Bill Gates calls for terror data debate - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-35639233 <comment><USER3> > Should governments be able to access information at all or should they be > blind, that's essentially what we are talking about

Actually it is not what we're talking about, because they're not blind, they can use usual means of inquiry, and the technology. How comes already there are no firearm firing sound detectors, or remote-controlled drones with tasers in major streets to react instantly, ect...? There are ways to act which don't strip citizens from their power, as information nowadays is power.

A handful of people died because they lacked this power, and this will always be the case that people will die because of their lack of power, no matter what they have.

At the end of the day, there is 7 billions people, and only one world, one humanity, one future, so protecting the people from the government is more important than protecting the people from the people, at least as long as it stays manageable.

Every month, the world gets more peaceful, and more educated, we just didn't always have the internet flashlight. Making such a backdoor, it's another leak to oligarchy, because security and corporations can ally and spy the rest into uncompetitiveness. Ect... I will worry when I see blood on the street.

<comment><USER4> "protecting the people from the government is more important than protecting the people from the people, at least as long as it stays manageable."

This is fundamental, and this point needs more airtime than it gets. Terrorism is a real threat. It is a challenge that our institutions are struggling to deal with. But the threat that it poses is tiny compared to the threat of powerful government, a troll that goes back to the beginning of civilisation. We must not let the focus on terrorism distract us into relinquishing defenses against the greater threat of powerful government.

Advances in technology make privacy more important than it has ever been. Without privacy, there is vast opportunity for government to reach deep into our lives in the name of enforcement.

Government of the people has an obligation to find ways to combat terrorism that are compatible with the controls we need on government. If we don't hold the line on privacy, government will increasingly shift us towards serfdom.

<comment><USER5> I would add that much of the supposed non-government threat we face, at least in the case of terrorism, was actually created and continues to be sustained by government policies.

Government has gotten us all involved in an endless war of attrition in which the average person has almost nothing to gain and everything to lose. If the priority was really to keep the population safe, things would be handled very differently.

<comment><USER6> It's not that simple. Terrorism or violence can happen anywhere and not be precipitated by any externalities.

People can conspire, people can be crazy, or unhinged. Columbine, for example. And even if we accept that terrorism is a reaction, they exist in many countries and would inflict more harm if they could. Terrorism is not a thing which only threatens the US, it exists in Europe, Africa, Asia, the middle east, etc.

But yes people will have to come to terms with how to deal with the issue of privacy (secrecy) vs openness (accessibility) How it's managed will change over time, surely.

<comment><USER7> Terrorism is dwarfed by gang violence and drug violence in the US in term of casualties. Terrorism is like the buzz of a mosquito. The psychological impact is disproportionate to the actual impact and law enforcement agencies are exploiting this buzz. They are labeling any controversial law "anti- terrorist", presenting any controversial case as an "anti-terrorist" case, etc... We should not over-react the other way but we should simply tell them "no". In a free country, two individuals should be able to have a private conversation without the State listening and recording.

<comment><USER8> But gangs aren't trying to secure nuclear weapons.

<comment><USER9> You use that word, acquire. You mean steal. The idea that a terrorist organization is going to _manufacture_ nuclear weapons is ridiculous.

But the solution to "someone might steal a nuclear weapon" is not "spy on everybody in the world" \-- the solution is to secure the nuclear weapons. Which is a thing governments do that nobody is objecting to and that has nothing to do with mass surveillance.

<comment><USER8> Sorry, didn't mean to suggest tacit approval for carte blanche government surveillance. I'm just implying that just because terrorism has a low death toll now, doesn't mean that it will [since terrorists are seeking to exact as much damage as possible]

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> > "They are not asking for some general thing, they are asking for a > particular case."

Was hoping Gates would be less naive in thinking this legal precedent has anything to do with this specific case which has close to 0% chance of providing any real-world information and more to do with the fact that this tragedy is used as political theatre and being exploited for maximum PR and political influence.

> "Should governments be able to access information at all or should they be > blind, that's essentially what we are talking about"

That's one way to frame the debate, the other is "Do We Have a Right to Security?" [https://securosis.com/blog/do-we-have-a-right-to- security](https://securosis.com/blog/do-we-have-a-right-to-security)

Given the US Govt is coming from a position of no trust who've shown a willingness to over reach and break the law whilst continuing to deceive and mislead the public - US citizens have every right to privacy that's insulated from the Government: [http://blog.easydns.org/2016/02/22/the-us-government- has-no-...](http://blog.easydns.org/2016/02/22/the-us-government-has-no- credibility-to-compel-anybody-to-weaken-security/)

<comment><USER11> <<Was hoping Gates would be less naive in thinking this legal precedent has anything to do with this specific case which has close to 0% chance of providing any real-world information and more to do with the fact that this tragedy is used as political theatre and being exploited for maximum PR and political influence.>>

Regardless of the merit of the case, I think it's pretty inappropriate that you are calling BillG naive. You really think that somehow you have more insight into the situation than BillG, who has access to pretty much any resource and source of information?

<comment><USER10> > Regardless of the merit of the case, I think it's pretty inappropriate that > you are calling BillG naive.

Actions speak louder than words, I don't care who you are. In this case his words are adding to the dangerous narrative the US Govt wants this debate to be framed on: exploiting a tragic case of terrorism to unlock the legal precedent with 175 other phones waiting in the wings:

[http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/york-da- access-175-iphones-...](http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/york-da- access-175-iphones-criminal-cases-due/story?id=37029693)

With the FBI having court orders out for 13 similar cases:

[http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/23/11098616/apple-fbi- similar...](http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/23/11098616/apple-fbi-similar- encryption-cases-court-documents)

If he's not naive, he's been actively complicit as part of the "Old Microsoft" (before security of user data affected their global Azure business model) who was more than happy to provide what ever access they could to the NSA which saw "Outlook.com encryption unlocked even before official launch" and "Skype worked to enable Prism collection of video calls":

[http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/11/microsoft- nsa-c...](http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/11/microsoft-nsa- collaboration-user-data)

<comment><USER12> To play the devil's advocate, LE can get a court order to search your house, your car, your file folder, tap your phone, and so on, and that's viewed as fair by most people, since there are some checks and balances: they have to convince a judge (we're not talking about the secret NSA court stuff), and have to stick to some rules when they do it.

Why should they not be able to search phones on a case by case basis, with a court order?

That's something reasonable people are going to ask.

Edit: This is a pretty good analysis of why turning over a tool to the FBI is a terrible idea: [http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/?p=5645](http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/?p=5645) \- but the FBI is saying they don't want that. The guy in the blog disagrees.

Let's say they meant what they said and everything stays inside Apple. Why shouldn't a court be able to order a search?

<comment><USER10> > Let's say they meant what they said and everything stays inside Apple. Why > shouldn't a court be able to order a search?

It should be more than clear by now they're not asking for a single iPhone's data - (the iPhone data in this case is useless). They're asking for Apple to create a new version of iOS (i.e. that doesn't yet exist) that weakens their own security protections to provide a backdoor allowing the FBI to hack into the iPhone themselves, which a) sets a legal precedent, b) allows them to keep going back to Apple crack new phones c) gives them access to software with a back door they can study and reverse engineer.

The FBI have carefully chosen this case to go public on (specifically denying Apple's request to have the case sealed) precisely because out of all its pending court orders to unlock iPhone's, this is the one that stands the best chance to gain political and public influence necessary to set the legal precedent.

Once set, it will compel Technology companies to create tools to weaken their own security, using their own resources against them, forcing them to include themselves as an Adversary who they need to protect their customers data from. Not to mention if Apple is forced to concede to the US Govt, it will be forced to concede to other governments as well. China have previously demanded to have a master key for all electronics sold in China which they had to back down from due to political and public pressure, if Apple concedes to the US Govt other governments will undoubtedly be demanding the same.

<comment><USER12> From that link: [http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/wp- content/uploads/2016/02/bul...](http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/wp- content/uploads/2016/02/bullshit.jpg)

He says it's BS, but it's kind of his word against theirs. Presumably, if the FBI says one thing and then asks for another, Apple could get the court to put a stop to it.

Like others have mentioned, Apple already have a way to get into any phone, and so far have kept it safe.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The frustrating thing about all of this is the blatant misuse of terminology by the media.

London resident. 7/7 killed 50 people and injured 700. Ten years have passed. The Troubles were worse.

'Terror' isn't a thing. It doesn't exist. 'Terrorism', does not exist. The real terrorists are the media companies and politicians that attempt to instill terror in the populace.

They try to craft this image of a world to be feared, with danger lying around every corner. Look around you. It's more dangerous for me to eat a Mars bar than it is for me to ride the London Underground, for fuck's sake.

<comment><USER14> So if government took a hands off approach to terrorism, opened our borders, let anyone fly on our planes, there wouldn't be an increase in terrorism? Is that what you're saying?

<comment><USER13> I'm saying that if the UK had open borders, we would be a better country.

I'm saying that if we could get on planes without spending hours in security, we'd be a better country.

I'm saying that your 'terrorism' is a farce. I don't believe in your 'terrorism'. Your 'terrorism' is an excuse to block good in the world, and to further evil, and I've had enough of it.

I'm saying that your actions, under the guise of preventing 'terrorism', have caused more terror. Your warnings to citizens to watch out - terror. Your pat downs at airports - terror. Your encryption laws - terror.

<comment><USER15> I am anti-empire, and anti-security theater as they come. But to say that all borders should be open, with absolutely no intelligence gathering and no consideration of massive migrant flows... this is one of the most blatantly child-like thoughts I've seen expressed here. There is a big gap between "Stop taking off shoes at the airport; stop launching drone strikes on weddings" and "No problems would arise from completely free movement between the vastly different cultures of east and west".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> This response really disappoints me. That seemed like he completely deflected the question and didn't answer. Im sure he measured his words carefully so that he wouldn't have to answer the inevitable, "will microsoft provide the same kinds of privacy protection as apple?"

Come on Bill G

<comment><USER17> I was under the impression Bill Gates does not speak for MS anymore. He doesn't work there and it would be horribly unprofessional to make promises on behalf of the current CEO.

<comment><USER18> Bill Gates is still a member of the Microsoft board: [http://news.microsoft.com/microsoft-board-of- directors/](http://news.microsoft.com/microsoft-board-of-directors/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> >> Mr Gates said the case was similar to the requests regularly made to phone companies and banks for information.

No. This is a request to _create_ something to gain access. If it were simply an information request I doubt Apple would complain much. AFAICT Apple got tired of secret requests to provide access to user information, so made things so they can not comply. To be clear, the authorities can still get a court order to gain access to your phone. They just need to compel the _user_ to provide the access. That's hard in this case because the user is dead, but none of that is really whats at play here and I think Bill G should know better.

<comment><USER20> I kind of wonder if billg doesn't want the FBI bringing up all the previous work that Microsoft has done installing backdoors in their products for the US Government:

[http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/06/microsoft- programmed-...](http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/06/microsoft-programmed- in-nsa-backdoor-in-windows-by-1999.html)

<comment><USER21> This is how it sounds to me. I think it is naive to assume Mr. Gates' character is so one-dimensional. He is a critical thinker; I'm sure he realizes the dichotomy he presents is BS. He wants to protect his legacy.

Mr. Cook, on the other hand, I truly feel is using this issue for a little free (minus legal fees) publicity, and to tell the FBI not to make such a big, public stink if they want cooperation. Like a contract negotiation.

It's easy to believe in someone who says what we want to hear, but necessary to question their motivations.

Honne and tatemae, pure and simple.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> The debate has been ongoing since the Snowden leak, and even before that among people who were aware of the disclosures by William Binney, Thomas Drake, et al. Unfortunately, the general public has shown that they really don't care at all.

Tech and government people tend to have strong opinions one way or the other, but the "debate" has mostly failed since the broader public couldn't care less, except maybe defaults to "(do|don't) trust your President," depending on whether their chosen political tribe is currently in office.

<comment><USER23> My impression is not that people don't understand or care, but are afraid and feel powerless to do anything.

<comment><USER24> I think many people do not understand. What seems obvious for us may be difficult to grasp even for programmers. Almost 20 years ago, I have received the virus "I love you" in my mail box. For me, it was obvious it was a virus and that it was "safe" to save it on disk and open it using notepad as long as I did not double click on it. I was very surprised that for most of my colleagues, it was far from obvious. I am not against giving powers to police, but for me, giving a backdoor is completely unacceptable.

<comment><USER23> People understand they're being spied on and feel powerless to do anything about it. Huge source them feeling powerless about it is that they do not understand how to respond to the matter using technology. That said, not understanding how something works does not mean they don't understand what is going on. If history is any measure of the future, they are right to be afraid and wary of saying anything.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> [http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/23/11098592/bill-gates-fbi- ap...](http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/23/11098592/bill-gates-fbi-apple- comments) \- Bill Gates says he was 'disappointed' by reports he backs FBI in Apple fight

But he doesn't fully support Apple, either

<comment><USER26> > "Let's say the bank had tied a ribbon round the disk drive and said, 'Don't > make me cut this ribbon because you'll make me cut it many times.'"

What a horrible analogy he tried to draw there. Shows a tremendous amount of ignorance when it comes to the encryption and security in use here.

<comment><USER27> Bill Gates is a very smart person. This is misdirection, not ignorance.

<comment><USER28> just because someone was smart, doesnt mean he is always smart or is still smart

people change and loose skills, yes people can become less smart .. or people who are smart in one field are not necessarily smart in all fields

people who are smart in math, can have very dumb ideas about politics ... and vice versa

<comment><USER27> You should read his blog.

<comment><USER29> What about it? I just went there and saw mostly fluff pieces.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Bill is no fool so he must be taking this side of the debate for tactical reasons - e.g. Microsofts huge contracts with the government, or perhaps something to do with his Foundation and keeping the govt sweet, or perhaps to do with Microsofts installation of back doors in the past. I suspect he has been leaned on to enter the debate. Not defending him, just trying to figure out whats going on here.

<comment><USER27> After a number of years using the same tactics, your tactics become you. Gates has been so thoroughly embedded for so long that being on the side of government and capital is not a tactic, it's just what he does.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> "Terror data"? Hail newspeak.

<comment><USER32> The way the piece oddly calls the shooter a "murderer" and not a terrorist reminded me of this [http://blog.erratasec.com/2016/02/weve-always-been-at- war-wi...](http://blog.erratasec.com/2016/02/weve-always-been-at-war-with- eastasia.html)

<comment><USER33> Isn't the difference, whether they knew their victims? If you target certain people, its murder. If you target innocent (unrelated to the murderer) victims or don't target at all, that's terrorism?

<comment><USER32> IMO it's the motivation - if someone kills a stranger it doesn't mean they're a terrorist

I suspect the BBC's wordplay is due to the on-going European immigration drama

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Can someone who really knows it, please explain one thing for me? I've heard different statements and don't know which one is correct.

Can Apple - in theory - unlock that phone?

Is it

a) Unless there's a defect in HSM module (Secure Enclave) that allows the key extraction (like SEM data forensics or whatever), Apple just can't unlock the phone, because it's outside of their control.

I mean, I can readily imagine a system where encryption key is completely unknown to the OS, OS doesn't have any access (or has a write-only access using public key encryption) to the user data while the phone is locked, and encryption is performed by a tamper-resistant hardware, that won't do anything without a correct secret (passphrase) and HSM will irreparably erase key material after 10 failures (which is the behavior hard-coded into silicon).

or

b) Apple technically can unlock the phone by doing an OS update with a specially crafted insecure OS, but doesn't wants to do so, because it would create a bad precedent. I.e. the HSM isn't absolute and can be forced to disclose the key (or accept brute-force attacks) by the OS.

To put it simply: in theory, can Apple defeat their own security - if they would really want to - or not?

 _Edit:_ s/TPM/HSM/g

<comment><USER35> It's (b) but they can't unlock the phone. They can make it easier to perform a brute force passcode attack against the device. The method to do this would be to restore the phone with a modified (and obviously signed) version of iOS that bypasses the passcode failsafes: such as wiping the data after 10 failed retries, and the exponentially increasing password retry delay.

The hardware imposes a limit of ~80ms on password attempts due to the nature of the hashing computations. So a four digit passcode could be brute forced in a maximum of 15 minutes if Apple were to install a purposefully hindered version of iOS on the device.

<comment><USER36> The failsafes as I understand it (from recent reading here) also include the inability to programmatically attempt login. As shipped, they will only accept such attempts from user input (keypad UI or fingerprint scanner).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I wonder if his talk is just because of competition they have with apple or not. In my opinion he could just look at the problem more realistically and saying the monitoring should be in control of some judicial system that is different than current (return true) by default.

Also it is laughable that some people were saying these monitorings are going to be limited to terror act law.

</comment><comment><USER38> Remember Government vs. MS case, where MS ultimately got what many people called a "slap on the wrist" [1]

I have nothing but a conjectures here, however, I always believed MS made a deal with the Government to give them a backdoor in exchange for far lesser settlement [2]

So I'm not surprised for Gates position here. It's mainly to justify his and MS earlier decision to give into the government's requests.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp.#Settlement)

[2] [http://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware- microsoft.en.html](http://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-microsoft.en.html)

</comment><comment><USER39> What if the secret the spies don't want anyone to know is that they are incompetent and that mass surveillance doesn't make us safer ?

\-- egregiously stolen from Adam Curtis's 'Bugger' [http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/3662a707-0af9-...](http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/3662a707-0af9-3149-963f-47bea720b460)

The real danger will be the actual coming threat. Instead of their much trumpeted 'manufactured' stooge plots, our incompetent spies seem to be unable to effectively stop real battle hardened death zealots - despite near total surveillance.

Jails are surveilled in a panopticon way but rife with drugs and crime - <USER2> mass surveillance is demonstrably ineffective there.

The other worry is the nagging doubt that the fears of government are their political opponents rather than enemies of the state - our fears are not aligned with theirs.

That our political and surveillance classes are interested in power not our safety is continually evidenced by the horrifying way they use they blood of their own citizens to try to justify more political power.

Q.V. the recent attempt to link the crypto debate with the Paris atrocities or the invasion of Iraq.

So much of this conflict is manufactured by seeming negligence, the conveniently blind eye.

For instance: locking up a young disaffected drug dealer with the number 2 recruiter for Al Quaeda at the time (in France). Locked in the same jail cell together, a few years later the young recruit, recruits others and shoots a cartoonist.

In Bitter lake, Adam Curtis posits that Daesh/ ISIS was the product of a super jail in Iraq and much of the ground support of the conflict is from the local who initally supported their liberators but lost due to endless Whitehall red tape about compensation for farmers. [http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p02gyz6b/adam-curtis- bi...](http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p02gyz6b/adam-curtis-bitter-lake)

</comment><comment><USER40> I could take his stance on this one a bit more seriously if he was making it available how much revenue of MS comes from federal government.

<comment><USER41> I don't know if I can take Apple's stance seriously either since I don't know how much revenue they (Apple) make off the federal government /s.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> At least this article gets that his position is a bit more nuanced, everywhere else in American news I'm reading "Bill Gates backs FBI!!!" [http://www.cbsnews.com/news/bill-gates-sides-with-feds-in- ip...](http://www.cbsnews.com/news/bill-gates-sides-with-feds-in-iphone-hack- battle/)

</comment><comment><USER43> I wonder what he would have said if he were still at the helm in Microsoft.

</comment><comment><USER44> This coming from the same guy who advocates for cashless third world economies and a one world government[1].

[1] [http://www.infowars.com/bill-gates-calls-for-global- governme...](http://www.infowars.com/bill-gates-calls-for-global-government/)

</comment><comment><USER45> This is always framed as a conflict between the government and "the people" but it's every bit as much a conflict between the government and a handful of hundred-billion-dollar megacorporations. Some of these entities are going to benefit from having enormous quantities of data at their disposal, it's just a question of which ones.

Zuckerberg's sort of aloof reaction to Apple's plight is telling. If it were really about citizens' rights then he would be every bit as outraged as when the FBI orders Facebook to hand data over.

</comment><comment><USER46> Bill Gates is an influential person and his opinion matters to many people. Some media outlets seem to claim he sided with the FBI. He denies this. It seems to me that he is trying to say that there is a way for Apple to decrypt the phone without providing a backdoor. What's interesting in my opinion is how these so-called independent media outlets are (deliberately?) misinterpreting his words to use the authority of Bill Gates to influence public opinion. I am not saying this is a move by the FBI, but ...

</comment><comment><USER47> The real issue is that they are after more than one phone. The DOJ is after twelve others according to the WSJ and the NY DA has 175 phones he needs unlocked.

It is just the tip of the iceberg and it won't be long before someone pushes legislation through Congress mandating a back door or and end to encrypted devices being allowed on US cellular networks

Better yet, they are beginning to the story that the next terror attack will be on Cook's shoulders.

</comment><comment><USER48> I propose to have a smart solution with encryption. For example you could give half of the access key to the local government (maybe 1/4 to courts and 1/4 to police force), other half to Apple. If both parties believe on the case, they unlock the phone. Maybe we can also include the international court.

</comment><comment><USER49> Bill is the world's richest person. If he wants the government to backdoor us all in the name of terrorism I want the one to his wealth. It's not just the government access that's at stake but all the other people (i.e. criminals, other govs) who will use that access to take whatever they want.

</comment><comment><USER50> Just as gates is trumping on about how it's an isolated special request for data from his competitor Apple the FBI just requested data unlocking from another 6 phones...

</comment><comment><USER51> Here's a simple, troubling aspect. The U.S. Government and state governments (and, I'm sure, foreign governments) increasingly seek to purchase private data for mining, and to sell their data for revenue.

The former is used particularly to make an end-run around legal restrictions placed on their own data gathering. And to create a firewall against oversight, with the activities of concern taking place in private entities not subject to public oversight.

The latter is... well, many things, but it is particularly a political expedience; when you face opposition raising revenue directly, instead sell off some portion of the public good, as quietly as possible. (Remember, for example, state departments of motor vehicles (DMV) trying to launch plans to sell drivers' data, including photos, a few years back?)

And, with the "revolving door" and ongoing sweetheart relationships between private and public positions and power brokers, there is also a large incentive of private and personal profit now driving this, as well.

So. Government data collection is no longer really nor just government data collection. It is increasingly -- or, increasingly dominant and pervasive -- a collusion between extant powers for their own purposes.

I don't want to be locked out of insurance, a job, etc. because my "profile" doesn't score high enough, or I friended the "wrong" person on Facebook. Nor do I want this to happen to others.

In biology, advanced species exhibit increasing levels of autonomy from "the herd." Our species and culture needs to keep that in mind and the foster it; there is strength in diversity. And that is predicated on some autonomy and privacy. The ability and freedom to differentiate and to find new modes, new optimizations. And to find the simple happiness that fosters greater productivity, not to mention a better personal life.

As an analogy, no one feels particularly comfortable with someone "staring over their shoulder" constantly -- particularly with a critical or condescending attitude.

A happy life does not involve Big Brother guiding, constraining, and homogenizing your every step.

</comment><comment><USER52> Here's another thought Bill.

Can a government order a corporation to make a new product using considerable resources for the governments use.

What if an African government didn't like you giving out mosquito nets and said: no - you go to your factory and make us 10,000 nets and give the nets to the government, so we can give give it to our politicans and then if they so desire they can give it to the people so the government looks like a hero. Here's a court order making it so.

<comment><USER53> Generally they would just take the factory: "nationalization". You try getting a businessperson to work for free.

<comment><USER52> That's an interesting thought.

I wonder how safe the internal apple devs are that could build what the FBI is demanding. If the FBI can identify them, they might "disappear" if the FBI doesn't get their way from Apple.

But nah, our government would never do that, right? Only China and Russia, etc. Wish I really believed that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Gates isn't calling for a debate, said that the FBI is right, Apple is wrong, and there's no way the FBI would use this as a backdoor for all phones.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11158210](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11158210)

<comment><USER54> "I hope that we have that debate so that the safeguards are built and so people do not opt — and this will be country by country — [to say] it is better that the government does not have access to any information," he said.

[http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/3559f46e-d9c5-11e5-98fd-06d75973fe...](http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/3559f46e-d9c5-11e5-98fd-06d75973fe09.html#axzz40zUs7M2E)

<comment><USER55> I haven't watched Bill enough to know for sure but he seemed quite evasive in the interview.

"Nobody is talking about a back door, so that's not the right question"

<comment><USER23> My impression of Gates is that he's lived most of his life in a bubble, has conflicting interests, but in the end, understands what's going on.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> Did anyone really need another reason not to use Windows?

</comment><comment><USER57> "Debate" = just let the government have what it wants.

</comment><comment><USER58> Bill Gates Says Apple Should Unlock the iPhone (techcrunch.com) 5 hours ago (92 comments) got down-voted (285.):

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11157328](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11157328)

</comment><comment><USER59> WOW now this explains why Windows is so easy exploit and fatal security flaws were built in so that Bill could help his county. Seriously, this is a terrible justification it is a shame that he actually feels this is an appropriate response. Too bad he is that out of touch now.

</comment><comment><USER60> I'm just going to be a little cynic here:

Bill Gates is still too attached to MS, of course, he build it. If Apple did what the feds asked it, this would back-fire Apple consumers.

1\. People would just no longer trust Apple, which translates into less devices bought.

2\. This won't prevent terrorist or whatever their excuse is. If terrorist know Apple does this, they will just use other devices.

At end, only us, the normal consumer loose with this.

This would just help MS and other companies to gain more market by screwing up Apple. Until the feds come after these other companies that is...

<comment><USER22> Or MS already has custom-made backdoors for governments, and forcing Apple to put them in too would take away Apple's superior positioning when it inevitably gets leaked that MS has been doing this for a long time.

No evidence for it, just another possibility

</comment></comment><comment><USER61> Wow, Bill Gates has an enormous financial incentive to diss on Apple over privacy in order to deflect privacy concerns away from Windows 10.

I found it disturbing that the corporate media covers this story with mentioning Gate's conflict of interest. We had General Electric (GE) News Network (also known as MSNBC) on all morning, they covered this story a lot, and never mentioned the conflict of interest.</comment>


Hacker Noon, a popular tech site, goes on the blockchain - <AUTHOR> https://decrypt.co/17341/hacker-noon-a-popular-tech-site-goes-on-the-blockchain <comment><USER2> What ever next? Food on the blockchain? Oh wait, they've done that already.</comment>


Tether – Locks your Mac when you walk away and unlocks it when you return - <AUTHOR> http://www.hellotether.com/

<comment><USER2> Car lock radio devices had a man-in-the-middle attack vector where a repeater could be set up by the car, and a roamer with another would walk thru the mall until they got close to you by accident. Then your car would unlock.

I imagine this is more sophisticated? Geolocation is hard to forge; each device is talking to the internet and not just pinging radio.</comment>


How has Turntable.fm grown so rapidly with no marketing? - <AUTHOR> http://www.quora.com/How-has-Turntable-fm-grown-so-rapidly-with-no-marketing

<comment><USER2> Aside from it being a great product, they have a ton of viral mechanics built in. The fact that you can't sign in unless you have a facebook friend on the service resulted in people broadcasting on across social platforms which generated lots of buzz. They also prominently display a ton of sharing functionality and let's be honest - people like sharing what music they're listening to</comment>


Does anyone here use FreeMind? - <AUTHOR> http://freemind.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page#Getting_a_taste_of_FreeMind <comment><USER2> I used to, but now I prefer [http://www.insilmaril.de/vym/;](http://www.insilmaril.de/vym/;) both have acceptable export to org-mode.</comment>


MySpace: PC manufacturers can stake out screen space of their own -- Microsoft be damned. - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/1998/12/16617

<comment><USER2> This is from 1998.

<comment><AUTHOR> That was the joke.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Toxic companies like Booking.com - <AUTHOR>

I recently saved atleast a couple of years of my career by reading about what Booking.com does to an engineers career. I have declined their offer. I am really thankful to the HN community for sharing such important insights. My aim is to create a list of such companies which are inherently bad for an engineers growth so that we don't fall into their traps. Could the HN community help me in creating such a list by sharing information about such companies and why they are bad for an engineers careers and if possible proofs. For example in Booking.com case there is http://blogs.perl.org/users/bookingemployee/2012/03/truth-about-bookingcom.html and numerous accounts on the internet about how engineers are treated like dogs. <comment><USER2> That post made me feel a lot better about my job. Yikes!</comment>


Investors Helped Build Tesla. They Could Undo It, Too - <AUTHOR> https://www.wsj.com/articles/investors-helped-build-tesla-they-could-undo-it-too-11558721830 <comment><USER2> I think the hyperbolic language when looking at costs of development should be avoided. Telsa did not burn through cash that quarter; they invested it and there has been real progress made with that investment. The automobile industry is very capital intensive. Would the author say Apple burned through cash developing a new iPhone or Amazon a new fulfillment center? I do not consider the floor analysts are setting in the $30-50 range credible. Tesla has real market advantages and if sold would support a much higher price point to another auto manufacturer. The big auto companies have had years to compete, model 3 has real sales volumes relative to it's market segment and there is still not a single car that offers specifications similar to those models available for 5 years. The original work on PEM and battery have not bee replicated and are not trivial.</comment>


UI Design: Which menu style is preferable? - <AUTHOR>

We are working on a web-application for business use. We are trying to make it very very simple as part of the the target group probably thinks that email is kind of complicated stuff.
We now have an internal discussion on how to design the menu. Some would like to have a traditional dropdown menu while others prefer the two-row approach (see http://tixclub.de/ or http://www.madvertise.de/ for examples)
Is there any evidence on which style users prefer? What is your personal experience?
Many thanks! <comment><USER2> Both have too many invisible options, in my opinion. See Google's search page top bar for what I think is a good setup - most relevant options first, and a menu for more.

Also, is your nick an Alphaville reference?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks. That is a good reference, but we do not have as many main categories as Google. I think it might confuse users to have all options on the same level.

The nick is just because its so incredibly cold here right now: Berlin -22 degrees, don't know in Fahrenheit but its "your face hurts when stepping outside" cold.

<comment><USER2> Well then perhaps you should reorganize it to have less options. Are you a category service like play.com or Amazon? If not, do your users really NEED to see all those options?

(I'm in Köln, it's much warmer here. But I was in Finland over the weekend, and it was around -20. It's not that bad when it's dry enough.)</comment></comment></comment>


Don't fire your customers - <AUTHOR> http://disattention.com/75/dont-fire-your-customers/

<comment><USER2> On a related note - as a consultant, freelancer other provider of service it's important to know when firing your customer is the right thing to do.

It's not something that should be taken lightly and should always be done with kid cloves but if you have a client or customer that is not the right fit, taking advantage or abusive to your staff then it's time to let them go.

Of course usually the answer to your clients and customers should be "YES"</comment>


The plug-in Prius delivers 42 percent of an electric-car revolution - <AUTHOR> http://www.slate.com/articles/business/the_juice/2016/04/the_plug_in_prius_delivers_42_percent_of_an_electric_car_revolution_i_did.html <comment><USER2> > _The plug-in Prius can go about 13 miles on battery power alone._

Old soviet Wartburg 353 could go over 1 mile on battery. One would put first gear, start engine without spark and car would jump forward.

I wonder what it would take to adapt regular car as a hybrid. Not for practical use, but to get those green priviliges.

</comment><comment><USER3> If you are driving 13 miles a day on electric then you might as well be cycling those 13 miles. So long as you are not physically disabled it does not take that long to get enough health together to cycle ten miles or so each way. Within this range it is hard to find a quicker door to door solution to one's transport needs, rarely does public transport beat a bicycle over a ten mile range in a built up area. By the time you walk to the train/bus and wait to get onboard, you are half way there already going the two wheeled way.

<comment><USER4> Electric cycles also make this easier for those with health issues, hills, slighlty further distances.

But for many people, they need a jack of all trades that can carry passengers, cargo, protect from the elements etc.

I would recommend cycling if and when you can, it's good for your body and mind as well as the planet.

<comment><USER5> Check out the Elf, organic transportation. It desperately needs suspension, and less rattling, and a battery upgrade option. Other than that, it's pretty good at combining cycling/emotor with protection from elements and visibility on the road.

[http://organictransit.com/](http://organictransit.com/)

<comment><USER6> More expensive than a second hand car though

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Why does the Prius have slow acceleration? Is it a mechanical issue or is it limited to make the battery last longer?

<comment><USER7> The acceleration is no worse than other small cars.</comment></comment>


Apple will decline after Steve Jobs… - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/philg/2011/08/27/apple-will-decline-after-steve-jobs/

<comment><USER3> This article is so astoundingly empty of any real logic that I am truly shocked that it's currently on the front page.

He claims that Apple's rise was fuelled by early adopters who forked over large sums of cash for the privilege of being able to posses the newest shiny bauble from Apple, but that their gadget lust has now been sated, thus spelling a near certain end to Apple's incredible growth. Does he realize that the very same people who paid to have the original iPhone have also probably put down money to have later iterations of the phone? The truth is that more and more people are now seeing the benefits of smartphones and are willing to invest more money in a mobile phone with more capabilities. This argument is completely bullocks!

<comment><USER4> Even if you are entirely correct, you've only addressed 1/4th of Greenspun's argument. Can Apple also:

a) Transition effectively to emerging markets

b) Find more industries willing to give them a 30% cut

c) Provide a compelling return to investors, despite stock option dilution, and an inevitably slowing growth rate

Disclosure: Short, hedging for USD inflation.

<comment><USER3> a) Apple is rumoured to be working on a low-cost iPhone for developing markets. Greenspun provides absolutely no evidence to support his claim that Apple cannot, except to say that emerging markets are becoming more important. If we use China as an example, desire for Apple products is absolutely booming there (see the profusion of fake Apple stores that Chinese consumers flock to.) I'd adopt a wait-and-see approach here, but Greenspun has said absolutely nothing.

b) Do you think their core profit centre is the iTunes Store? Because it's not. They make their money on iPhones, iPads, iPods, and Macs. This point is really dumb because even if it were true it has absolutely no bearing on the company's bottom line.

c) ...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This analysis is astonishingly shoddy, for all the reasons that tabbyjabby pointed out and more. But worse, it doesn't even get close to the root-cause for why Apple may decline in the post-Steve Jobs' era.

Steve Jobs' greatest accomplishments are not Apple I, Apple II, Mac, iPod, iTunes, iPhone or iPad. It's Apple, itself.

Depending on how one tallies, Apple has been through three successful major technology and business transitions, combined with three minor ones within the Mac family, and two minor ones within the iOS family: Apple II > Mac [Mac (68K) > Mac (PowerPC) > Mac (OS X)] > Mac (Intel)] > handhelds [iPod > iTouch(iOS) > iPhone (iOS) > iPad (iOS)]. Combine that with the development of new business/sales platforms (virtual Apple Store, physical Apple Stores, iTunes, App Store, etc.) that enhance the consumers' Apple experience. Each one of these required the insight to recognize a particular opportunity (and the discipline to ignore others), the investment of resources to develop those opportunities, and wherewithal to follow through on the execution, even if that means cannibalizing from the sales of incumbent products. Without these pivots, Apple would not be in dominating position it is in today.

Consider that companies with longevity are able to execute strategic pivots when required. IBM is an example of a tech company that has done so at least four times over its long, 100+ year old history. Apple has done three within 30 years.

What is the one link between the major initiatives? They all occurred while Steve Jobs was in a position where he could significantly influence Apple. It is interesting to note that two significant new Apple tech platforms that failed - the Apple III and Newton - and the one significant new Apple business platform that failed - licensing Mac clones - were not initiatives that Jobs was affiliated with. (Before moving on, let's acknowledge that the Lisa failed under Jobs' purview, and that the 68K > PowerPC transition was successful carried out during his absence,)

We see how Apple's success if predicated on an ability to pivot to address new opportunities in the market, even if those opportunities cannibalize an existing profit center. Jobs' value to Apple extends beyond being a visionary, design auteur, or talented business negotiator. None of those things would have meaning if he didn't also have the force of personality and strength of credibility to compel dramatic changes within Apple.

So, then, the question becomes, who can fill in for Jobs in _this_ capacity? If no one can, Apple is very likely to decline, much as Sony has in the post- Morita era.

<comment><USER6> The path to II to Mac is not nearly as clear as you imply. Apple really lost a ton of momentum with the III and Lisa and that helped solidify the IBM PC and their clones as the de-facto standard (which we suffer until today - <USER2> there is an ISA bus and a 8042 keyboard controller buried somewhere inside your Macbook).

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> See also: <http://aaplbear.com/>

"As a company grows, it becomes harder to provide high % returns to investors."

<comment><USER7> This is incredibly short sighted. One of the key issues here is with the iPad. The notion that iPad sales will cannibalize Apple computer sales. This will surely be the case whenever people are no longer buying laptops and a tablet can fulfill their every need. Although none of this has been observed yet. People are NOT replacing their computers with tablets and I don't see that shift happening for at least another 3-5 years. Apple is clearly gearing up for another push into mobile computers with the Macbook Air (it is quickly becoming the "next generation" laptop and will help to boost laptop sales).

Let's say this idea that tablets are replacing laptops is true; then you need to look at market share values. Apple has said time and time again on earnings calls that iPad sales are not so much cannibalizing their own computer sales as stealing market share from competitors. The PC market is much larger than Apple's share and the iPad is priced much more in line with low end PCs than higher end Apple laptops.

TLDR; Assuming tablets do replace laptops for a significant number of people (which I refute). More people are replacing their low end PCs with iPads than their higher end Mac laptops.

<comment><USER4> I agree on this point, but I think the overall argument -- that Apple will have a very hard time growing 30% a year in 2-3 years -- is pretty solid.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Not if Tim Cook continue to wear those jeans and turtle necks.</comment>


Facebook Apologizes for Pain Caused by 'Year in Review' Posts - <AUTHOR> http://time.com/3647800/facebook-apologizes-year-review-post-pain/

<comment><USER2> It's probably tough to be the company that billions of people use (no sympathy though). I can see at least two valid responses:

1\. If you don't like it, you don't have to look at it.

2\. Facebook could have made this opt-in: "Hey, would you like to see some of your most trending moments from this year?"

All this until we get really good at sentiment analysis. I think, too, that Facebook users need to realize that Facebook is _going_ to find ways to use their content. If you upload those memories, they can bring them back to you.

(IMO, it's more of a win to consume on Facebook rather than produce.)</comment>


Richard Stallman on the Ogg Vorbis license (2001) - <AUTHOR> https://lwn.net/2001/0301/a/rms-ov-license.php3 <comment><USER2> The reasoning in this short message seems very unlike anything else I've heard from Stallman. Has he changed a lot since 2001? From what I've read I'd gander that Stallman has become markedly less pragmatic (or more radical?) since this was written.

Listening to him speak in 2009 was surreal, especially during the Q&A session. I can't recall any specific quotes but he was ready to burn ten bridges for an ounce of symbolic freedom. The whole time I kept thinking of this John McCarthy (coined the term AI, "discovered" lisp) quote:

"He's a man of principle. He'd cut his mother's throat for a principle."

<comment><USER3> Stallman has been viewed as "radical" his whole career. Certainly there was nothing more "pragmatic" about him in 2001.

The important distinction is that the things (you don't list specifics, so I'm just assuming) that Stallman finds "important" seem like senseless distractions to his audience. It's hard to remember now, but in 2001 the idea of patent-encumbered algorithms being a threat to free software was not nearly as well-understood as it is now. Most people in the community were happy to download and build LAME (or whatever), and just shrugged when the Linux distros turned out not to be able to ship it.

Stallman was right (and to be clear: he'd been screaming about patents for a decade already in 2001). We were wrong. This has been a pattern his whole career.

So, again without actual evidence, I'm just going to guess that within a decade that stuff you heard in 2009 that sounded so "radical" is going to seem a lot more clear in hindsight.

<comment><USER4> Stallman has two really, really annoying features:

1\. He is a grating and uncompromising lunatic, and does not make any attempts to present himself as agreeable to other people.

2\. He's been proven completely correct on everything he's warned us of in this industry to date.

<comment><USER5> #2 is total bullshit.

<comment><USER6> [ citation needed ] on both the declaration that he's been proven right and on your slapdash dismissal of that assertion.

And, please, could you be more of a contributor and less like an aggressive drunk starting a bar fight?

<comment><USER7> This very story is a potential example. The mp3 patents in the US will expire in 2015. What "harm" has been done in that time? Fraunhofer made a pile of dough and that's about it. The open alternatives failed to catch on and my guess is that after 2015, mp3s will still be used as before. Very few users will know or care that the patents have expired.

I guess you could say Stallman wasn't wrong exactly, just unnecessarily alarmist over this particular issue. I'm not saying software patents are benign, by the way - I'm only addressing mp3 here.

<comment><USER8> It's easy to look back and say "see, it didn't do any harm!" Predicting the future is much more difficult, and it's perfectly reasonable to look at past trends in that prediction. If Frauenhofer had stopped giving out licenses, would you still be making that argument? If they started patent trolling, what would you be saying?

Calling someone out after the fact for warning about the potential for harm when the risk is very real based on what happened in the past just sounds like revisionism.

<comment><USER9> This section of the discussion has entirely been about hindsight, specifically that RS has always been right.

On one hand, it's possible that mp3 could have become the defacto standard by being widely available, and then had the patent holders clamp down and raise prices. This didn't happen, and I don't think it was likely to happen.

RS' writings always have two parts. First, he predicts what could happen if things keep going in the current direction. He's quite good at this, because he's a smart guy, and all of his predictions I'm familiar with reflect a future that I think is _technically possible._ Second, however, is the tone and gravity he assigns to the consequences and likelihood of those possible futures. I find those parts of his writing to be unreasonably pessimistic and actively harmful in avoiding real problems.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> It is exactly the FSF's reasoning for LGPL -- to stop a non-free alternative from becoming a standard:

 _Using the ordinary GPL is not advantageous for every library. There are reasons that can make it better to use the Lesser GPL in certain cases. The most common case is when a free library's features are readily available for proprietary software through other alternative libraries. In that case, the library cannot give free software any particular advantage, so it is better to use the Lesser GPL for that library._

<http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/why-not-lgpl.html>

</comment><comment><USER11> Why is MP3 still more popular than Ogg if Ogg is much more leniently licensed?

As an end user I can't discern any difference between the two in terms of filesize or sound quality.

<comment><USER3> The MP3 patents have at this point largely expired, so there's comparatively little real cost in implementing them for commercial products. And actually, to the extent that the difference can be measured, Vorbis is generally considered to be a better codec.

But content rules. I have 8G of mostly-mp3 music in my Google Music account simply because that's how I got it. Players out there play mp3 because that's what is out there. Of the successful consumer platforms out there, only Android includes ogg support out of the box, and that mostly due to the whims of its developers than any real market pressure.

It's exactly that point that Stallman was talking about in 2001 -- despite having very good software available, we're now into our second decade of "free software products cannot play music by default". Maybe we should have listened to him more carefully...

<comment><USER12> Sansa clip (a successful player for those of us who want really small devices to play music on the go, before it I still had a usb-stick/mp3 player combo) had ogg out of the box.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The key point here is the difference between copyright and patents. If someone has a copyright on something, you can create an alternative (free) implementation of it. If they have a patent, you can't.

</comment><comment><USER14> This reminds me of a time when I emailed rms about the entire GNU/Linux naming controversy. I had said that perhaps Linux could officially be the name of the OS, and also that to solve the problem of GNU and the FSF not receiving credit, that people could be educated on who actually wrote Linux.

Needless to say, he disagreed. Stallman is as stubborn as a boulder, and a complete extremist.

But he's also right.

<comment><USER15> GNU/Linux is precise in the way alternatives aren't.

Linux kernel running BusyBox? Linux, but no GNU software; not GNU/Linux.

GNU utilities, BSD kernel? GNU but no Linux; not GNU/Linux.

These are things that exist: lots of routers and similar "running Linux" use BusyBox; Debian will let you install a BSD kernel.

Of course, "I am running Linux on my desktop" is accurate, and carries the expectation that you're using much of the rest of the GNU system because that's by far the most reasonable (and common) option... so people say that, because it's fewer syllables, and the FSF feels like they're not getting the credit they quite rightly deserve, and that's the situation we're in.

But changing the name of the GNU project to Linux is not a solution at all; they're still working on Herd for one thing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Wait a minute. Now that a court has decided mathematical algorithms can't be patented, can't we have the MP3 patent thrown out?

<comment><USER17> The MP3 patent isn't a numerical algorithm, it's a description of using a certain algorithm to store sound (to my understanding). Yes, that seems like a silly distinction, but that's basically what patent law is.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> ogg/vorbis just have to change the format name. saying ogg (the file extension) is awkward in any language. hence nobody cares for an ogg player.

just name it FM4 (free music 4). is will just naturally enter the mind of everyone that hears it as a a natural replacement for MP3.

(dolbly did that, AC3 just to have the 3. mpeg-la did that, MPEG-4 after mpeg2)</comment>


Marc Andreessen Annotates Paul Krugman's Amazon Op-Ed - <AUTHOR> http://tech.genius.com/Paul-krugman-amazons-monopsony-is-not-ok-annotated <comment><USER3> Wow. Talk about an advertisement for the ineffectiveness of annotations. I've got comments from multiple different authors on here simultaneously - who are all these people? I was interested in Marc's annotations - talk about bait and switch.

For complex subjects, this is a great example of why single-author critiques are best, so you can follow a single person's train of thought and their logical conclusions (or errors).

This particular debate strikes me as pretty juvenile in both directions - <USER2> Krugman, and his critics. Marc gets "closest to the pin" for me when he says "if Amazon was a monopoly, it would be raising prices." Of course, that's not to say any big company can't overplay its leverage in "supplier negotiations" and this is surely something worth discussing. Marc is also right that the judgment here is a lot more nuanced than standard oil owning 60% of the market.

Going a little deeper on the Hachette dust-up, it's really interesting that the chattering classes never took much of an axe to Amazon's reputation until it tread on their turf - book publishing! All the waylaid mom-and-pop stores were just hicks who had it coming. Protecting the fat advances paid to big name authors - that is sacrosanct - part of the rewards that go with public life these days, and part of the corruption IMHO.

I will end with Glazer's beginning - "Krugman nearly always gets it right...but this is very wrong." I find that this Amazon critique is easier to contextualize if you shift that understanding - Krugman is frequently wrong about many things, and this Amazon article fits neatly with that overall trend.

<comment><USER4> >Marc gets "closest to the pin" for me when he says "if Amazon was a monopoly, it would be raising prices."

That's not really what he says, he said that if they raised prices, Krugman would take that as evidence of monopoly behavior as well. Monopolies don't always raise prices; sometimes they keep them quite low.

<comment><USER5> Marc should know about monopolies. Microsoft started giving web browsers for free to undercut Netscape's business model. Once your competitors go out of business, you would be free to raise your prices.

<comment><USER6> But the question is, when have companies manage to kick their competition out of business and raised prices?

More importantly, if the theory is: "Amazon/Microsoft/ETC is trying to underprice and drive its competition out of business, and not just doing good business.", then what is the falsifiability test of this theory?

How do you know whether Amazon isn't just the best and cheapest service provider out there?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'm not sure how impressed I am by Marc's arguments. For instance:

> Another classic Krugman rhetorical maneuver. According to Paul, keeping > prices low is a sign of monopoly power, but of course he'd also say that > keeping prices high would also be a sign of monopoly power.

This seems silly. Krugman doesn't say that Amazon's low prices are a sign that they _have_ monopoly power. He's saying that Amazon uses low prices to _acquire or maintain_ ("reinforce") monopoly power ("dominance").

</comment><comment><USER8> I can't imagine that this stuff is legal - the NYT has paid Krugman to write this, and Genious is just copying the text and adding a few (to my mind inane) links and comments. It all seems very shady..

<comment><USER9> Not only that, they don't even link to the original NYT article!

This is less a deconstruction of Krugman's article than it is a self-promotion of Crap Genius.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Am I the only one who thinks that inline responses usually end up making the replying author sound childish and petty?

<comment><USER11> This is an interesting observation. I wonder if it's because, on Paul Graham's disagreement hierarchy [1], inline annotations strongly encourage DH3 responses, make it challenging to write DH4-5 (because of lack of space, and interruption of the flow of the main piece), and outright make it impossible to write a DH6 response.

That doesn't necessarily make them bad - often you can provide useful elaboration or contradict factual assertions - but I think you're right that they do have a petty vibe to them.

[1] [http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html)

<comment><USER10> Ah, this is great. I had forgotten about this essay. I think this part is particularly relevant:

> Even as high as DH5 we still sometimes see deliberate dishonesty, as when > someone picks out minor points of an argument and refutes those. Sometimes > the spirit in which this is done makes it more of a sophisticated form of ad > hominem than actual refutation. For example, correcting someone's grammar, > or harping on minor mistakes in names or numbers. Unless the opposing > argument actually depends on such things, the only purpose of correcting > them is to discredit one's opponent.

It's really easy to end up doing this when replying inline.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Is it just me or is the Genius interface kind of confusing? Is there any way to see just Marc Andreessen's comments and not the comments of a bunch of other randos too?

</comment><comment><USER13> I always find it amusing when someone snipes at someone else's writing and still comes off second best.

</comment><comment><USER14> This format is terrible for both usability (click click click click) and general coherence. A plain old fisking would be vastly superior.

</comment><comment><USER15> Andreessen makes some really excellent points in there, but there a few that just strike me as incorrect:

> Another classic Krugman rhetorical maneuver. According to Paul, keeping > prices low is a sign of monopoly power, but of course he'd also say that > keeping prices high would also be a sign of monopoly power.

Yeah its both. You can be a monopoly by having ridiculously high or low prices, mainly its really low then really high and if you think Amazon wouldnt raise everything by 100$ if it could, you're just wrong.

> It will startle every single business owner and CEO in the world to learn > that negotiating with suppliers is now a business tactic that is "out of > line".

No negotiating is smart. Strong arming is wrong. Amazon is strong arming people not negotiating. They are playing the game where if you don't agree with what they are doing they are taking their toys and leaving. This causes economic harm to the company because of Amazon's volume to the point where the publishers have to use Amazon's terms which is monopolistic power.

<comment><USER16> That's pretty much how negotiation works.

If a company doesn't give me the raise I want, I accept an offer from a company that does give me the raise I want: "Taking my toys and going home"

If you say "Well, I don't agree with you, however, I'm going home and leaving my toys here for you to play with" then you'll probably end up at home without any toys.

Taking your toys and going home is your BATNA. Hachette has a shitty BATNA and is hence losing the negotiation, because they don't have any toys Amazon wants, and hence Amazon doesn't care they are going to go home and whine to daddy Krugman that little Jeffery isn't sharing his toys.

It's 2014, taking words from a text file from some author, putting them into a PDF isn't some kind of miracle that warrants 90% of the cost of the book.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I wonder if diapers.com had been an Andreessen investment if his take on Amazon would be the same?

</comment><comment><USER18> > Krugman is one of the most important writers and the world, and nearly > always gets it right.

I stopped reading right there.

</comment><comment><USER19> Marc Andreesen getting trolled by Paul Krugman, a modern master of trolling.</comment>


Massive S3 outage - <AUTHOR> http://developer.amazonwebservices.com/connect/thread.jspa?threadID=19714&tstart=0 Massive S3 outage.  Seems to affect other AWS services (SDB, SQS) as well.<p>Other AWS services are down too ... EC2 http://developer.amazonwebservices.com/connect/thread.jspa?threadID=19715&tstart=0 SQS  http://developer.amazonwebservices.com/connect/thread.jspa?threadID=19713&tstart=0 <comment><USER2> Interestingly, my desktop applications did not go down this morning. It was right there waiting for me as I sipped my coffee.

It also didn't go down all the times the 37Signals web apps I pay for or the hosted FogBugz installation my company uses have gone down.

Desktop apps rock! :)

<comment><USER3> My PC crashed while I was reading your comment. :)

<comment><USER2> Of course, I have lost massive amounts of valuable data because hard drives crashed and, like 95+ % of PC users, I don't back things up.

<comment><USER4> Bingo. Lesson learned: Data in one place is going to die. Data in two places is probably going to live. Defense in depth.

Lesson NOT learned: S3/my hard drive/Carbonites/etc rulz!

<comment><USER5> Note: we had no data loss or corruption with the S3 outage

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> So it is 6 hours complete outage in around 22 months since its opening beta. The lifetime outage is somewhat around 6/(30 * 22 * 24) = 0.00037 = 0.037%! I think this is pretty impressive achievement to build a system with uptime as 99.963%. Especially for some poor engineers woke up at 2am in Seattle and started to figure out what went wrong and get it back on line. I think it is pretty cool.

In the case when our PCs/Macs crashed. Even I could rush to a Circuit city/JR store to get a replacement hard drive. I probably will spend the same amount of time just to revive my system, given I have good habit back up the system. If that is not the case, I will need to reinstall operating system and applications. I guess the down time may be 24 to 48 hours.

So the downtime for a person without good habit in backup. The uptime will be 99.849%! if it takes 24 hours to get back the system in 22 months.

<comment><USER7> 3 9's uptime as "pretty impressive"? You must be a programmer.

<comment><USER6> Yes. as a lousy programmer and lousy administrator myself, I am pretty impressed at 3 9's for a new system that support HTTP DELETE, PUT under heavy load can reach such record. I am too ignorant to know any WEBDAV based system can be that reliable under the same load. And I am also amazed that the downtime for my PCs/Macs is far inferior than an immature s3! And I am also wondering the day those systems can be as reliable as telecom's 5 9's (5 minutes/year).

<comment><USER8> We use them commercially too, and I am very happy. For a system that is under development (and presumably iterating internally), support has been nothing short of fantastic.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I think the internet needs an S3 clone, offered by another company. Both companies would be better off because of eachother.

S3 is still more reliable than a couple of dedicated servers, though :)

<comment><USER10> "S3 is still more reliable than a couple of dedicated servers, though "

Maybe. I've had colo or dedicated servers since 2000, and the last time I had one fail in any way was in 2001. I move servers every 2-4 years to newer, faster hardware, but even so, my current uptime is longer than S3 has existed.

<comment><USER11> I was worried people were going to reply with a bunch of anecdotal evidence. Thank you for resisting the urge.

<comment><USER10> I'm not quite sure if you really think I resisted the urge (presumably because I used "maybe"), or if you were being sarcastic. :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Phew, back up. Although that the fact that it was possible to have the entire network go down is quite worrying.

S3 actually has an SLA; <http://aws.amazon.com/s3-sla> If I'm reading that right, if S3 is completely down for more than about 40 mins in Feb (which it was - about 90 mins by my count) then we should get a 10% discount for this month. Is that right?

<comment><USER13> I'm still getting spotty S3 service

<comment><USER12> Yeah actually only HTTP object GET requests seem to be working for me (although they're working 100% of the time).

<comment><USER13> It seems to be back on. I wonder if the outage's length had something to do with it being so early on the west coast.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Kathrin of the The Amazon Web Services Team has posted some more specific details on the failure here. In summary it seems their Authentication service was overloaded.

[http://developer.amazonwebservices.com/connect/message.jspa?...](http://developer.amazonwebservices.com/connect/message.jspa?messageID=79982#79982)

</comment><comment><USER15> Bummer. Would anyone like backup virtual hosting on our physical servers?

</comment><comment><USER5> Our site seems to be running fine (EC2/S3). We actually have all files currently on EC2 and backed up to S3 (We haven't checked to see if the backup is still working yet)

<comment><USER5> From our S3 Logs from our EC2 instance ()which saw no interruption): The first failure we had was at 4:25 this morning, no success until 7:08, then mixed results, now full success since 8:55

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Fudge - ec2 is working for me, but s3 reads and writes are not. Guess its time to get to work on some kind of failover...

<comment><AUTHOR> People seem to have trouble with ec2 as well. [http://developer.amazonwebservices.com/connect/thread.jspa?m...](http://developer.amazonwebservices.com/connect/thread.jspa?messageID=79806&tstart=0)

<comment><USER13> I think its fair to remove the 'Possibly' from the post's title at this point

<comment><USER13> Ok - we are back in business

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Today was the day I was going to tackle the S3 component of our application... and I wake up to see this.</comment>


Trump's visa plan leaks: American techies first - <AUTHOR> https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/01/31/trumps_h1b_plan_leaks_american_techies_first/ <comment><USER2> <refills popcorn> This'll be interesting.

Tech workers hate Trump, and have been forcing SV bosses to say bad things about him.

But this move is clearly going to benefit us (well, I'm in Australia so not affected directly, but "us" as tech workers). Raising tech salaries and reducing the ridiculous exploitation of immigrant tech workers is good.

SV bosses would clearly like to continue paying less for tech workers, and the visa program was a tool to do that. They now have a proper reason to say bad things about Trump.

But Trump would also like to have SV on his side. Where does he think the power lies there? With the bosses or the workers?

I look forward to next week's episode of "What Trump did to the USA"

<comment><USER3> > Raising tech salaries and reducing the ridiculous exploitation of immigrant > tech workers is good.

Why not keep the H-1B floor at 60,000, but require employers to contribute another 60,000 to a fund to pay for Americans to be retrained as tech workers?

<comment><USER4> I don't think that's particularly fair on immigrants. It sets a double standard as to what people are worth.

PS. Also Australian... yeah, we're awake at this time.

EDIT:

To clarify, I'm not at all suggesting screw over Americans either. I'd not be thrilled working in any industry where I'd spent years getting qualifications, just to be constantly undercut by any group of people.

However, I don't think encouraging companies to underpay a certain segment of humans is an ethical way to resolve the problem.

<comment><USER3> > I don't think that's particularly fair on immigrants. It sets a double > standard as to what people are worth.

How so? The minimum wage for H-1Bs is over 4x higher than the minimum wage for Americans.

If Americans had a minimum wage of 60k per year and immigrants were getting paid $7.25 per hour then that would be one thing, but it's currently the other way around.

<comment><USER4> So, ah... What you want is the _American_ minimum wage increased to $100,000 and to leave the _immigrant_ minimum wage at $60,000?

Yeah... I can't see that being abused at all. Good luck with that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm in favor of vastly raising the H1-B cap, or eliminating it altogether. But. If we _are_ going to have an H1-B cap, I think awarding the visas to the highest-paid applicants is probably the most fair way to administer it. I know of no better way to objectively measure "in high demand" than "well-paid."

<comment><USER6> Does this mean that any applicant can set their salary requirements at $300,000 and nobody else can be hired until they are?

<comment><USER4> I was wondering about this same thing. Highest paid doesn't equate to highest skilled at all.

The scheme seems more designed to punish companies from hiring immigrants than actually ensuring only high quality employees make their way to Silicon Valley.

Admittedly, I think increasing the $60,000 figure seems reasonable. It should be set at a figure (and updated regularly enough) such that it's slightly _above_ the average wage in the industry. That way it's really targeting _skilled_ workers, as opposed to cheap workers.

<comment><USER7> >The scheme seems more designed to punish companies from hiring immigrants than actually ensuring only high quality employees make their way to Silicon Valley.

I'd say you're exactly right (perhaps replace "punish" with "disincentivize" for more broad agreement), as concerns about the place of domestic labor in the face of foreign labor was the major campaign issue, rather than a desire on the part of the US electorate to refine/optimize the talent pool of Bay area international workers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Something should be done as long as we hear stories like this from Disney and other companies: [http://www.computerworld.com/article/3077302/it- careers/it-l...](http://www.computerworld.com/article/3077302/it-careers/it- layoffs-at-insurance-firm-are-a-never-ending-funeral.html)

<comment><USER9> There's a substantial difference between actions like that where they're clearly out-sourcing to slash costs and situations where you're trying to build an engineering team with top talent and want to tap the top 1% from all over the world, not just the local labor pool.

The reason there's a lot of foreign workers in the valley is becaus these companies poach the _best_. Just look at how many Canadian software engineering graduates are sponged up by Valley firms: It's a constant drain on talent. The Valley picks the best because in many cases the Valley can pay the best rates. This is not "We hired X because they were 50% cheaper than Y", it's "We hired X _and_ Y because they're the best in their fields."

Attacking foreign workers as a whole is a serious problem. These firms _want_ the best talent, and the best talent is not exclusively American.

Attacking deliberate undercutting efforts like Disney's is something that's reasonable. Disney had a team that could do the job that they cut loose so they could hire _another_ cheaper team using foreign workers. That shouldn't be as easy to do as it is.

Don't think that slamming the door on foreign workers will magically make American salaries go up. It'll mean the average talent will go down, and salaries will be roughly the same for the same amount of talent anyway.

These companies will just open up satellite offices and hire foreign workers anyway. They just won't pay American taxes.

<comment><USER10> I suspect another reason that politicians are so eager to stomp on H1B workers is because they're an easy target: most people don't care, and the H1B workers themselves can't vote, so pandering to anti-foreigner hysteria is a good bet for a politician...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I think this is n-th hand reporting of the exact same draft executive order that has been out for weeks. It is just repeating speculation of other news sources as to what the actual reforms will be and losing some of the fact that it is mere speculation.

The draft circulated weeks ago merely says to investigate the program and propose to better protect American workers and prioritize hiring the best, with no concrete proposals.

<comment><USER12> Ok, but a more interesting question is that if it is true (or something very similar is in the works) is it a good idea?

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I am finding the occasional reference to immigrant tech workers going back to their home countries and launching good teach business at home to be a positive thing. Seeing developing country with new tech scenes come around to solve their own local problems is inspiring to me. It gives me hope that tech really can change the world...

</comment><comment><USER14> What about non-tech workers that come to the US through an H1-B? Scientists come to mind. If you don't have a PhD, your starting salary isn't going to exceed $100K. Are they just out of luck?

<comment><USER7> There's already a good number of US-citizen PhDs in non-CS/"tech" fields who are being underutilized. Perhaps such moves will help prioritize them and adjust some of the supply/demand issues.

<comment><USER15> Not all PhDs are equal. You're not hiring them to flip burgers at McDonald's

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Two questions (one fact-based, one opinion)

1\. This article notes that the various proposed H1B reforms would require (for some definition of require) that companies make an effort to hire Americans before offering positions to visa workers. Isn't this already a requirement?

2\. I agree $60,000 is a very low minimum. But how is $130,000 reasonable? Even in this industry that's a significant salary.

<comment><USER17> > _2\. I agree $60,000 is a very low minimum. But how is $130,000 reasonable? > Even in this industry that 's a significant salary._

The current administration is businesspeople. They know $130k sounds too high, it's anchoring for negotiations. It'll go lower.

But also it's kind of the point of the reform being pushed, right? If somehow $130k is passed, it will obviously disqualify most foreign workers from acquiring these visas, and maybe the current quota of visas wouldn't be met. Then the quota may be lowered in the future, further limiting the visa program.

<comment><USER16> The 130k minimum was proposed by a Democratic congresswoman, not the administration.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> What are ways companies skirt L1 laws? I always assumed offshoring was done through a country with the laxest visa laws possible.

<comment><USER19> The L1 has no quota so it is used to get around the H1B quota. They just have to form a shell company in the other country, have employees stick around for an year and then come over under the L1 visa. There are no education requirements unlike an H1B. There are no prevailing wage requirements unlike an H1B.

<comment><USER20> > They just have to form a shell company in the other country, have employees > stick around for an year and then come over under the L1 visa.

That does not sound easy as you make it out to be.

<comment><USER19> Not easy but if you are hiring enough employees then it can be cost effective.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Isn't this the same "leaked executive" order that was being discussed few days back ? This news items has nothing new. Also, government's "American First" approach would always result into another mess like "war on drugs". Somehow American workers should come first but not the American company!

> Raising tech salaries and reducing the ridiculous exploitation of immigrant > tech workers is good.

Why not raise it to $200K or another arbitrary number if increasing wages are a good thing ? All increased wages would mean american corporations will be less competitive and hence it hurts average American consumer who perhaps is more poorer than the tech worker.

I sense "American First" is more of a "No Browns and Asians" that is likely to hurt entire tech industry.

</comment><comment><USER22> There is clearly need for reform here. Careful thought and a deep understanding of what is good for tech, and for workers, should both be considered. Unfortunately, careful thought and deep understanding is not what this administration has shown itself to be about.

</comment><comment><USER23> The H1-B program isn't just about techies. Translators, for example, might not demand a $130,000 salary, yet the top talent will often be foreign.

I'm sure Trump would like SV to form a movement behind this, much like the inroads he's trying to make with various tech leaders. It's just not as simple as looking at one type of worker and calling it a day.

Any changes to such a policy would need to be properly vetted across all industries.

</comment><comment><USER24> Cringley discussed the L-1B issue on Feb 6:

[http://www.cringely.com/2017/02/06/trumps-upcoming- move-h-1b...](http://www.cringely.com/2017/02/06/trumps-upcoming- move-h-1b-visas/)

<comment><USER25> L-1B suppresses wages more than H-1B because it is not transferable. Not getting any raises? Only option is to go back home or accept it.

<comment><USER26> I'm sure the lawyers will figure out how to abuse the L1 if H1B reforms are brought in. At least on the IT consulting side.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> there is nothing about trump's plans in this article. 130k and everything else were bills introduced by senators. they have very little chance of becoming law.

</comment><comment><USER28> Won't this push companies to hire remote workers as contractors instead for even lower salaries?

<comment><USER29> This. Many people (usually on the right) argue that increased minimum wages cost people jobs because companies that rely on low-wage, low-skilled will simply automate, because the companies are going to follow basic economic principles. A high wage barrier to H1B workers makes hiring overseas workers more attractive, and if companies can get the model working well (where offshore tech teams do a great job), that's worse in the long run for American tech workers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Huh, over 30 stories posted in the last 24 hours with "Trump" in the title, only 2 with more than 20 points, and they're both relatively pro-Trump. Interesting.

</comment><comment><USER26> 130k.. big raise.</comment>


Awesome Knowledge Management - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/brettkromkamp/awesome-knowledge-management <comment><USER2> I was looking at this from another perspective and got a little bit down the rabbit hole a few months ago. [https://www.ebiester.com/annotated- links/documentation/2020/...](https://www.ebiester.com/annotated- links/documentation/2020/05/04/annotated-documentation-links.html)

I think we need to look outward to other disciplines here. We do a poor job of organization and that causes many of the problems we see.

</comment><comment><USER3> I see lots of personal knowledge graph software, but no personal knowledge hypergraph software. Mine seems worth mentioning:

[https://github.com/JeffreyBenjaminBrown/hode](https://github.com/JeffreyBenjaminBrown/hode)

<comment><AUTHOR> Submit a PR for your project ;)

<comment><USER3> Done!</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Which good websites degraded their own UX/UI? - <AUTHOR> Imgur, reddit etc comes to mind. They have become almost useless and provide a really bad user experience. Full of dark patterns, horrible detection algorithms and moderation tools. Biggest abusers of AMP too.
Google search has become annoying and limited. Previously you could set your settings to exclude websites instead of doing it everytime, you had filters too and it didn't ignore your words in the quotes (you didn't even need those).
Notifications have become quite annoying as well. Every app seems to abuse it in a race to get to the top. I wish there was something like spam notification filter but then again, that would give more power to google to decide what goes on and out. <comment><USER2> YouTube.

For some reason they decided that conventional page navigation is old-school and they had to reimplement it in JS (gotta justify front-end developers' salaries I guess).

Of course, the (obvious) outcome is that navigating between YouTube pages is slow as an old pig and the conventional, browser-based navigation was faster (who thought native code with decades of experience and optimisations would be faster than JS?). I now always press F5 to do a full page reload as soon as the address bar updates as it's faster than letting their JS-based crap do it.

</comment><comment><USER3> Most notably Pinterest and Craigslist and most epically MySpace back in the day.</comment>


Google Chrome Extensions for People Who Build Websites - <AUTHOR> http://sixrevisions.com/tools/chrome-extensions-developers-designers/

<comment><USER2> The Chrome extension gallery has a category for web developer tools: <https://chrome.google.com/extensions/featured/web_dev>

I don't know how the article missed Speed Tracer. [https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/ognampngfcbddbfe...](https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/ognampngfcbddbfemdapefohjiobgbdl)

<comment><USER3> They also missed iMacros for Chrome - great for web regression tests (record & replay). A bit like Selenium, but easier to use for quick testing/performance measurements. [https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/deckhobdafgddagl...](https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/deckhobdafgddaglbaokimbcjjdikago)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> No stylebot? For me, it's the biggest innovation in CSS editing since Firebug.

<http://stylebot.me/>

<comment><USER2> I was just looking for this yesterday but couldn't remember what it was called.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Until there's a full version of Firebug available for Chome, I'll be sticking with Firefox for development work.

<comment><USER6> I agree with you that Chrome dev tools are lacking a bit, but what do you miss specifically?

I find that the JS debugger is far better (or at least since the last time I worked with Firebug). That's enough for me.

<comment><USER7> \- multi-line javascript console

\- inline viewing of ajax requests

\- go to link that works

\- urls that work

\- keyboard shortcuts for debugging (go to line, create breakpoint)

\- inspector with more options

\- easier to edit inline html with highlighting not raw text

\- connecting to console via other extensions (chrome API is very small compared to firefox API)

\- Better search in scripts

\- Better search in DOM tree

\- Better search in inspector

\- Less clicking when viewing remote content

\- Displaying remote content that works (file is loaded, content tab is empty)

Only a matter of time before it's implemented in chrome. But, firebug already has all this stuff and it makes a huge difference when debugging JS

Note: I wrote a couple of chrome extensions. Therefore, I cumulated more frustration than the average JS developer on chrome because switching to firebug is not even an option in my case ;-)

<comment><USER8> i did not recognize this until recently so i sympathize; but the chrome inspector has a javascript environment superior to firebug. i do suppose this is arguable, though.

more objectively, you can definitely review ajax requests in the inspector- and I actually think this feature is superior as well.

interestingly, I actually learned to love the chrome inspector because I was so fed up with using firefox in general (enough so that it's debugging capabilities did not outweigh the cons).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> For anyone using the "color picker" extension, there is a better option (Windows only, sorry). I use ClipX, which is a utility for having clipboard history (i.e., you can ctrl+c 10 things and have them all available.) It's amazingly useful, and works exactly as you'd expect out of the box.

It has an extension called Color Picker, which gives you a shortcut for popping up a Color Picker/Eye Dropper tool whenever and wherever you want, anywhere inside you Operating System. It's customizable as to what exactly gets copied to your clipboard. It is a much better option than having an extension, IMO, both because it's part of a utility I use anyway, and because it is available anywhere inside Windows, not just your browser.

<comment><USER10> For OSX I use 'DigitalColor Meter', comes with all OS X's and isn't browser based. Can do Hex + RGB, install Afloat and you can keep it above all windows on your mac.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> As much as I liked that list, I stopped from installing all of them, because they scare me. Call me stupid and paranoid, but I dont understand why a friggin "color-picker"-extension would require full access to my browsing history. If anyboy can explain, I d be glad to be informed on why that is.

</comment><comment><USER12> The title is a little yucky with the "15", but the extensions mentioned are legitimately useful to web devs.

<comment><USER13> I think it's OK when it's not a top. The title is just stating the fact that 15 extensions are listed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> The color picker module does not do what is stated in this article, did they even try it? The feedback section for color picker is riddled with comments that it doesn't do what people would naturally think it would do (pick out a color on the page using an 'eye dropper' like functionality.

Fortunately, there is both an actual 'eye dropper' extension and the 'color pick' extension. Eye dropper never worked for me on my Linux box, but color pick works like a charm. Here is its extension page: [https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/ohcpnigalekghcmg...](https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/ohcpnigalekghcmgcdcenkpelffpdolg)

</comment><comment><USER15> A couple more I find useful:

\- Evernote Web Clipper - for saving code snippets and notes about projects \- Resize Window - to open a page in a resolution of your choice. Very useful. \- Awesome Screenshot - take a screenshot and let people know what you think about a page ... if you're using Safari, Coda Notes is much nicer, though :)

And, of course, the developer tools included in Chrome (first in Safari ... and they still are nicer there) are great, too.

Any more extensions HN users find useful?

<comment><USER7> Refer to <http://news.ycombinator.com/formatdoc> for formatting options.

Feel free to add a couple of links

About chrome extensions: You might like vimium <http://github.com/philc/vimium>

<comment><USER16> If I could upvote you more I would! Vimium in Chrome is the bees knees! The best extension ever made, no discussion.

<comment><USER7> It needs a bit more work (if you compare it to vimperator on firefox). Especially some essential things like cursor mode, visual mode, bookmarks and keymarks

Take a look at my fork (and others) for more stuff. <http://github.com/hbt/vimium>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Firebug Lite link seems to be broken in the article. This link works:

[https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/bmagokdooijbeehm...](https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/bmagokdooijbeehmkpknfglimnifench)

</comment><comment><USER18> save

</comment><comment><USER19> I like cqstyle for editing CSS in Chrome. However, I may be partial since I wrote it.

[https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/kgjoohfhbbdcbnec...](https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/kgjoohfhbbdcbnecemfodgoofpohgbee)</comment>


Show HN: Build your own Kickstarter-like funding landing page with Stripe - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/Stamplay/stamplay-selfkickstarter

<comment><USER2> Very cool. As far as Stamplay goes, can we use whatever frontend technologies we want? You used angular.js for your example, but it's not something we use.</comment>