [http://macosxhints.com](http://macosxhints.com) (redirects to) [http://hints.macworld.com](http://hints.macworld.com)

EDIT: Grammar: add missing direct object to last sentence of second paragraph.

<comment><USER3> Years ago, when OS X was my preferred platform, I was really impressed from the fast and really good support of "Many Tricks". Always felt like I was supporting one of my colleagues emerging side projects and I felt quite good as he was actual taking customer care serious by trying to solve things in direct communication and not just redirecting to a FAQ or similar.

I just want to say thank you, Rob! Keep fighting the trolls.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> If anyone is looking for an alternative: I put together a grid based window manager without an UI some months ago. [https://github.com/janten/keypad- layout](https://github.com/janten/keypad-layout)

<comment><USER5> This looks pretty cool. I'm on a phone, so didn't look at source, but I'm curious about install procedure (also see an issue about brew).

As a web dev, I think I'd like to see this work like a css grid. Width then height. So, ^3^2 would be three columns two rows. Maybe that won't work in practice. Maybe I'll play with the code to see.

<comment><USER4> Right now it is a simple download from GitHub though I have already submitted a pull request to brew cask. Thank you for opening the issue which finally motivated me to do this.

The tool does work like a grid but with start and end positions instead of sizes so you can move and resize at the same time. ^1^3 is from position (1,1) to (3,1) (i.e. top row), ^1^6 is (1,1) to (3,2) (top two-thirds) etc. You can basically paint the location and size of the window using your numeric keypad. Its pretty straightforward once you try it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Oh dear. I guess Spectacle (the app I use that does a similar thing) will be on a pretty long list of those to follow.

<comment><USER7> I've been using Magnet for a while now. It seems much more stable and efficient than Spectacle. Hopefully it will not end up on this chopping block as well. [http://magnet.crowdcafe.com/](http://magnet.crowdcafe.com/)

<comment><USER8> Magnet author here. We're from Europe, Czech Republic in particular, so I don't think we're a viable target for a US patent troll. Glad you like our app!

<comment><USER9> Hey, I mailed you guys but you never responded :( Would it be possible to add sort of a tiling window manager mode that would disallow stacking and force any open window to adhere to a 6x6 (or whatever) grid? Sort of like Amethyst..

<comment><USER8> Sorry about that! We have considered adding more features, but it's impossible to do that while keeping the app reliable and simple, so it's likely to stay this way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Software patents don't exist in Europe. So they can probably just add some small-print that says "please don't download this if you are outside of Europe".

(IANAL)

<comment><USER11> They _do_ exist in Europe, and indeed many companies patent things in Europe to take advantage of legislation like Patentbox.

<comment><USER10> Okay, I looked it up, and strictly speaking you are right, [1].

But, quoting:

 _" The European Patent Convention (EPC), Article 52, paragraph 2, excludes from patentability, in particular

1\. discoveries, scientific theories and mathematical methods;

2\. aesthetic creations;

3\. schemes, rules and methods for performing mental acts, playing games or doing business, and programs for computers;

4\. presentations of information."_

I believe the patent in question falls under 4, 3 and perhaps 2.

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

<comment><USER12> That's all well and good, but if you get sued you still have to pay quite a lot of money to a lawyer to prove you're right, and even if you win you're still stuck with the bill.

<comment><USER13> Given the description of the law -- is that something that happens a lot in Europe? (patent troll's actually suing, and people actually defending). Your comment suggests it does unless I"m mis-reading but I'm curious what that's based on.

<comment><USER14> Some are heralding the European courts as the next hot venue for patent trolling. I am not super current on it but so far I don't think that's particularly materialized. I think the delay and uncertainty of the UPC has a lot to do with it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I once designed an app to later realize that I was infringing dozens of patents I never knew existed before.

Go and read a dozen patents, then come back and tell me they're not obvious. Most of them are ridiculously obvious, assuming you have some understanding of their given field/domain.

<comment><USER16> I was always told not to read patents. If it can be proven you're aware of a patent prior to releasing something that infringes it, you get hit with extra penalties. See [1] and [2].

[1]: [http://www.dresan.com/blog/2011/04/05/i-dont-read- patents/](http://www.dresan.com/blog/2011/04/05/i-dont-read-patents/) [2]: [http://endsoftpatents.org/2010/03/transcript-tridgell- patent...](http://endsoftpatents.org/2010/03/transcript-tridgell-patents/#do- read)

<comment><USER14> That was definitely true around the time your links were written, 2010-2011 or so. A few things have shifted in the application of treble damages and some new avenues for avoiding prolonged patent battles that have prodded many to come around on that way of thinking. Still, some entities choose to be willfully ignorant. But in my opinion, it's better to know what's out there

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I was about to complain loudly about bullshit patents, but then I took some time to read the actual patent (make sure to look at the images too!), and it turns out that this patent describes a method that is very similar to what Moom does (judging by screenshots). This is not a case of the overly broad patents that we usually complain about, this is a very precise patent.

<comment><USER18> Being similar doesn't justify it as a patent. A core foundation of patents is that the invention be novel and non-obvious to a practitioner. If countless people independently -- without learning from the claims -- derive exactly the same "invention", it is an invalid patent. Of course then you have to actually get it invalidated, at great time and expense.

It is completely a bullshit patent. The patent office got their fees, and then they'll get their fees again to re-evaluate it.

<comment><USER19> My main beef with patents (from a layperson's perspective) is that due consideration isn't adequately given to the effort taken by the patent owner to provide some sort of value to society in general.

What use is a novel invention if the patent owner does nothing with it. I would argue that Moom or other apps have provided more value to society at- large as compared to the patent owner.

<comment><USER20> One could argue that securing the patent puts the innovation into the public domain. Otherwise it might have stayed inside one person or company's domain. Then died with them.

<comment><USER21> When was the last time you actually _read a patent_ to learn about a novel technology? As opposed to an article, published paper, conference talk, random blog post, or a thousand other sources? They're not particularly good forms for conveying information; they exist primarily to stake a claim on a pile of territory.

That leaves aside the liabilities that reading patents to learn about technologies can open you up to, in the form of "willful infringement.

<comment><USER14> Yeah, this is currently a huge problem with the patent system as a whole, and can be summarized in one word: lawyers. I believe the patent system has been hijaked by lawyers and has veered off course from the original intent (even though i hate that term). The solution to this is to rewrite the written description law to reduce the burden on patentees to add in a bunch of verbosity and at the same time require more in the claims. And while we're at it to simplify the whole damn claim construction process. I'd advocate for putting examiners at the forefront of construing claims, and requiring statements by the examiners on the record of what the claims mean at the time of examination and why they are being allowed. A mini memo on claim construction at the time of allowance. This will never happen, of course.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> This person holds a number of similar patents from the looks of it:

[https://www.google.com/patents/US8434019](https://www.google.com/patents/US8434019)

[https://www.google.com/search?q="Daniel+Paul+Nelson"](https://www.google.com/search?q="Daniel+Paul+Nelson")

</comment><comment><USER23> The patent describes something very like Moom's "Grid" feature (I think the «select more than one selectable region» bit is the key restriction).

So if the patent stands up, I suppose they'd have the option of just removing that feature.

<comment><USER11> Indeed they might: The first versions of Moom were released after the patent priority, but before it was published.

This is something they should discuss with their attorney.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Interesting, I guess there's so much prior work around* it should be easy to dismiss the patent.

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

<comment><USER25> Please go read the patent, it describes an "apparatus and method" that is much more advanced than traditional tiling window managers. The patent doesn't even compare to simple terminal based tiling of sub-shells. It also describes a GUI to control the positions, and describes in detail how it's supposed to work. There is a section "Description of the Related Art" in the patent which makes references to existing (at that time, year 2008) approaches and why they are not good enough. Example: "[...] Windows provides [...] commands which are accessible from the Windows taskbar. However, these commands are not as intuitive as they could be and they do not provide a desired level of control when positioning windows".

<comment><USER26> >There is a section "Description of the Related Art" in the patent which makes references to existing (at that time, year 2008) approaches and why they are not good enough

In that section, it mostly compares itself to Microsoft Windows' stacking (not tiling) window manager. There's no comparison to ANY of the already existing tiling window managers.

It was filed on June 2nd, 2008.

There were a ton of tiling oriented windows managers in place for many, many, years prior. Many of them supported automatic layout, and many supported a variety of grid layouts as depicted in the patent.

Here's a video from 1987, 21 years prior to the filing of this patent, showing the Siemens RTL tiling window manager: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFd0FDv3fQc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFd0FDv3fQc) You can see the selected layout in the upper left hand corner of the screen. The video itself shows the user choosing where new windows will land, and the automated tiling/fit.

As mentioned earlier, a ton of other tiling window managers existed well before the filing of this patent. Many of them with automatic tiling, and several grid layout options. I don't see anything in the patent that sounds novel to me.

<comment><USER11> The patent doesn't appear to describe tiling window management, but the composition of a window layout using a number of menu options that integrate neatly with the existing environment's window controls, and that visually demonstrate their effect.

Indeed the patent describes a user interface to accomplish this that looks very similar to screenshots of Moom.

My experience with the USPTO is that statements like "I don't see anything in the patent that sounds novel to me" doesn't amuse them and they take this sort of thing seriously. Whether you agree with software patents or not, I think it's important to not be too dismissive of that fact.

[1]: [https://www.google.com/patents/US20090300541#forward- citatio...](https://www.google.com/patents/US20090300541#forward-citations)

<comment><USER26> >The patent doesn't appear to describe tiling window management

It does though. The screenshots show grid options, and describe how the end user can place windows in the grid. It specifically complains about how MS Windows has overlapping windows. Grid + no overlap == tiling.

>Indeed the patent describes a user interface to accomplish this that looks very similar to screenshots of Moom.

Sure. The argument about "novel" is that the patent holder wasn't the first to do something "similar to Moom". The idea that 2008 was the first time someone had the notion of grid layouts and allowing an end user to place a window in them is just silly.

<comment><USER11> It may be silly, but remember that the US uses first-to-file, not first-to- invent.

<comment><USER26> First to file, though, is just about the patent being granted. Once you start using your patent to bully people, prior art, even non-patented prior art, can be used against you.

Edit: _" Once the patent has issued, you can challenge it at the USPTO by filing a request for reexamination of the patent"_[1]

[1] [https://www.uspto.gov/patents-maintaining-patent/patent- liti...](https://www.uspto.gov/patents-maintaining-patent/patent- litigation/about-patents)

Edit2: It's also possible there are overlapping, earlier patents. This one looks promising...compare the drawings: [https://www.google.com/patents/US5712995](https://www.google.com/patents/US5712995)

<comment><USER11> > Edit2: It's also possible there are overlapping, earlier patents. This one > looks promising...compare the drawings:

There's also:

[https://www.google.com/patents/US5796402](https://www.google.com/patents/US5796402)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Another Moom Alternative (free) - SpectacleApp, [https://www.spectacleapp.com/](https://www.spectacleapp.com/)

</comment><comment><USER28> Looks roughly like WinSplit Revolution, which afaik was first released in 2009, but I don't know which features existed back then.

</comment><comment><USER19> There's something fundamentally broken about the patent system.

<comment><USER29> It's difficult to say where the fault lies. I would rather live in a world of patents than not, if we insist on sticking to the idea of not forcing research and discoveries into the public domain. What would have prevented this particular case?

<comment><USER30> This is an obvious feature for just about any user, making it nonpatentable by the criteria of USPTO, as far as I understand it. This is also not novel, though it is very useful (for the other 2 criteria).

<comment><USER31> The problem with that in the USA is that you are burdened to prove that in court as a defendant, and you also have to pay your legal costs (lawyers etc.) _even if you win the case_. The costs are huge, so only the big guys have to afford defending themselves!

<comment><USER30> Absolutely, but I'm more talking in the initial patent approval than the litigation afterwards.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> knowing absolutely nothing about patent law, I'm surprised that tiling window managers are not considered prior art or would at least mean this idea is not novel.

<comment><USER16> Read the patent. I'm not aware of any TWMs implementing the kind of grid interface Moom is using.

<comment><USER32> I did read the patent but I don't understand exactly what moom does. If a tiling window manager defines a set of inputs for defining grids and moving/resizing windows on that grid, where is the difference?

<comment><USER16> The actual patent document, with drawings, is at [1]. It describes the visual, mouse-driven grid UI Moom uses to let you draw out where windows should be placed. As far as I can tell it doesn't mention anything about hotkeys.

[1]: [http://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?PageNum=0&docid=08434019&IDKey=...](http://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?PageNum=0&docid=08434019&IDKey=70F1BA777FF4&HomeUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fpatft.uspto.gov%2Fnetacgi%2Fnph- Parser%3FSect1%3DPTO1%2526Sect2%3DHITOFF%2526d%3DPALL%2526p%3D1%2526u%3D%25252Fnetahtml%25252FPTO%25252Fsrchnum.htm%2526r%3D1%2526f%3DG%2526l%3D50%2526s1%3D8434019.PN.%2526OS%3DPN%2F8434019%2526RS%3DPN%2F8434019)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> I'd be curious to see how this affects other similar apps. I use Magnet and I love it - I'd hate for it to disappear.

</comment><comment><USER34> The most important single thing to read in a patent is the claims, especially the independent (stand-alone) claims.

Infringement analysis amounts to attempting to map the claim's list of elements onto the accused method or structure; if the map function returns FALSE, then that particular claim very likely isn't infringed by that particular accused method or structure.

(That is: If any claim element isn't present—possibly in the form of an "equivalent"—then the accused method or structure doesn't infringe that particular claim.)

Prior-art analysis works backwards: If a claim returns TRUE when mapped onto a piece of prior art—or onto something that would have been "obvious" at the time the invention was made when taking into account all of the relevant prior art [0]—then that claim is probably unpatentable.

In this patent, claim 1 seems to be representative. I've broken up the paragraphing and added bracketed lettering.

 _(Usual disclaimer: This shouldn 't be relied on as a substitute for legal advice; I'm not acting as anyone's lawyer; etc.)_

==QUOTE==

1\. A method for positioning a window on a user's display, the method comprising:

[A] providing, in a window-based computing environment, an image [i] representing an entire display area of a user's computer screen and [ii] comprising a plurality of selectable regions,

each selectable region [x] representing a sub-area within the display area and [y] having a shape and orientation similar to the corresponding sub-area,

wherein the selectable regions are arranged in the same way the corresponding sub-areas are arranged in the display area;

[B] enabling a user to simultaneously select more than one selectable region from the plurality of selectable regions; and

[C] automatically moving a window in the window-based computing environment to a sub-area corresponding to the selected more than one selectable region.

==END QUOTE==

[0] Obviousness analysis is really tricky because it necessarily requires hindsight. The test is, in essence: Given everything that was known in the relevant field(s) at the time, would a hypothetical person of "ordinary skill" (in that field or fields) have regarded the claimed subject as obvious?

My personal tl;dr for obviousness analysis is this: Suppose that a team of competent-but-not-necessarily-stellar colleagues were shown or told about the claimed invention. If their collective reaction was to raise their eyebrows and murmur, "hmm; _that 's_ interesting," then the claimed invention might well have been non-obvious. On the other hand, if their collective reaction was to shrug their shoulders and say, "um, yeah, and?" then the claimed invention might well have been obvious.

In the real world, obviousness analysis is supported by "objective evidence" of nonobviousness, if available. For example, commercial success that's shown to be due to the technical merits of the claimed invention (as opposed to being due mainly to, e.g., marketing) can weigh heavily in favor of nonobviousness. Admiration of experts, ditto.

(I once heard a story, very likely apocryphal, about a patent examiner who rejected a patent application on grounds of obviousness; the patent attorney overcame the rejection by pointing out that the claimed invention had received the Nobel Prize. Personally I'm skeptical because the timing wouldn't work, but the story illustrates the concept.)

<comment><USER35> Came here to say this, and I wish more non-lawyers understood how to read a patent. The scope of coverage is not the title. The scope of coverage is not the drawings. It's the claims.

If folks want to explain why this shouldn't have issued, identify a single document from before 2008 that describes every single feature of the claims.

It's worth noting that this issued just before a 2014 Supreme Court case (Alice v. CLS Bank) that probably can be used to kill the patent regardless of whether it's novel and non-obvious.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> Let's talk about prior art about this patent claims.

I remember using software from Barco to position application Windows on a videowall that predates that patent at least five years.

Maybe getting prior art at hand could be good (just a suggestion)

</comment><comment><USER37> Kinda feels the same to me as when they tried to patent Turmeric.

</comment><comment><USER38> What's the best way to prevent patent trolls from suing you? Or is it more like hoping to just have luck and not get sued?

<comment><USER39> 1\. Have a lot of money to hire best layers to sink bastard. 2\. Work for a big corp/government. 3\. Live in a country where they don't give a damn about patents.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> Are there any interesting stats/graphs or an estimated percentage of US- granted patents that are bullshit?

<comment><USER10> The problem: bullshit is in the eye of the beholder.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> so.. as programmers, we should be getting a patent first on any new idea before we begin programming? So much for an MVP.

We need tools to simplify the process of writing a good patent. The current system is skewed towards business types that would rather game the system than create an actual thing.

</comment><comment><USER42> I thought patents were invalid if they were just "something you can do in the real world... but using a computer". I'm pretty sure grid layouts have been in mathetmatics, printing, etc for hundreds/thousands of years. It's likely a shit patent.

<comment> mark-r A bad patent is still a patent, and if it shouldn't have been granted the burden is on you to prove it. With all the costs and risks involved.

What galls me most about the patent system is all of the things that are trivially obvious once an enabling technology becomes available, and the first person to apply gets a government sponsored monopoly.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> What kind of person spends their days looking through other people's software, asking if their collection of questionable patents applies to someone else's hard work?

<comment><USER44> Is this an honest question?

Honest answer: That person is someone who makes more money per hour than the person who did the hard work. And they stand to make even more money in the event of a settlement.

How can you fix this problem? Take away the financial incentives.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> are there any open source alternatives to Moom?

<comment><USER46> I highly recommend Slate ([https://github.com/jigish/slate](https://github.com/jigish/slate)). It doesn't appear to have some of the features of Moom, but it's quite adept and configurable.

<comment><USER47> doesn't seem to have been touched for 4 years

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> the patent troll likely want little money instead of no money or costs.</comment>


Ask HN: Are we all OK with short DNS TTLs now? - <AUTHOR> Conventional wisdom has long had it that short DNS TTLs are bad because they increase query loads and any faults in DNS will cause availability problems more quickly.
It seems popular now though for large sites (e.g. twitter.com, github.com, ycombinator.com, stackoverflow.com just to name a few) to use relatively short DNS TTLs, between 1 and 5 minutes, presumably to make failover easier.
Has popular opinion around short TTLs being "OK" changed? Are these sites doing something special to make this viable? <comment><USER2> Very large site operators use anycast routing[1] which is particularly well suited to UDP DNS; they can easily spread load and minimize latency. If you can leverage anycast directly or indirectly through DNS hosting services then low TTLs are not a problem.

Otherwise, it depends. Even with one DNS query per HTTP request, DNS will only represent a fraction of your network load. It's difficult to make any DNS server break a sweat. More likely the network link will saturate beforehand, causing lots of dropped packets. But it's trivial to advertise and use multiple DNS servers; much more trivial than a web application stack. DNS was built for high availability almost since day 1. This is also why you shouldn't worry too much about low TTLs exacerbating network faults--there's no excuse for not using geographically dispersed authoritative name servers.

For example, depending on the site I'll often host the domain on my own primary name server so I can control records without fscking with a web GUI or REST API, but the advertised authoritative name servers are EasyDNS servers which behave as secondaries mirroring my primary.

The real issue isn't load but latency. That's a more complex problem. If you're not using anycast then your site is probably not big enough or important enough for a few millisecond latency upfront for intermittent page loads to matter. Also, many caching resolvers these days will preemptively refresh records upon TTL expiration subject to usage patterns, which means if you're seeing moderate, repeat traffic then users may not experience any additional latency at all. (Similarly, caching resolvers will often remember failing servers and try them last, regardless of ordering in a response.)

As for how painful are erroneous DNS changes, low and high TTLs cut both ways. If it really matters you should be monitoring this stuff 24/7 (e.g. Pingdom), which means record errors should be quickly identified and reported. If you're setup to respond quickly (which you should be for a serious commercial operation), that augurs in favor of low TTLs.

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

</comment><comment><USER3> AWS Route53 defaults to 300 seconds (which is probably why so many articles see that as the median ttl), and I've never encountered problems leaving that at the default. I suspect the performance problems are real if you're running your own dns servers - but if you're piggybacking on something like AWS I seriously doubt you'll see issues (apart from monthly bills, if you suddenly go viral to the moon...)

"Back in the day", Internet Explorer was a problem with TTLs, from memory IE6 was when they stopped caching all dns lookups for 24hrs no matter what the til was, and IE6 still coached for 4hrs. (This was a drama for me back in the early 2000's when I was trying to do dns based load balancing...)

My opinion these days is don't try to go much below 1 minute if you want other peoples resolvers or software to honour your ttls, but I do see people using 1 sec ttls occasionally, so presumably if your application doesn't mind too much if not everybody h9onours your ttl - it's still worth doing for some people...

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Also in the mix: is there any point in having multiple A records for a busy site now?</comment>


Ask HN: What are some insightful YouTube channels? - <AUTHOR> ASK HN: What are some insightful YouTube channels ? <comment><USER2> I watch Big Think regularly. They have short videos with quite a wide variety so speakers and I feel as though I've gotten some pretty good insights from their videos.

[https://www.youtube.com/user/bigthink](https://www.youtube.com/user/bigthink)

</comment><comment><USER3> Three channels I'd describe as insightful without any feeling of exaggeration are Winston Sterzel's and Matthew Tye's vlogs on living, working and travelling in China. I had very little idea about Chinese society earlier except what's portrayed in media, but now I feel a lot more informed thanks to their videos.

[https://www.youtube.com/user/churchillcustoms/about](https://www.youtube.com/user/churchillcustoms/about)

[https://www.youtube.com/user/serpentza/about](https://www.youtube.com/user/serpentza/about)

[https://www.youtube.com/user/laowhy86/about](https://www.youtube.com/user/laowhy86/about)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> How About [https://www.youtube.com/user/caseyneistat](https://www.youtube.com/user/caseyneistat) ?

</comment><comment><USER4> It depends on how you define `insightful`

If I just want to satiate my curiosity and have free time I watch Vsauce. Occasionally I watch Numberphile, 3Blue1Brown & Computerphile, but these are more math/CS related. Enjoy!

<comment><AUTHOR> ex- nerdwriter1

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Shameless plug here. :-) I wrote an article about YouTube channels for entrepreneurs which did pretty well on Medium (50K reads).

[https://blog.yalabot.com/i-got-sick-of-commoditized- content-...](https://blog.yalabot.com/i-got-sick-of-commoditized-content-for- entrepreneurs-heres-what-i-started-watching-instead-cdf9a5b28652)

</comment><comment><USER6> The Thought Emporium, if you are sciency-inclined - [https://www.youtube.com/user/TheChemlife](https://www.youtube.com/user/TheChemlife)

</comment><comment><USER7> [https://www.youtube.com/user/stanfordonline/videos](https://www.youtube.com/user/stanfordonline/videos)</comment>


Using Private Email, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/04/us/politics/using-private-email-hillary-clinton-thwarted-record-requests.html <comment><USER2> The whole disclosure stems from hacking of another e-mail account, apparently.

 _The disclosure that Hillary Clinton used a non-governmental e-mail address while she was Secretary of State originally came courtesy of "Guccifer," the Romanian hacker now serving time in a Bucharest prison for his online attacks against scores of public figures._

 _As TSG first reported in March 2013, "Guccifer" illegally accessed the AOL e-mail account of Sidney Blumenthal, who worked as a senior White House adviser to President Bill Clinton, and later became a senior adviser to Hillary Clinton's 2008 presidential campaign._

 _When "Guccifer" (who was later identified as Marcel Lazar Lehel) breached Blumenthal's account, he discovered an assortment of correspondence sent to Hillary Clinton at the e-mail address email@example.com. The "clintonemail.com" domain was registered in 2009, shortly after her nomination to become Secretary of State._ [1]

They host with MX Logic[2], some McAfee's enterprise-y mail service. At least it wasn't firstname.lastname@example.com.

[1] [http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/investigation/hillary...](http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/investigation/hillary- clinton-private-e-mail-account-897531)

[2] [https://www.mxlogic.com/](https://www.mxlogic.com/)

<comment><USER3> The story seems a bit more complicated on how it was setup.

 _It was unclear whom Clinton hired to set up or maintain her private email server, which the AP traced to a mysterious identity, Eric Hoteham. That name does not appear in public records databases, campaign contribution records or Internet background searches. Hoteham was listed as the customer at Clinton 's $1.7 million home on Old House Lane in Chappaqua in records registering the Internet address for her email server since August 2010.

The Hoteham personality also is associated with a separate email server, presidentclinton.com, and a non-functioning website, wjcoffice.com, all linked to the same residential Internet account as Mrs. Clinton's email server. The former president's full name is William Jefferson Clinton.

In November 2012, without explanation, Clinton's private email account was reconfigured to use Google's servers as a backup in case her own personal email server failed, according to Internet records. That is significant because Clinton publicly supported Google's accusations in June 2011 that China's government had tried to break into the Google mail accounts of senior U.S. government officials. It was one of the first instances of a major American corporation openly accusing a foreign government of hacking.

Then, in July 2013, five months after she resigned as secretary of state, Clinton's private email server was reconfigured again to use a Denver-based commercial email provider, MX Logic, which is now owned by McAfee Inc., a top Internet security company._

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Hilary Clinton's not the first nor only politician guilty of doing this, NY Daily News just put together five other notables:

\- Sarah Palin

\- Mitt Romney

\- Karl Rove

\- Andrew Cuomo

\- Chris Christie aide Bridget Anne Kelly

[http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/5-examples- lawmaker...](http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/5-examples-lawmakers- email-lawbreakers-article-1.2135674)

It definitely seems less than ideal for these rules to be abused like this.

The problem is, how do you stop it?

It's unreasonable to expect all private communications to be on public record, and if you write a note to your babysitter during office hours, why should the wider world have to know about it?

It's a difficult balance.

<comment><USER5> Well, the specific law referenced here is a federal law which only applies to high ranking federal officials (e.g. Cabinet secretaries). It would apply to Clinton, but not to most of the people on your list.

"The head of each Federal agency shall make and preserve records containing adequate and proper documentation of the organization, functions, policies, decisions, procedures, and essential transactions of the agency and designed to furnish the information necessary to protect the legal and financial rights of the Government and of persons directly affected by the agency's activities. (44 U.S. Code § 3101)"

The only relevant question is, "are emails 'records'?", and according to the State Department, the answer is yes:

"All employees must be aware that some of the variety of the messages being exchanged on E-mail are important to the Department and must be preserved; such messages are considered Federal records under the law. (5 FAM [Foreign Affairs Manual] "

And I might add that the accusation here is not that she had a personal account in addition to her official one, it's that she didn't have an official one at all.

<comment><USER6> > The only relevant question is, "are emails 'records'?"

I don't know, I see other relevant questions. For instance, nothing in the quoted law says anything about _how_ they shall "make and preserve" the records, only what purposes those records must be adequate to serve. So, using private email _alone_ doesn't seem to be a violation, it seems to be something that might be the starting point for an inquiry as to whether she made and preserved "ontaining adequate and proper documentation of the organization, functions, policies, decisions, procedures, and essential transactions of the agency and designed to furnish the information necessary to protect the legal and financial rights of the Government and of persons directly affected by the agency's activities", but it doesn't alone provide an answer to that question whether or not you consider emails as records.

<comment><USER7> Undoubtedly emails are records. This has been established in previous scandals from both parties that failed to retain them as required.

In the corporate world, if there were a legal requirement for compliance, the auditor would verify that all work email is going over work servers, and then review the policies in place on those servers. You could technically let a special employee run their own server, but then _that server_ would need to be audited, and the policies in place there reviewed. "Nah, you can trust Joe" wouldn't cut it.

Otherwise the entire point of compliance laws just goes out the window.

<comment><USER6> > In the corporate world, if there were a legal requirement for compliance, > the auditor would verify that all work email is going over work servers

Legal compliance audits that I have been involved in tend to go beyond what is _unquestionably_ prohibited by the law and also seek to identify and eliminate activities which _might_ arguably violate the law (and thus create legal risk) including, but not limited to, those which violate organizations internal guidelines which are based on the applicable law but whose requirements may be (generally, _should_ be) more strict than the law itself.

There are three different, but related, categories into which this might fall, in decreasing order of breadth:

1) Behavior that would be of concern to a compliance audit focused on the law in question,

2) Behavior that would violate administration guidance related to achieving compliance with the law in question,

3) Behavior that actually violates the law in question.

You are arguing, and I agree, that it is #1. There are reports that administration sources have indicated that it is #2 (I see no reason to doubt them, though I haven't seen the actual guidance, so I don't have an informed opinion.)

Neither of those, however, is the same thing as it being #3.

<comment><USER7> As to #3, quoting from the article, as of 2009 (emphasis mine):

> agencies that allow employees to send and receive official electronic mail > messages using a system not operated by the agency _must ensure_ that > federal records sent or received on such systems are preserved in the > appropriate agency record-keeping system.

How did they ensure this? As a few news stories, including the linked article, have reported, they would have been immune from FOIA requests.

Here's another from [http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/hillary-clinton- used-p...](http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/hillary-clinton-used-private- email-account-for-state-department-business-115686.html)

> The fact that Clinton's emails were not a part of official State Department > records until recently means many of them would not have been located in > response to Freedom of Information Act requests, subpoenas or other document > searches conducted over the past six years

<comment><USER6> > How did they ensure this?

Yes, that's exactly the question this raises.

> As a few news stories, including the linked article, have reported, they > would have been immune from FOIA requests.

They would not have been immune. They _may_ have been _overlooked_ in the course of handling such requests, although assuming anyone in the State Department offices responsible for conducting document searches in response to FOIA requests (or subpoenas, etc.) was aware of the practice, they quite probably wouldn't have been, there just would have been an extra step involved in handling the requests.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm voting this one up although I have concerns the article could end up in some kind of partisan BS here.

So let's be clear about the root of the problem: government regulations demand that public officials have recordable conversations as part of their duties. This allows openness and inspection. (It also allows political shenanigans)

It's a very, very similar situation to where we are with government spying on the citizens. The government, for whatever reason, has decided it wants to record everything you do of type X. As a subject of the government, you are not given a choice. To record some information in some contexts might be reasonable, in other contexts it might not, but all we're given is blanket requirements.

What we're seeing with Hillary -- and probably with anybody else that has any common sense -- is just blowing off the law and "making things work" without regards to whether it is legal or not. For what it's worth, and I am a member of neither political party, I'd do the same thing.

You can try to make this into an election-year deal about Hillary, or stand on a soapbox and talk about government accountability, and you wouldn't be entirely wrong. But the real issue here is that the freaking government is trying to collect too much information about everybody. It's not just limited to public servants. And the proper response to a government that refuses to act in a reasonable manner is non-violent non-participation.

Having said all of that, I fully expect that point to be completely lost by folks on both sides of this issue.

<comment><USER9> > _And the proper response to a government that refuses to act in a reasonable > manner is non-violent non-participation._

I couldn't agree more.

<comment><USER10> Try "non-participating" by not paying taxes....

<comment><USER11> It's really too bad that not paying your taxes isn't thought of as a valid way to voice your opposition to what's going on in Washington. I realize why it's that way, but it's a real bummer to me. Not because I'm a greedy bastard who doesn't want to pay a dime, but because elections aren't that great of a feedback mechanism now that career politicians and parties and etc have developed into neigh unstoppable powers that put people into office.

It seemingly has been in the past, but for some reason isn't now.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_resistance](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_resistance)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> From what I understand she is not the first secretary of state to do this (All her predecessors did as well) and the laws that require them to keep emails and/or use provided email were passed AFTER she held the position. I'll agree it's a bad practice but can we fault her for doing that same thing as the people before her when there was no law/rule/regulation to do otherwise?

<comment><USER13> This of course should not have been the case, but does seem to be. All of her predecessors appear to have used their personal emails as well. Kerry is the first one to use an official email. She left office at the beginning of 2013, while the official policy banning personal email went into effect at the end of 2013. [http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/03/03/hillary- ema...](http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/03/03/hillary-email- scandal-not-so-fast.html)

<comment><USER7> Careful when you say "the policy of banning personal email went into effect in 2013," because it might suggest to the casual reader that there weren't other requirements being violated. Such as the 2009 law that required the State Department to ensure that, regardless of which email system employees were using, that all emails were being retained properly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Why is this news now? Wouldn't everyone she would have corresponded with have known it isn't a government email and raised a flag?

<comment><USER15> The IT dept would also know that she gets no official email. Normal auditing software alerts on counts to make sure the backup is working.

<comment><USER16> Yeah, but is some low-level IT guy going to throw away his government career by confronting the United States Secretary of State with an accusation of wrongdoing?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Hillary is the front-runner in the democratic field. And the republicans are putting Jeb Bush forward as "most electable", whatever the hell that means.

I suppose the power elites are freaking out right now because neither of those bluebloods should be allowed anywhere near the white house.

Will status quo go out the window with the next president, or will we continue with the endless war, bailout, QE, and surveillance policies of the Clintons, Bushes, and Obama?

<comment><USER18> Oh, definitely more of the same. Until this nation's citizens stop the my party is better than your party BS and actually start paying attention to what these people are doing to our country, we'll never have change.

<comment><USER19> The "everything's terrible!" tone of your comment is one of the major problems and main contributors to the partisan divide. It would be harder to get people riled up for their pet party if more people were aware that, hey, things are going pretty well! It would make the things that aren't going as well easier to identify and work on.

<comment><USER20> Everything is terrible -- in that the two leading parties in the United States are doing a poor job of representing the values of the people. They need to be fundamentally readjusted or be replaced by better alternatives, and that is not accomplished easily.

In nerdy terms, if there are N dimensions to public policy and individuals are represented as N dimensional vectors, the ideologies of our current parties do a terrible job of dimensional reduction.

<comment><USER19> That perspective is absolutely what I'm arguing against, and I believe it is one of the main contributors to exactly the problem it decries. Convincing people that everything is terrible is the first step to convincing them that it's the other side's fault and you have the solution, which is how we end up with the divisiveness that fails to represent the mostly moderate values of the people.

<comment><USER20> No -- I think you missed my point.

Everything is terrible, because there is no other side. Neither party represents my interests adequately, and both parties are sclerotic and resistant to change because of symbiotic relationships with rent-seeking interest groups.

What should I do?

<comment><USER19> I didn't miss your point. The divisiveness that follows from convincing people that everything is terrible isn't just bi-directional, it also divides many people (like you and me) into a helpless feeling "nobody speaks for me" group.

I don't know what you should do, but current my strategy (as you can see) is to call out what I see as unhelpfully hyperbolic rhetoric (both negative and positive, though that's rare these days) when I talk to people and point out good things about our society while not papering over things I'd like to see improved.

There are quite a few axes on which to measure how well things are going, and the adequate representation of your (and my) interests is just one of them. I totally agree the system doesn't do a great job of that, but it does a good job of lots of more important things.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> This is an unusually political post to have risen so high on Hacker News. Is that because of the significance of email to the story? The use of email in this case is not very technically interesting. Or is there some other attraction?

<comment><USER22> A hacker discovers a secret email account and server being run in violation of the law that could bring down the leading Democratic presidential candidate? That's Hacker News.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I don't understand this story -- according to the smoking gun report, there's only evidence that this one guy sent her emails to her person account ( possibly by an autocomplete or address book oversight? ) and not any evidence that she sent any emails of replies back. If she wasn't sending emails from the account, and just one person was using her person address as the recipient, it seems just like a one off minor oversight from one of her advisors.

<comment><USER5> It appears Clinton's staff has provided 50,000 pages of correspondence from the account in question since it was discovered.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> How is this supposed to be a scandal exactly?

The issue seems to be that she could of hid something in her personal emails by not turning everything over. But couldn't any official have just used their gov email for "official business" and use their personal email for stuff they want to hide? Doesn't every politician actually do this?

The fact that Clinton is letting personal correspondence mix with government correspondence indicates to me she has less to hide, not more.

The only issue that has the possibility of being legitimate in is the Benghazi stuff. Technically, it could have been a deliberate move to make emails related to Benghazi un-searchable during the investigation. Of course, this only actually matters if those emails contain anything significant/damning, and they probably don't.

<comment><USER25> Well yes, if we are discussing why it's illegal to use personal email for this kind of communication, you can't make the assumption that it's legal to use the personal email for hiding stuff and arrive at the conclusion there is no scandal.

That's circular logic.

<comment><USER7> This "it could have been worse" is weird. The point of requirements to use official channels is two-fold:

1\. It maintains an archive that can be used for accountability.

2\. Anyone communicating with not-that-account can potentially flip to the watchdogs, making it harder to use unofficial communications.

I'm not so naive to think that those unofficial communications don't happen. I expect that most campaigns have used them for dirty laundry. It doesn't mean we get rid of the channels we _can_ see.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> [http://textsfromhillary.com/](http://textsfromhillary.com/) [http://textsfromhillaryclinton.tumblr.com/](http://textsfromhillaryclinton.tumblr.com/)

So you mean to tell me that all of these are from a Gmail account?

</comment><comment><USER27> Interesting timing of this revelation.

<comment><USER28> Regardless if it is to stile a political run or to get the damage over and done with this is the type of behavior by top officials that needs to stop. Is Kerry doing similar? Who else is? There seems to be a concerted effort by the Administration and/or those in it to hide communication from the official record, being Hillary Clinton or Lois Lerner.

What happens to her because of this obvious effort to conceal is the most important aspect of the case. Will she get the wrist slap like Pretraeis and other friends of Washington get? Likely. Whereas everyday citizens are hounded to death by AGs and the like.

To be honest, government officials taking actions like this need to be treated like the criminals they are, they are purposefully betraying the public trust and hiding behind the power of their office and names to do it. The real one percent in Washington

<comment><USER29> > Is Kerry doing similar?

The article says "Secretary of State John Kerry uses a government email account, and his correspondence is preserved as part of the department's record-keeping system."

<comment><USER30> From a Washington Post[1] article:

> Clinton was not the first secretary of state to use a private account. The > State Department said Clinton's successor as top diplomat, John F. Kerry, is > the first secretary to use a standard government e-mail address ending in > "state.gov."

[1] [http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/hillary-clinton- used-...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/hillary-clinton-used-private- e-mail-for-government-business-at-state- dept/2015/03/02/275d13d8-c156-11e4-9271-610273846239_story.html)

<comment><USER7> If you read the article linked here, the law was changed in 2009, partly as a consequence of the 2007 scandal in which some Bush emails weren't preserved because they were run off of a server managed by the RNC.

The agency _must_ make sure that emails are being retained according to law. In any private enterprise that must retain records, there is exactly one way to do this: you use your employer's email server, which has a long audit trail and dedicated compliance officers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Ezra Klein is good on this: [http://www.vox.com/2015/3/4/8146295/hillary- clinton-emails-t...](http://www.vox.com/2015/3/4/8146295/hillary-clinton- emails-transparency)

</comment><comment><USER32> Simple solution suggestion: if you use your private account for government business it converts into a government account. If you don't want that to happen don't use it that way.

</comment><comment><USER33> It's interesting that [at least some members of] the same administration that denies privacy for citizens still want it themselves.

</comment><comment><USER34> Private as in _not public_ , as a government employee's email should be, not necessarily a _secure_ email.

</comment><comment><USER35> Because nobody else in politics ever did this.

<comment><USER36> Does not make it right. It is time to clean the house.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> Yawn.

</comment><comment><USER5> What difference, at this point, does it make?

</comment><comment><USER38> _GASP_ ... another politician gaming the system.

</comment><comment><USER39> Given the sheer number of officials doing thing this, I can only assume this is done mostly out of ignorance about how email works. If I knew nothing about email, I could see myself assuming IT has a magic way to archive this. Remember when Sarah Palin's account got hacked? She probably never thought about how the security questions could easily be looked up once she was in the public spotlight. Once your email account is set up, I imagine most people don't really think about it.

Of course, it's also 2014, there is no reason a high-level official should be this ignorance, but it wouldn't hurt for aides to make sure they are using the correct email account.

<comment><USER40> C'mon, she hired someone to set up a mail server just for this position, she knew what she was doing.</comment></comment>


On Releasing My First OSS Project at Thirty-Five - <AUTHOR> https://formidable.com/blog/2016/10/25/on-releasing-my-first-oss-project-at-thirty-five/ <comment><USER2> Some of the people who do the most damage making age an issue in tech are 30-something people who think they are getting omg so old. This age fixation serves nobody, other than giving you a clickbait title.

</comment><comment><USER3> I am impressed about his ANSI art scene and ACiD affiliation, as someone who grew up admiring that work through bbs's.

As a first time author of open source at age 36, I know how good it feels to finally give back. Paying it forward, especially in tech, is an important life milestone.

It's a tech mitzvah.

</comment><comment><USER4> Thanks for posting!

</comment><comment><USER5> Congrats!</comment>