Troubled covert agency responsible for trucking nuclear bombs across America - <AUTHOR> http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-nuclear-couriers-20170310-story.html <comment><USER2> This is the fourth among the U.S. nuclear weapons institutions that I've read is in trouble, going back several years:

1) Air Force ICBM launch operations: The General in charge had a serious drinking problem (consider that for a moment), to the extent that he went on a bender in Moscow. Among launch officers, there was widespread cheating on qualification tests, disregard for regulations (such as sealing doors to secure rooms), and very low morale.

2) Air Force nuclear bomber operations: At one point, they lost track of a nuclear bomb (or maybe cruise missile), and it was flown to a base in another part of the country before anyone figured it out and could track it down. The Secretary of Defense fired the General in charge.

3) Security at facilities containing highly enriched uranium/plutonium (the essential material to making weapons; the one component that keeps terrorists from making one): At one facility, some peace protestors (not James Bond-level attackers) breached the security and setup a protest next to a building containing the materials. They were there for something like 30 minutes before they were discovered and apprehended.

4) And now this.

This isn't a system that can succeed 99.999% of the time. If one nuclear weapon gets into the hands of someone willing to lose it, millions of people will die and then you can imagine the response - the course of history and civilization will change.

<comment><USER3> As a counterpoint, zero defect policies could be be harmful. If everyone must take a test and score 100% or otherwise end their career, shenanigans happen.

<comment><USER2> > As a counterpoint, zero defect policies could be be harmful. If everyone > must take a test and score 100% or otherwise end their career, shenanigans > happen.

It's not a counterpoint, it's a consideration when designing the system. Taking this into account, the system must still function 100% of the time. If what you describe did happen, than the cause of failure would shift somewhat from the officers to the designers, but the system still failed (however, one must question the judgment and character of anyone who cheats on a nuclear weapons launch qualification test, no matter how hard it is).

<comment><USER4> Right. A system can function at (effectively) 100% correctness being composed of individuals who are not 100% perfect (because nobody is).

If 1 person is 99.99% correct, how correct are 3 people when consensus is required to make a decision? 5? Its just math.

<comment><USER5> You can only 'do the math' if you assume uncorrelated errors and no unanticipated or emergent failure modes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The anti-adblock paywall makes this site unusable for me. Would someone please post the text of the article here?

<comment><USER7> Just disable JavaScript, the article is perfectly readable without it.

<comment><USER8> Thank you. It really is unreadable without it.

Does anyone know of any plugins that disables javascript on a website basis for chrome?

<comment><USER9> Yep. I installed uMatrix specifically for a previous article on this site. :P

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> A friend of mine used to be in the Navy nuclear power program, and worked at LLNL for a bit, too, and he talked about how they would throw nuclear material in the back of a van and drive it around. And this was in "Nuclear Free Zones" in the Bay Area. It is so sad to see people protesting and blocking trains carying low level nuclear waste (like the suits workers would wear at nuclear power facilities) through their towns, when this kind of far more dangerous shit is going on and know one knows about it.

</comment><comment><USER11> A couple of my army buddies did this when they got out after Iraq. The money sounded good and it was work we were used too. I don't talk to them much but I do know they didn't do it for very long. They said it sucked and that was the end of it.

</comment><comment><USER12> This agency has more reasons to be covert than NSA. How is it possible for reporters of a major newspaper to obtain access to such material, including routes (even if obfuscated), number of sorties, names and contact details of former employees, other operational details? It's one of those cases where security by obscurity makes sense, I think.

</comment><comment><USER13> _hauling the most lethal cargo there is_

I can think of about 50 more dangerous things I'd rather not pass on the highway.

The truck carrying a nuclear warhead is about a squillion times more dangerous than the warhead itself.

Trucks have killed more people than nuclear weapons _ever_ will.

<comment><USER14> I got stuck next to one of these in a 2 hour jam (something big was on fire 100 miles south of us) on CA I-5 the night before Thanksgiving 20 or so years back ... it was so obvious - large white unmarked truck, combat-style jeep- things front and back bristling with big antennas, full of scary dudes in fatigues and dark glasses - it was like something out of central casting - throw a McDonalds logo or something on the truck for heaven's sake

While sitting next to a nuke and not really knowing how safe it was was a bit scary the actions of the security dudes when people started getting out of their cars to stretch their legs was far more scary - they were actively menacing while trying not to give away why they were there or that the unmarked truck between their vehicles was in any way special (despite being stupidly obvious)

<comment><USER15> Sounds more like an aircraft/spacecraft part in transit. Or aircraft weapons. Regardless of the OP, nukes are small. They dont need big trucks. My money would be on a shipmemt of missles parts (rocket motors) or similar weaponry that you donr want shipped by air.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Why dont they just transport by air than on road, safer and quicker. Surely they have changed tactics from what is given in the article.

<comment><USER17> Air has different risks, I wouldn't assume it's safer. Given the accident in Spain, I assume it's far more dangerous. That accident left a 2km^2 mess of plutonium.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1966_Palomares_B-52_crash](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1966_Palomares_B-52_crash)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> "That worst case would be a terrorist group hijacking a truck and obtaining a multi-kiloton hydrogen bomb."

Umm... is it just me, or does this really not seem like _the worst thing_ that could happen?

You have a truck with nuclear bombs in it, travelling across America... isn't the bomb already in the place that a terrorist would want it to be?

I would think that _the worst thing_ that could happen, is for one of these trucks to blow up - or am I missing an understanding of how nuclear bombs go off?

<comment><USER19> Perhaps someone more familiar with the topic than me can answer, but I believe the warhead casing protects from most external explosions (unless it is direct high-kinetic collision).

If it does penetrate the casing, I believe it would not trigger a nuclear reaction but rather become a dirty bomb. This is obviously still bad, but NOT AS BAD as you might think.

Side note, I'm not sure why the article says kiloton? Does the US still use kiloton warheads in its arsenal?

Either way, the reason for the reduced detonation (or imputed dirty bomb) is because multi-megaton nuclear detonations require hexagonal detonators arranged around in sphere with near-perfect implosion timing so it creates the appropriate nuclear reaction (which must implode before it can explode). If a detonator is triggered arbitrarily, I think a dirty bomb would be the only effect (yes, still bad). If the timing is off, then I believe the detonation would be kiloton, not megaton (reduced effectiveness).

<comment><USER20> The US does indeed have a lot of kiloton weapons. The warheads on the Minuteman missiles, for example, are 300-500kt. Larger numbers of smaller warheads are more efficient at destroying stuff if you can deliver them accurately, so weapons have shrunk quite a lot from their Cold War peak.

I believe all modern American weapons are one-point safe, which means "The probability of achieving a nuclear yield greater than four pounds of TNT equivalent, in the event of a one-point initiation of the weapon's high explosive, must not exceed one in a million." ([http://www.acq.osd.mil/ncbdp/nm/NMHB/chapters/chapter_7.htm](http://www.acq.osd.mil/ncbdp/nm/NMHB/chapters/chapter_7.htm)) So, if it works as designed, accidental detonation from some external force won't even be in the kiloton range.

<comment><USER21> I understand "one point safety" to refer to the "detonation of the high explosives by means other than the firing system" as the firing system is designed to fire at the multiple points at once. Can anybody honestly claim that it's completely impossible that the firing system accidentally does the task that it is its main purpose and... fires?

Speaking just from the point of the computer engineer, bit flips or even more bit flips actually occur in practice. One specific "if" branch wrongly taken... one single specific bus line true instead of false... etc...

Only for the first few bombs, the human had to actually add the last piece of uranium or plutonium for the bomb to have enough radioactive mass inside to make the nuclear explosion physically possible. In all the more modern designs everything needed in already inside of the bomb or the warhead. The claimed safety seems to be "everything's there, but the electronics (or the computer) controls everything." How calming.

Regarding one in the million, the people who made the PBS documentary say:

For the accident in Damascus, Arkansas, US: "the air force claimed there's _one in the million_ chance that the fallen socket would hit the missile. During our shooting of the recreation we dropped 12 sockets and 6 actually hit the missile":

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EoxB88rL_2M&t=2m15s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EoxB88rL_2M&t=2m15s)

The bomb designer, writing the paper a few years ago:

[http://psam12.org/proceedings/paper/paper_497_1.pdf](http://psam12.org/proceedings/paper/paper_497_1.pdf)

"It is recognized that it is very difficult to provide assurance that the < 1E-03 numerical requirements for a safety subsystem have been met, let alone the < 1E-04 or 1E-05 assignments given to elements or components within a safety subsystem. In fact, it is not possible to amass quantitative data that supports such assertions with a high degree of statistical confidence across all relevant environmental conditions. In other words, it is not possible to conceive of all possible abnormal environments, nor can all environments which can be conceived be tested exhaustively in a repeated fashion to generate overwhelming statistical certainty of weapon response."

<comment><USER20> You make some interesting points. Certainly, it seems tough to be truly confident of that one-in-a-million claim.

It's theorized that modern PALs incorporate the explosive timings into the authorization code itself. All those different explosive initiators have to be set off at just the right times, and if this theory is true, then the information of when each one needs to be triggered isn't even present in the bomb. This eliminates (well, makes extremely improbable, anyway) the possibility that the electronics accidentally trigger a full detonation due to some malfunction.

Of course, whether this is really true or not is unknown....

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Its a good time to make noises about needing more money for your agency with Trump just coming into office

</comment><comment><USER23> Blast Corps?

</comment><comment><USER24> Seriously, why the hell is the US reviving the nuclear weapons program? It's against all humanity. What the world really needs are giant robots. As far as the vulnerability of trucks is concerned, I give you the Fast & Furious film franchise.</comment>


WTO finds Washington broke trade rules by imposing tariffs on China - <AUTHOR> https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trade-china-wto/wto-finds-u-s-tariffs-on-china-breach-trading-rules-idUSKBN2662FG <comment><USER2> Did the WTO ever rule on China's protectionist practices? The wikipedia page on those reads like a joke [1], and doesn't even mention the forced partnerships, technology transfers, and bureaucratic measures to prevent access to domestic markets [2,3].

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_and_the_World_Trade_Orga...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_and_the_World_Trade_Organization#Conditions)

[2] [https://www.orfonline.org/expert-speak/china- protectionist-t...](https://www.orfonline.org/expert-speak/china- protectionist-tendencies-continue/)

[3] [https://intrepidsourcing.com/trade-wiki/protectionism- forms-...](https://intrepidsourcing.com/trade-wiki/protectionism-forms- purpose-outlook/)

<comment><USER3> There is a term "whataboutism" which is applicable here and which is used for negative description.

While China may be more than guilty in their own ways, and even earlier than USA, it's important to stick to the agreement, to avoid them losing any value. If USA can't hold their part, they hardly can expect that from others.

Having that, it's also important to have effective mechanisms in place to deal with breaking agreements, so partners wouldn't have, as the only option, to resort to breaking their part themselves.

In other words, WTO should be better structured to deal with those who broke rules. It should hardly matter if that is Liechtenstein or USA.

<comment><USER2> > There is a term "whataboutism" which is applicable here and which is used > for negative description.

I think it's less whataboutism and more like self-defense. If someone punches you, it's not whataboutism to mention it when discussing why you punched them back. Only in this case, it's your industries that you're defending.

It's a very blinkered perspective to view this only through the lens of adhering to WTO agreements, and elevate adherence to them to some kind of virtue, regardless of what other countries are doing.

<comment><USER3> > It's a very blinkered perspective to view this only through the lens of > adhering to WTO agreements, and elevate adherence to them to some kind of > virtue, regardless of what other countries are doing.

Keeping promises is not some kind of virtue?

<comment><USER2> It is, but it is myopic not to consider other factors. Especially when those promises were given on the condition the other party keep theirs.

"At least we virtuously upheld our promises" is very cold comfort as your industries wither.

<comment><USER3> I agree, but would prefer to have a mechanism which would protect against misbehavior without going to tit-for-tat. WHO agreements should have been better - and if it's not feasible, it should be known.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Win a $3K/Month Saas Business - <AUTHOR> https://contest.io/c/qu6hwcgx This is your chance to grow an existing Software as a Service (SAAS) business AND take 50% of the profits while working with an already established, proven and profitable business. It's a once in a lifetime opportunity that will shift everything you know about starting and growing a successful business. <comment><USER2> Awesome. I just entered the Contest.

Dane Maxwell makes $500K a year from his bootstrapped Saas businesses. He also runs a program called: "The Foundation"</comment>


Phantom traffic jams, and why lane expansion isn't really successful - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/traffic-talk-ford-vanderbilt-2018/ <comment><USER3> > Latent demand is the idea that if you widen a highway to reduce its traffic > density, people who would otherwise have stayed on surface streets will now > fill the newly available space on the highway, negating the benefit of > having more lanes.

...if the only benefit of building more lanes was reducing mean transit time at rush hour. You could also just build a one lane road and have the toll so high that only a single driver could afford to use it; that would be optimally "beneficial" in this model.

<comment><USER4> Thank you. I am mystified by the apparently widespread mental framework that roads don't actually do anything other than attract masses of people in cars, inexplicably like insects toward bright light.

<comment><USER5> It's true that roads convey people & permit economic activity.

But that road down the way that is so congested right now? If we expanded it, and it could convey more cars at the same level of congestion- _where did they come from?_

The latent demand represents potential traffic that either:

1) is doing just fine taking a different route right now

2) isn't particularly economically valuable, i.e. not worth waiting through traffic for

3) things like future sprawl enabled by wider roads today

In order, #1 is not particularly valuable to reroute, it was doing ok. #2 is not very valuable either, though perhaps a little. #3 creates new demand, but the only thing we get in return is lower density.

So I guess in sum the point is that all the most economically valuable travel is already happening, right now, and by widening the road we add only the travel that has such marginal economic value it's not worth doing today. So the more we widen the road, the less & less economic value we get in return.

<comment><USER4> >2) isn't particularly economically valuable, i.e. not worth waiting through traffic for

With schedules and business operating hours, many economic activities are impossible due to hard time constraints.

I don't see how your argument would be less applicable to a city with two dirt roads.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I can't speak to the aggregate, but going from two to three lanes in each direction on I-90 in northern IL has cut travel times for us by about 8% despite increased total traffic. This is because trucks passing now leave the left lane open and because the speed limit was increased 5MPH.

<comment><USER7> Also: induced demand is a _good_ thing. Even if travel time were the same with three lanes instead of two, that's 50% more people moving down that road. That's a quantifiable social benefit.

<comment><USER8> > That's a quantifiable social benefit.

Only if you know how the occupants in these additional vehicles were transiting previously. If they were previously carpooling, or if they moved away from a good (but slightly less time efficient) public transport option, then the social benefit would be somewhere between minimal and nil.

<comment><USER9> But presumably the new occupants compared their existing old travel method, and deemed the new one better. If the old method had some "social benefits", it must mean that the old method's social benefit came at a cost in benefit to the occupants. Otherwise, they would not have chosen the new method!

<comment><USER8> Just because an individual makes a particular choice when given the opportunity, doesn't mean it must be a social benefit.

<comment><USER8> I love how I was voted down for that comment, one which ought to be obvious on its face. There are plenty of choices people make that don't benefit society as a whole. That isn't controversial.

<comment><USER8> Rather than vote me down, perhaps you could reply instead? Use your words.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I just got a new Subaru Outback with their Eyesight Adaptive Cruise Control. I've gotta say it is fantastic and just the sort of fairly simple and safe technology that could ease traffic jams. Certainly outside the city where I live, the way it nicely follows cars at a safe distance seems to make a lot of sense. As soon as the lead car moves away, it neatly accelerates to the preset speed and smoothly decelerates on the engine braking (or even real braking if needed) when it sees the gap closing. It's very obvious on my long commute that probably only 30% of cars seem to be using just regular cruise control, based on how their speed varies on the clear open road.

<comment><USER11> Adaptive Cruise is life-changing. I couldn't go back to normal cruise.

A major downside to Adaptive Cruise is when another driver uses your gap to change into your lane, and your car slams on its breaks because suddenly their car is just inches away from yours.

Recklessly aggressive drivers are learning they can take abuse these safety features in the cars of other drivers, making roadways potentially more unsafe.

<comment><USER12> What are you saying, you want it to crash into them for you? That's a major downside?

<comment><USER13> I'm not parent, but just a note from me: I drove a brand new Volvo XC40 last week that had adaptive cruise control. If someone just cut in to the front of me the car slammed on its brakes even if it wasn't necessary. The car could just as easily slow down gradually until necessary space was free in front of the car (as I usually do when I don't have adaptive cruise control).

<comment><USER14> Try Mazda, they're much better in that regard.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Bill Beatty's comprehensive explanation from 20 years ago is still the best: [http://trafficwaves.org/](http://trafficwaves.org/)

<comment><USER16> All he's doing here is obviating braking. In theory it could make for slightly reduced trip time as some stop-and-go's have more inefficiency than just moving slowly. He's reducing the pressure of the flow. But he's doing nothing about the actual causes of the slowdowns, which is on-ramps, off-ramps and rubbernecking. So while you reduce stop-and-go, you're still traveling at maximum capacity, just like in stop-and-go's. A kink in a hose doesn't go away if you reduce the water pressure.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Lane expansion isn't likely to eliminate rush hour, but it will increase the number of vehicles served, and can also reduce the duration of peak congestion. As vehicle populaton grows, congestion will grow as well, however.

A recession is even better than construction at improving traffic, however.

<comment><USER18> The article has a lame explanation of latent demand. Sure some switch from surface streets to the highway. But people also decide to make more trips, commute further, or use public transportation less. So the result is after an adjustment period of about one year there's almost precisely as much traffic per lane as before.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> If a lot more people drove manual transmissions, or at least learned that you can slow down by just raising the accelerator a little rather than hitting the brakes, things would be a lot better. It really doesn't seem like a hard thing to learn.

<comment><USER18> I believe it's the reaction time lag, not using the brakes instead of the throttle to slow down. Basically people suck at staying in the ideal position half way between the car in front in the car in back. Because of that they brake hard as they come close to the car in front. The next car has to brake harder... till you end up with cars stopping. So it's the human reaction time combined with cars accelerate (generally) slower than they brake.

<comment><USER20> This. There are lots of studies that have pointed to slow re-starters as the prime culprit for traffic. And it's only gotten worse with cellphones because now there is something to longer distract people when the come to a stop.

<comment><USER21> Slow-restarters _and_ sudden late-brakers. This is really all about an oscillating wave being carried vs mean flow speed. The best part when you get the hang of it is that in many situations when you can anticipate the "slow- restart/sudden late-brake" of a dozen or so cars before you (and a couple behind you), you can act as a dampener as you strive to keep near the mean flow speed, and delightfully see the phantom jam downright _evaporate_ in your rear view mirror.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> My favorite related quote is that adding lanes to decrease traffic is like letting your belt out to lose weight.

For more info see: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Induced_demand](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Induced_demand)

<comment><USER22> But you are ignoring the human and economic benefits of increased travel.

A better example would be someone pulling their belt so tight they can barely move, and then letting it out.

<comment><USER4> But we let the belt out all that way, and the belt still touches their waist!

<comment><USER22> Then there is more demand. Keep going. There is nothing that has unlimited demand.

You can't reduce demand by constraining supply, all you are doing is making people unhappy.

If your policies are very free, you'll find people will figure out how make things more efficient. For example inexpensive delivery will become possible if there was enough space for traffic.

I know this because I've lived in dense cities (no delivery service - it's simply too hard to find parking, and thus too expensive) and wide urban areas (every store offers delivery because it's cheap and easy).

And that's _exactly_ the opposite of what everyone thinks will happen - <USER2> want cars off the road, and replaced with delivery, without actually making delivery practical (i.e. inexpensive).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Limiting the use and possession of private cars would go a long way into reducing environmental impact and income inequality.

<comment><USER24> That'd be great, but no one wants to actually build any workable alternatives, at least in the US. A lot of people would probably be happy to give up their cars (or at least keep them parked until they need them for weekend trips) if they had good public transit available to use instead. But US cities are not doing a very good job with that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> I wonder if toll payment based on amount of time spent in a lane would improve things? Right/exit lane would be free and incrementally increase up to the high cost left lane. The lane stripes would have connected rfid sensors to measure amount of timr spent in each lane.

Might work because less lane switching means less slow downs to adjust to new cars entering a lane. And people who don't absolutely need to will remain on right lanes while leaving the left lane for those committed to the lane or for those using it momentarily to pass other cars. Heck,you can even change lane pricing dynamically based on traffic and time of day.

<comment><USER8> This would almost certainly cause extreme congestion on the exit lanes and as a result a huge speed differential between lanes.

Moving to the faster lanes would be dangerous. Cars merging back into the slower lanes to exit would cause permanent jams in the second lane at every turn-off. Nobody would benefit in the end and the road would be horribly unsafe.

<comment><USER25> That's why I suggested dynamic pricing and charging based on time spent. The right most lanes would congest but they would also have exiting cars.

Second from right could cost a bit more than free (1cent per mile for example). It would be an incentive to use it for passing but also to avoid right lane congestion for a negligible fee. Third and fourth from right can cost $0.20 and $0.40 per mile which discourages long term use but also allows those in a hurry who can afford the fees to leave the highway faster and allow for cars in right lanes to use less congested left most lanes to pass slow drivers and lane exit/entrance in their lanes.

Think of it from a network traffic CoS and QoS point of view (also,sorry for the late response,hope you see this)

<comment><USER8> Again, a nice idea in theory but it will just concentrate congestion towards the right, which would exacerbate the speed differential between lanes and make the road much less safe.

It would exacerbate economic disparities, forcing poorer people—who are already chronically time-poor as well as money-poor—to spend more time in their car for the convenience of rich people. Rich people already have innumerable advantages in our society, we don't need to go around looking for more to give them.

(As a comparatively rich person, I appreciate living in a society surrounded by people that are—in the main—well educated, healthy and not overly stressed, and I happily pay a lot in taxes to help maintain that. Which is why the USA holds zero appeal to me; you couldn't pay me to live there.)

<comment><USER25> Overall,there would be less lane changing and cars would leave the freeway faster. The pricing can be adjustes or subsidized for low income drivers.

If you pay a toll anyways,this is an opportunity to save money and use the tollway,where as you would normally take the slow and long unpaid route. This would actually make toll roads accessible to the poor. No matter how I look at it,if you add lanes,they should be paid for so that it would be more affordable abd practical and actually incentivize drivers to cause less jams.

Also,traffic jams are not exclusive to the USA. Maybe it should be modeled in a more politically convenient way? How about fuel tax deductions? You get n deductions where you lose more deduction points by using left lanes? That way there is no added cost to the driver,the tax payers as a whole pay for it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I find that on my commute most of the time when one lane is moving slow it's because the vehicle at the front of a long line of cars, usually the left two lanes, in traveling 5-10 mph slower than other traffic. Speed differential and the use of brakes seems to cause traffic jams, so having vehicles all traveling the same speed or at least moving out of the way if they'd prefer not to go with the flow would seem to solve these issues.

<comment><USER27> "A long line of cars ... traveling 5-10 mph slower"

In other words you're saying that they're closely packed. If the distance between cars is reduced by 50% and their speed has reduced 10-15%, the _throughput_ of that section of road has _increased_ substantially.

As you said, it's speed differential and the use of brakes that causes traffic jams. By that reasoning, the left lane should go the same speed as the right. That would also discourage the use of lane changes which is generally what causes people to use their brakes on the freeway...

And remember the square law of braking. Because the safe following distance increases so much when you increase speed, faster speeds on the freeway decrease throughput rather than increase it.

<comment><USER28> > And remember the square law of braking. Because the safe following distance > increases so much when you increase speed, faster speeds on the freeway > decrease throughput rather than increase it.

Got an article to explain this? It seems counter-intuitive.

Following distances should be based on time, not physical distance. It shouldn't matter if cars are going 30 mph or 300 mph. If everyone maintains a 3 second following distance, there should still be a throughput of 20 cars per minute.

<comment><USER27> At 10mph, safe following distance is 1.8 seconds. At 60mph, safe following distance is 3.6 seconds. At 90mph, safe following distance is 4.4 seconds.

[http://www.adventures-in- education.com/math/StoppingDistance...](http://www.adventures-in- education.com/math/StoppingDistance.htm)

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

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> These problems only occur when the load get close to the effective maximum load. It's easy to look for blame in driver behavior, but I think misleading -- it's like taking that first crystal to form in 0 degree water, and blaming it for ice formation. You may be able to reduce crystallization (and thus sneak in a couple more Joules) by distilling the water (adaptive cruise control) or cleaning your glassware (on-ramp metering or "do not change lanes" signs), but really you're just fighting the statistics of phase changes.

Note that I don't have a ton of supporting evidence for this sort of thing. One imaginary project that I would love to see if I had the time or the patience for deep research is to just gather a data set and make it public of anonymized traffic behavior -- over a large stretch of highway, have periodic cameras that track every car by license plate (if possible) or car shape, aggregate and remove the identifying data, and output a data set that allows you to slice it by time or by moving segment to directly observe these things.

</comment><comment><USER30> I was hoping for more detail. The argument against adding more lanes is that making the freeway faster than surface streets causes people to prefer the freeway to surface streets.

Tying lane count back to fuel economy, average door to door time, and number of vehicles served would be much more productive.

Similarly, the article recommends hov meters on freeway entrance ramps, but doesn't mention that they create jams sbout a half mile after the entrance. Again, some sort of metric involving "how many people", "how long", and "how much gas" would go a long way.

Fun fact about the Bay Area: my car gets about 75% of epa freeway mileage driving from SJ to Santa Cruz (over a mountain), but only 50% from San Jose to Mountain View (in traffic). This is if I try my best to conserve fuel in the traffic case. If I drive aggressively, the gap widens.

So, reducing conjestion could substantially increase the miles per gallon of the existing silicon valley fleet of cars.

Instead, the "environmentally friendly" nimbys keep voting in people that pay for traffic quiescence "upgrades" that further snarl traffic and increase the local carbon footprint.

</comment><comment><USER31> Here in New York I would attribute traffic jams in equal parts to the endless construction, massive congestion, and a huge number of terrible and/or elderly drivers. All it takes is a couple of slow/bad drivers to clog up the expressway for miles, even if the congestion is low and there is no construction.

</comment><comment><USER32> If another freeway lane attracts drivers up from the surface streets, then that must be good for the surface streets. I assume the new drivers must have determined that that's a more efficient way to get from A to B.

</comment><comment><USER33> Better idea- expand the lanes but give them to a light rail system instead.

</comment><comment><USER34> One solution is to restrict lane changes.

All it takes to create a phantom traffic jam is someone to change lanes where the cars behind need to slow or brake to accommodate them.</comment>


Ask HN: How can I invest in tech startups with as little as $50k? - <AUTHOR>

I am a long time developer who has put together a little war chest that I'd like to invest. I'm looking to invest between $25k and $75k into new tech startups but I don't know how to do this. Are there funds that invest exclusively in high-tech startups? Can I approach companies directly? What other options am I overlooking? <comment><USER2> The fundamental problem that you have here, as I think plays out across previous comments, is that $25-75K is not a large enough stake to both diversify and achieve large, life-changing returns.

If you'd gotten 50K into the first rounds of facebook, zynga, twitter, etc, your returns would be in the millions of dollars. But these are extreme outliers, as you probably know. Even if you could confidently choose, from all the angel opportunities out there, a single winner in order to maximize your investment return as a percentage, in the vast majority of cases in which you were able to do so, you probably wouldn't get back that many times your money. (For a variety of reasons that are too detailed to go into here having to do with the dilution and preferences that most successful companies take on over successive rounds you won't be able to participate in, and for the primary reason that very few companies exit at a valuation greater than $100M.)

The two obvious ways to play it are, 1) as others have suggested, to get into a syndicate of some kind. Beyond angellist syndicates (which I'd second), you could look at becoming an LP in an angel fund or micro-vc fund, assuming you are an accredited investor.

The other way to play it would be to wait for opportunities you truly truly believe in or that you have truly unique access to. (E.g. your best friend and roommate from college who's a genius is doing something amazing, there's a round coming together by the best angels you've ever heard of, and you beg him to let you in.)

In the first case, you would decrease your likelihood of losing all your money, increase your likelihood of participating in a success, but not maximize your return.

In the second, you have a very low chance of getting it right, but if you do, you will have maximized your return.

If you had enough money to put 25-75K into at least 20 different companies, I'd consider a hybrid strategy where you participate in a syndicate to get smart and to get deal flow, and invest additional dollars side by side, or in subsequent rounds, when you see things that could be home runs.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm a big fan of fundersclub.com. With a single investment (min 10K) you can hit 10 or so of the best companies from the winter or summer batch of YCombinator.

You need an invite to join, and you must be an accredited investor. If you need an invite contact me and I'll refer you.

By the way, this is very risky and very illiquid. I don't recommend investing more than 5% or 10% of your net worth. And don't expect to be able to cash out on anything for 5 to 7 years.

<comment><USER4> You need to be an accredited investor, which I think generally means a net worth of $1MM.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I wouldn't invest more than 20% of your total savings in something that high risk. Basically what you can afford to lose. And your going to want to make sure you spread it out enough to cover the risk. and it that works out to like less than 10k per investment and 20 investments I'm not sure your going to get your desired result. Even that could not work out so well. That's even if they want your money.

<comment><AUTHOR> I totally see your point. There's no way I could diversify my $75k enough to sufficiently offset the risk associated with investing it. A few people have mentioned investing clubs or syndicates -- this seems like an interesting way to break in.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Are you looking for a good, solid investment plan, or are you taking a punt that you could hit it big? Or, are you more motivated by helping someone get a start that otherwise might not be so forthcoming?

<comment><AUTHOR> I have my portfolio of "solid" investments - now I'm looking to grab the brass ring. I have no trouble parking my money for years before a liquidity event but I'm definitely looking to see a sizable return on investment.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> You are overlooking the most obvious option: Start your own company. That's what I did and it's pretty awesome so far. More work than I ever imagined but awesome all the same. :)

<comment><AUTHOR> I have certainly considered that, but I'm at a point in my life where I want my money to work for me - not the other way around. I'd be interested in providing capital for a startup but I have less interest in being involved in their day-to-day business.

<comment><USER7> Perhaps looks for "Small Cap" funds focused on tech or do your own research on the tech sector and buy stocks. Otherwise you are talking angel investing and I think, for a little while longer at least, you need to be an Accredited investor with all the income and net worth rules that go along with that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I am struggling for external-investment, if you're interested we can talk. I am registering my company in next month.

I am 23 year old and my business model is based on India and it is million dollar business. Because of this, none of the investors are showing interest. (hell, i can't even apply to YC because they usually fund to idea which somehow benefits US economy). I have never visited any foreign countries, i haven't really sure how much valuable my idea is outside my country. Certainly i see big growth. And, i am not looking for big funding. 20k-40k is suffice .

If this sounds good, we can talk future at firstname.lastname@example.com

</comment><comment><USER9> you should look into joining an Angellist Syndicate

<comment><AUTHOR> This looks super promising! Thanks for the lead.</comment></comment>


A coupon/deals site built using Roda gem for Ruby - <AUTHOR> http://www.getbeststuff.com <comment><AUTHOR> I built this site using Roda gem for Ruby. I was experienced with Sinatra but after reading that Roda was faster and more lightweight than Sinatra, I thought to give it a try instead. Its really great.

Other than that, the site uses many API services and they are integrated to the site using Ruby.

Would love to get your feedback on the site.</comment>


Write logic, not mechanics - <AUTHOR> http://jeditoolkit.com/2012/04/26/code-logic-not-mechanics.html

<comment><USER2> Well put. It still puzzles me that promises and/or CPS don't have a greater adoption in the JavaScript community. I guess that what happens is that the concept of a callback is a very easy to understand one, but a system becomes more complicated and cumbersome (exponentially, I would say) with every new callback that is added to it. The real problem comes when creating big async applications in JavaScript based entirely in callbacks, as it is the norm now specially in NodeJS projects. Using callbacks to build complex applications is a sure way to un-maintainability.

<comment><USER3> I found this very useful for architecting larga javascript aps: [http://speakerdeck.com/u/addyosmani/p/large-scale- javascript...](http://speakerdeck.com/u/addyosmani/p/large-scale-javascript- application-architecture)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> It strikes me that this developer chooses to write an abstraction on top of JS for solving his recurring problems, over simply using language features readily available.

Promises are as much a pattern or mechanic as callbacks, but the latter feels far more natural in JS. The `promised` decorator is interesting, but it has problems:

\- The application I work on, and have in mind with this, would need just about every function decorated.

\- It doesn't account for methods, unless you're default decorating the method, ie.: `Foo.prototype.myMethod = promised(function(/* ... _/) { /_ ... */ });`

\- Every decorated function takes a noticable performance hit, because things like `Function#apply` and concatenating `arguments` are relatively slow.

\- It doesn't sit well with me that the example rewrites a method on a prototype declared elsewhere: `console.log = promised(console.log)`

Further, the article and library don't even scratch the surface of complicated async flows. Think async versions of common functional-style methods like `map`, `reduce`, etc.

For example, a basic scenario from our own build process is: Scan a directory for template files, read them, compile them, then concatenate the result and write it out.

We used to have a promise library to do all of this, from handling a build process to performing database queries. I discovered Async.js at some point and haven't look back since: <https://github.com/caolan/async>

<comment><USER5> Promises are likely to be baked into JavaScript at some point in the future[1], so I would recommend becoming familiar with them now. Even if you don't use the pattern personally you will likely run into libraries that do use it once it is part of the spec.

I don't too much like the promise pattern this article gives, Q is the definitive implementation: <http://documentup.com/kriskowal/q/>

[1]<http://wiki.ecmascript.org/doku.php?id=strawman:concurrency>

<comment><USER6> Just to be clear this library implements just a subset of Q with exact same API, with only addition of `promised` wrapper. I'm convinced that this wrapper is a better way to deal with promises than dozens of utility functions that you have to learn about.

For example Q.all is promised(Array) I find later more intuitive.

That's not to say don't use Q! Q is brilliant piece of software and I'd be more than happy to see more people using it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7>
        it's possible to make sync function async
        it's not the case other way round

Is this terminology correct? I thought it is easier to make async functions sync by blocking it, and harder to unblock a sync one. Am I confusing this with something else?

<comment><USER8> I think the OP refers to the syntax/API for each. If you're already using async APIs, adding a sync one that runs in a separate thread won't change much.

On the other hand, you need something like CPS or coroutines to cleanly use an async function in a program mostly using sync APIs.

Of course, if you have the right tools (CPS/coroutines) you can make any async API look sync, as you said.

<comment><USER6> I mainly was referring to JS where we don't have coroutines and there is no plans to have them either.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> A good example of deferreds can be found in jQuery - every AJAX method returns a deferred that you can chain success, error, etc. handlers to. So it's not like this idea isn't a mainstream one.

The main problem I see is that very few libraries handle receiving promises as arguments, probably because there isn't a standard/widely-used implementation of them. So your logic ends up being backwards, e.g you'd chain Mustache.render off of a jQuery success promise, rather than just passing the success promise in.

<comment><USER6> What I'm suggesting is that promises don't need any special treatment. If you have a function that you want to feed a promise just wrap it: promised(Mustache.render). That's all it takes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> The code doesn't actually work though, the very first example is broken:

        function sum(a, b) { return a + b }
        sum = promised(sum)

        var a = defer()         // make promise
        var b = sum(a, 1)
        var b = sum(b, 5)
        console.log(b)          // eventually prints => 17
        a.resolve(11)           // fulfill promise

Prints:

        [object Object]15

<comment><USER6> I have already fixed that, it was a typo, I meant following instead:

        var deferred = defer()          // make promise
        var a = deferred.promise
        var b = sum(a, 1)
        var c = sum(b, 5)
        console.log(c)                  // eventually prints => 17
        deferred.resolve(11)            // fulfill promise

<comment><USER11> You were writing an article about it and didn't get it right on the first time - maybe that's the reason more people don't use it.

<comment><USER12> That, or a majority of the JS coding crowd is too novice to appreciate maintainable code better than copying and pasting "simple" plumbing all over the place.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> For any node.js devs out there, here is the promises library I've been using with great success: <https://github.com/coolaj86/futures/tree/v2.0/future>

</comment><comment><USER8> This is one of the simplest implementations of deferreds I've seen in JS so far.

<comment><USER14> It looks like a bunch of us have had the same idea for Node.js. I wrote for example this: <https://github.com/drostie/ducky/blob/master/promises.js>

I've abandoned it at this point for a very particular reason: operators don't work well in this phrasing. That is, the example case given in the above discussion:

        function makeView(templateURI, dataURI) {
            var template = readURI(templateURI),
                data = readURI(dataURI);
            return Mustache.render(template, data);
        }

...while it's not bad, also doesn't actually try to "write logic", in a post that's about "write logic, not mechanics."

What you really want to do is much more complicated because the example code starts to look ugly:

        var userPromise = db.getUser(data.session);
        return userPromise.attr("role").equals("admin").then(
            render(open("yay.xml"), db.send(data.request)),
            render(open("no_permissions.xml"), {})
        );

Don't get me wrong, I still like the idea and think that there might be a very promising way to do this sort of work in Node. Certainly I prefer those five lines to always writing:

        db.getUser(data.session, function (err, user) {
            if (err) return callback(err);
            if (user.role === "admin") {
                db.send(data.request, function (err, reply) {
                    if (err) return callback(err);
                    render_file("yay.xml", reply, callback);
                });
            } else {
                render_file("no_permissions.xml", {}, callback);
            }
        });

But as much as I _really_ don't like that lame error stuff which breaks in a stiff wind, I also _really_ want to be cautious about the exchange of these two lines:

        if (user.role === "admin") {

        userPromise.attr("role").equals("admin").then(

What we really want, I guess, is some sort of mesoscopic system -- we still want operators and familiar control structures from our "micro" world, but we also want lazy evaluations and so on from our "macro" framework. This is not impossible but it is hard to get right. If my "ducky" project moves forward it will probably look something like this:

        return db.getUser(data.session)(function (user) {
            return (user.role === admin) ?
                 render(open("yay.xml"), db.send(data.request)) :
                 render(open("no_permissions.xml"), {})
        });

You bubble up the lazy constructs with returns, the error handling gets internalized within the lazy constructs, and the "control-method" invocation allows you to build an arbitrary control structure with whatever object you have right now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> The lack of semicolons in the article's examples makes me uneasy...

<comment><USER16> _Oh noes!!! and his library starts with the dreaded exclamation point!!!_ \-- another disgruntled JavaScripter.

I know that people identify strongly with technical choices[0] (and if you feel uneasy, you're probably the victim of this natural inclination of ours[1]), but I'm tired of the semicolon drama here on HN.

Could we please stop?

\--

[0] <http://paulgraham.com/identity.html>

[1] or did I miss your sarcasm?

<comment><USER17> I detect sarcasm. Especially given the headlines of the past week.

Constructive post though, thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> That last line

        return Mustache.render(template, data)

Isn't exactly equivalent to the non-promise one, since now `Mustache.render` is async, is it?

<comment><USER9> It's much more useful now, IMO. Now you can chain an error handler onto your view's render method, and the level of abstraction becomes "I couldn't render the view" rather than "I couldn't get some JSON from the server".

Functionally the behavior is the same - you're still going to have to gate an asynchronous stream of actions (make sure steps a, b, c have completed before d, etc.), but with this, you can describe that logic where it matters - renderView().then(attachHandlers).then..., instead of callback nesting hell (attachHandlers would have to be in renderView).

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I will be down voted for saying so, but "than" and "then" seem to be reversed throughout the entire article. I would like to learn more about promises now.

<comment><USER6> You're absolutely right! My English is far from being perfect and in addition I was rushing to get this post out making bunch of mistakes. I tried to fix all the "than" "then" issues, thanks for pointing that out ;)

<comment><USER18> I was thinking about promises, because I just wrote a procedurally generated universe in Javascript with over 2^100 locations. To do the procedural generation correctly, the Math.random() function has to be called in the same order every time for generating each "sector." I had used promises in Smalltalk, but never found an application super for them and was thinking that promises would be a way to code this cleanly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> A very well thought out article.</comment>


HP to offer 3-year laptop battery as an option - <AUTHOR> http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/12/10/HP_to_offer_3year_laptop_battery_1.html

<comment><USER2> Misleading title, the battery does not hold a charge for 3 years. It has a lifespan of 3 years assuming 1000 charges.

<comment><USER3> Exactly.

I was so excited, too. "Does it have a mini nuclear reactor?"

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> More on Boston Power, the company that makes the battery: <http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/mar08/6008>

<comment><USER2> The article would be fine without the anecdotal evidence of battery fires. I doubt it's a common occurrence given how many batteries are out in the wild.</comment></comment>


When angels can't understand what your business is about - <AUTHOR>

I've got an issue which other people on HN are sure to have met, and would appreciate their views.
I've been putting together a business based around providing a particular type of risk analysis for banks and pension funds.
Up till now there have been zero products that make this available at reasonable cost, and there is a gaping market opportunity. The software is written and in beta test, I have a stack of interested clients and meetings lined up for the next few months, and the numbers are pretty compelling.
Here's the problem. Anyone in the business understands the concepts and the benefits. However, the reaction of almost all potential angels I've shown has been 'we can't understand what it is you're doing   - we don't invest in ventures we don't understand'. I'm beginning to see why TV shows like 'Dragon's Den' only show inventions that can immediately be understood by the audience, rather than more abstract IP such as industrial processes. I've made the elevator pitch as simple as possible, but it's still more complex than talking about an improved mousetrap.
While I don't actually need angel capital at this stage, this does raise some questions for the future.
- The issue may be due to me, in that I haven't expressed the idea simply enough. However 'controlling risk/stopping your bank collapsing' is just too vague. Are there better ways to get interest? Or should I just wait until I have sales, and let the numbers speak for themselves?
- Do all angels/VCs take this attitude? What proportion of potential investors will dismiss anything they can't understand immediately? Is it just a question of finding the right investor? (I'm in Australia where the pool of angels is tiny compared to the US).
- How do other entrepreneurs manage this issue? I would imagine biotechnology has similar problems - the potential profits are considerable but the investor needs to be pretty knowledgeable even to understand the opportunity. <comment><USER2> If you're giving a reasonably clear + coherent pitch but the potential investor doesn't understand the problem or the business space you are in then it is probably not a good match for either party.

I disagree with some of the advice on this thread that you should be explaining it as clearly as it takes - it assumes that the universe of all investors and the potential investor audience for your idea is a 1:1 map, which it isn't.

I would never invest in a space I don't understand, even within the broad 'internet/technology space'. I know nothing about the finance space you are in, so even if trusted peers vouched for you I wouldn't get involved because I just don't know the space.

Smart money is always better than dumb money, and if the investor doesn't know your space then its theirs would only be dumb money.

You say you don't even need investment - if that is the case then don't waste a second of your time seeking validation from potential investors (which is what I feel you are doing)... seek customer validation instead by getting deposits, contracts for future business when the tool is available or at the very least, letters of intent. Good luck!

EDIT: another thought - a space like yours probably relies heavily on 'who you know' because I'm guessing the size of potential customers is relatively small and insular. You're either already tapped into those circles or you're not - and that might also might be having an affect on the quality/suitability of people you are liaising with. If you are not well tapped into those circles then also consider what impact that will have if you can't setup the deals/get your foot in the door with potential customers even if your technology/product works and solves the problem.

</comment><comment><USER3> Find industry investors, look up other companies who sell to your market and see who invested in them (also for those which have exited, have a look at their founders).

Alternatively speak to your customers, one of them may be willing to invest. People who buy financial analysis software tend to be sophisticated buyers. Bloomberg was started with an angel investment from their first customer Merril Lynch.

Also if you can get letters of intent from your customers commit to buying your product you can use them as collateral to get a loan from your bank.

</comment><comment><USER4> Have you tried looking for angels through your potential customers? As in, ask your (future) customers if they can introduce you to a VC or angel.

</comment><comment><USER5> IMO you're focused on trying to convince the wrong people. You should be figuring out how to sign up clients, sell them the product make a lot of revenue, then you don't need angel investment. In the case you have growing revenue have hundreds of clients, and you just want to blow up at that point there should be no reason for any angel to turn you down. If you have something thats making a lot of money and have a huge market, then angels will take the effort to learn about your market and what you are doing.

</comment><comment><USER6> As an entrepreneur, the onus does fall on you to make sure that your elevator pitch is such that any layman can understand it. Generally, the Angels are smart people and are generally quick to catch up. May be you can go with a metaphor that people understand, like you are the mint.com for really small hedge fund managers (it probably doesn't make sense but you get the idea). It's ok to be vague to get people interested and once they give you their full attention walk them through the process (but stay away from too much details, its ok to be slightly wrong than to be entirely incomprehensible).

Once the investors do their research (and they will) they will come to you with specific questions and that's the time to show the entire breadth of your knowledge and full set of features.

All from my personal experience. My $0.02.

</comment><comment><USER7> Ask sales & marketing oriented types within your interested prospects how they'd explain the concept to a stranger.

Record and transcribe their comments.

Make a greatest hits compilation from those comments.

Try that with Angels.

Repeat.

</comment><comment><USER8> I'm in the ibanking risk technology space, and while I've never been in your position, I'd be happy to bounce some sales ideas back and forth

my first concern would be: what do you offer over riskmetrics, that couldn't be a feature in a larger offering? most of the work in utilizing third part software is data normalization over the inputs, so you've got to have a compelling use case

e-mail me web at foobox dot com if you're interested

</comment><comment><USER9> dotBen has it about right. It sounds like your startup operates in a specialized domain, so most investors won't have the expertise to understand it - which means they likely won't invest as you've discovered (and as hard as it is to believe, it turns out you don't want them to).

The startup I co-founded struggled with exactly this issue for the same reason - the company operates in a specialized domain. Just like you, customers got it but investors didn't. After about a year of fund raising (and working with customers) we found someone with the ability, desire, and domain knowledge to invest and we got a funding commit after a 1 hour first meeting. With the help of the lead/early followers, the round filled out shortly thereafter.

If you have something valuable as measured by customer interest and, ideally, adoption, hang in there and keep looking. Try to figure our quickly who will lead a round and who won't. Unfortunately, it is hard to tell the difference until you experience the process with someone who decides to lead.

</comment><comment><USER10> You say you don't need money right now, so launch even if it's a beta and show it makes money. Investors will get interested if you can show your product makes money and you can explain how additional capital will be used to make even more money.

</comment><comment><USER11> Honestly it sounds like you have a sweet idea. You should watch [http://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspi...](http://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action.html)

</comment><comment><USER12> I would try taking as much time as necessary to explain the idea to a smart friend without an industry background and seeing how they explain it to someone else.

</comment><comment><USER13> Framing error: You should think of it as "I'm not motivating and explaining this simply and clearly enough" instead of "investors can't understand".

</comment><comment><USER14> I've noticed this problem too. I think a lot of investors in the Valley are simply ignorant. Granted, they're busy, but many of them overplay their busyness and take a fairly myopic approach of if-I-can't-get-it-in-thirty- seconds-it-must-not-work. That's not true. Some problems worth solving are actually complex and require time to understand, somewhere between 30 seconds and an hour.

My solution has been to do as much as possible without their money.

<comment><USER15> Active angels will typically have seen many deals, in the hundreds for people who have been doing Angel investing for more than a couple of years. I think it much more likely that an entrepreneur who is not able to get his business opportunity across in the first meeting, is probably not being very clear, or has not really figured out their business model.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> I have a similar issue and I am nowhere near the development stage you are at. I flippantly make remarks that "I have found the cure for CF and it is a video game!" and stuff like that. I continue to wrestle with how to simply and accurately convey what I've accomplished (in terms of getting myself well when doctors claim it can't be done), why I believe it generalizes and is replicable, and why I think an improved information delivery system is The Answer rather than some "charity". I think at some point charity to help pay for costs involved in getting well will have it's place but first some serious in-roads need to be made into "mind share" -- into convincing people that a completely different way of viewing the problem is essential, more essential than money, drugs, etc.

I've spent several years talking to people on online forums and working on getting my head wrapped around the issue. I think it's important to find the "skeleton"/framework of it to hook people but it's important to not over simplify. I'm not really planning on seeking investors, at least that is not part of my mental model at this stage. But I think you need to find a) a means give sufficient background info before the actual pitch and b) a really good analogy/metaphor to help bridge the communication gap. For unrelated reasons, I have some practice with stuff like that. I am still working on trying to apply it to the whole "I've found the cure for CF..." thing.

Good luck with this.

</comment><comment><USER17> You may not want to hear this as its somewhat radical..what is wrong with your happy customers being your Angle VC?

Radical, huh?

Of course not all business models and cost structures can take that approach to using happy customers as Angels...

However, if you read back on early Apple INC history you will find that Mr Jobs was using credit from suppliers as seed capital/angle funds. so its not a new thing at all..

Its the same in biotechnology some of the angels turn out to be actual customers..</comment>


Alternatives to Rust - <AUTHOR> Are there similarly performant ways to achieve the same safety guarantees provided by Rust? Do compiled functional languages or toolkits/libraries for existing imperative languages have the characteristics of Rust that are often stated? <comment><USER2> Well, there's ADA.</comment>


Ask HN: Example of a chatbot in a business use case that doesn't suck? - <AUTHOR> Honest question, genuinely curious. Ive never ever seen something that rivals an FAQ, never mind a human.<p>The best I can seem to find gives a list of clickable links (like a telegram bot) but at that stage its like your designing 1990s WAP pages so may as well just bite the bullet and make it a website. <comment><USER2> [https://experience.helpshift.com/free- trial/](https://experience.helpshift.com/free-trial/)

Helpshift provides chatbots for customer support. We realized a fully automated experience doesn't work, so focus on automating tedius stuff so that the human agent can focus on part which actually require a human agent.

</comment><comment><USER3> Drift's NLP for customer service workflows ends up being pretty nice.

[https://www.drift.com/automation/](https://www.drift.com/automation/)

</comment><comment><USER4> Sales sequences. We are building this chatbot for LinkedIn outreach. You can check it out at [https://wcurl.io](https://wcurl.io)

<comment><USER5> I like your site but you shouldn't implement a custom scrollbar, that's horrible usability wise.

When I scroll, I think something is off on because it doesn't behave like a normal site would.</comment></comment>


A Solar Storm Likely Detonated Dozens of Sea Mines During the Vietnam War - <AUTHOR> https://gizmodo.com/a-powerful-solar-storm-likely-detonated-dozens-of-u-s-1830321540 <comment><USER2> Think Gizmodo is off by a couple of zeroes, and I'm not even referring to the "50 decades" part but the number of detonations. That dozens number is surely in hundreds, if not thousands.

The report (PDF) describes my lower bound clearly, but is otherwise full of fascinating operational details and related horrors. The higher bound is reported by retired chief petty officer Michael Gonzales Jr, who was a mineman. Having worked the reseeding operation, he puts the count at 4,000. This is generally corroborated by declassified memo 2217-73, which states this in the timeline, "4 Aug - Solar storms deplete DST fields."

Using two types of planes, the Navy planted 11,711 sea mines in the area over eight months, nearly the entire majority of them being the Mk-52 (magnetic) type weighing at 1,000 lbs a piece. Each plane could carry four bombs at a time and not all could be capped so they were an annoying aerodynamic drag to pilots. Some early mines detonated prematurely due to a configuration flaw, and the arming mechanisms were adjusted accordingly.

On August 4, nearly fifty mines were visually observed detonating spontaneously (half the explosions were seen, other half were seen as craters.) Elsewhere, "numerous" underwater shocks were felt by destroyers. So that puts it a terrifying notch over "dozens." Within weeks, sympathetic detonations and self-destruct mechanisms were ruled out.

While I find the cause of the detonations - even if it was just dozens - eerily fascinating, more importantly I find the whole idea of tossing 11,000 sea mines somewhere harrowing, and obviously dangerous under even the most controlled conditions.

No one is documented to have died during the solar storm detonations, but there were other losses due to the mining operation. Two U.S. aircraft crashed, an A-7E Corsair II (pilot missing), and a Sikorsky SH-3 helicopter (pilots and crew survived due to training, rear admiral Robinson and two aides drowned), rare flag officer to die in combat until 9/11\. Five U.S. warships struck misplaced mines; four took light damage but USS Warrington (DD-843) had to be scrapped due to a high repair cost of $4M. The mine was estimated at $720. But if the cost estimates were accurate, it took about $6,250 to lay a single one ($37k today).

Mining waters around Vietnam was apparently in contravention of the Geneva accord, but they used the 1972 Easter Offensive as a "justification for a retaliatory move," which explained why they didn't lay sea mines the first seven years of the war.

</comment><comment><USER3> I just happened to be camping on Ossipee hill in southern Maine on August 4, 1972 (I was 15). It was the most intense aurora I've ever seen. It covered the entire sky with incredible movement and brightness. My friends and I just laid on our backs in the moss for the entire night and watched the show.

</comment><comment><USER4> When I was a student, my university always boasted that it had helped research a way to detonate these mines and so helped the North win the war and I have always assumed so. Who could have thought that solar wind had helped!

Relevant links and snippets (google translated):

\- [http://www.vusta.vn/vi/news/print/Guong-hoat-dong-KHCN/To- GK...](http://www.vusta.vn/vi/news/print/Guong-hoat-dong-KHCN/To-GK-Dai-hoc- Bach-khoa-nghien-cuu-de-ra-pha-thuy-loi-va-bom-tu-truong-38029.html)

\- [http://vinamarine.gov.vn/Index.aspx?page=detail&id=2908](http://vinamarine.gov.vn/Index.aspx?page=detail&id=2908)

> Explosion-control heads for torpedoes and magnetic bombs were dissected to > draw an electronic map, explain the operation principle and measure the > parameters. Sensors ranging from a long rod type (MK-52) and a thin film > type (MK-42) are also investigated and analyzed.

> The GK1 also produced a large Helmholtz coil to produce a precise control > and measurement magnetic field that was intended to imitate the magnetic > field generated by the ship or car in order to affect the sensor of the > control. explosive. Thanks to such basic research, the GK1 team not only > understands the mechanisms that cause the torpedo and magnetic bombs to > explode, but also to know how to generate large, small, slow-moving magnetic > pulses. Active control of magnetic bombs and explosive magnetic explosives, > ie, breaking them.

> \- Removed 67 mines, mines (including 8 MK52 strategic mines in direct > disassembly with units, dozens of bombs from school, bombs explode slowly, > explode immediately).

> \- Detonation (by many technological solutions) 2.157 mines, mines.

</comment><comment><USER5> > Buried for nearly 50 decades, these now declassified documents

Damn... kudos to their archivist.

<comment><USER6> Decade is ten years. 50 decades is 500 years.

Kudos to their archivist. Might be a time traveler too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Classified because if you know which storm triggers the mines, and which does not, you know much of a change you can get away with. You know how much you need to do to hide your ships from them.

<comment><USER8> Hide my ships? I would figure out way to generate a solar storm and clean that shit up.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> > Operation Pocket Money

 _giggle snort_</comment>


Big News EOS 5d III can now shoot continuous raw video with magic lantern hack - <AUTHOR> http://www.eoshd.com/content/10324/big-news-hands-on-with-continuous-raw-recording-on-canon-5d-mark-iii

<comment><USER2> Amazing. Considering 4K TVs are pretty affordable now, this is great news.</comment>


Monetary Reform: A Better Monetary System for Iceland [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://www.forsaetisraduneyti.is/media/Skyrslur/monetary-reform.pdf

<comment><USER2> You probably need to give people some context on what this is.

Annars getur tetta verid svolitid ruglingslegt :)

<comment><AUTHOR> Fair enough :) Here's the abstract: "This report is a study of monetary problems in Iceland and in what part they may be caused by the current monetary mechanism, the fractional reserve system. There is indication that the fractional reserve system may have limited the Central Bank's ability to control the money supply while giving banks both the power and incentive to create too much money. Indeed, commercial banks expanded the money supply nineteen-fold in the fourteen year period that ended with the banking crisis of 2008. There is also indication that the fractional reserve system may have been a long term contributing factor to various monetary problems in Iceland, including: hyperinflation in the 1980s, chronic inflation, devaluations of the Icelandic Krona (ISK), high interest rates, the government foregoes income from money creation, and growing debt of private and public sectors. Economists have long been aware of the problematic nature of the fractional reserve system and proposed various reforms. A program for monetary reform by Fisher et al in 1939 received the support of 235 economists from 157 universities and colleges but was not imple- mented. This report reviews some of the more frequently mentioned proposals for monetary reform: 100% Reserves, Narrow Banking, Limited Purpose Banking and describes in detail the Sovereign Money proposal. In a Sovereign Money system, only the central bank, owned by the state, may create money as coin, notes or electronic money. Commercial banks would be prevented from creating money. This report describes how such a Sovereign Money system could be implemented and what steps would be required for a successful transition."</comment></comment>