500 Startups Open for Applications - <AUTHOR> http://500.co/2013/01/31/applications-open-for-500strong-starfleet-academy/

<comment><USER2> FAQ says that they charge $6,000 per founder and $3,000 per non-founder to participate in the accelerator program.

Do most accelerators charge you to participate in them, while at the same time investing ~$50,000 for 5% equity?

<comment><USER3> Y Combinator doesn't charge you anything, but gives less cash for roughly the same equity. I don't know about Tech Stars. I think Founder Institute charges and doesn't invest, but I don't know their terms, and they're not really an accelerator.

It's normal for VCs in Series A to bill you for their legal expenses. Maybe that's a similar kind of thing to giving money and then charging back for expenses. It's obvious that accelerators have per-participant expenses; it's up to them and their LPs whether they should cover it by recouping from portfolio vs. overhead.

I don't think this term would influence my decision to participate or not. If an accelerator isn't a clear yes (massively increasingly your odds of success, raising your investment valuation, etc., far beyond what it costs), it's a no.

For Y Combinator, I'd say it's a clear yes. For a lot of the other accelerators, it's a no. I've heard good things about 500 Startups from other people I know who have participated.

<comment><USER2> Thanks for all of the information. Now that I understand why these are the terms it makes more sense.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Why does 500 Startups feel like a funnel for getting taken advantage of?

Oh my, just started reading the FAQ. Bad terms. Very bad.

<comment><USER5> What specifically is bad about them?

<comment><USER6> Pay to play.

<comment><USER7> Not at all!

If 500 Startups funds a company ($50,000) to join the accelerator, it will charge fees to help cover the costs of running the accelerator office space.

<comment><USER8> Why don't they just give the company the net then? Free + $35k is better psychologically than "$50k but we'll be taking some back."

<comment><USER9> It keeps the company in check. It reminds the company that expenses come with the business. It forces founders to be mindful of what they're getting. It makes everyone realize that they're being invested in as much as they're investing too.

I don't care if psychologically $35k sounds better than $50k minus expenses to you. It makes for better founders and better companies. You should think about it from this perspective.

<comment><USER6> _It makes for better founders and better companies._

Can you explain this part a little more?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> There's something about 500.co and it's members which makes me think of them as a totally different cult, very closed group of people, arrogant and somehow not a very good feeling about them. It must be just me.

<comment><USER11> I saw a live stream of 500s presentations. There was a guy who couldn't stop swearing. I have nothing against swearing if there's good reason for it (eg. someone's really truly upset and needs to communicate how upset they are), but for a pitch to outsiders? It really bugged me. I guess for similar reasons, I love HN because it is really civil compared to other forums on the web; many other places (excluding quora), the trolls seem to run wild.

I don't want to think all 500s participants are like that, but it rubbed me the wrong way. It seemed childish, like, "I'm cool because I can swear, check me out!" I don't think I should let it colour the way I think about all 500s participants, but for some reason, it's a permanent link in my mind whenever 500s is brought up.

<comment><USER12> They seem like they're actually a pretty good outfit, but Dave McClure is known for communications chock full of explitives. I don't have problems with those words - they're pretty effective when used in the right way - but they kind of lose their meaning when used in those quantities.

Seems like sort of a minor detail though if they do a good job otherwise.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Have any foreign companies successfully applied? How do they handle visas, company location etc.?

<comment><USER14> As other commenters have pointed out, 500 is way more international than YC. Over half of the companies in the current batch (of which I am one) are international. Dave McClure, Paul Singh, etc spend HUGE amounts of time travelling the world looking for the best trends and startups. In that sense, they select from a much wider field of applicants.

500 itself has no problem giving money to international companies - however, most companies flip-up or establish in the US to make it easier for other investors. It does depend on the company though. Some companies come to the US to enhance their network, not necessarily to crack into the US market, so setting up shop here legally doesn't make sense.

For visas - they provide references, etc that are needed and are very quick and responsive about it. That said, they will not "sponsor" you to come in on an H1-B or anything like that.

<comment><USER13> Thanks for the info!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Hmm <http://news.500.co> seems to be down.. :)</comment>


Museum of Endangered Sounds - <AUTHOR> http://savethesounds.info/ <comment><USER2> The whole site is just a frame around [http://mrgory.info/sm/](http://mrgory.info/sm/)

</comment><comment><USER3> Love the concept,but a simpler website would have really helped you know.The USP of this website is the sound.The cursor based shadow effects are not exactly needed and all the other visual treats are not really helpful while selecting tiles

</comment><comment> david-given Hmm. There's a complete screen dump in the ZX Spectrum sound.

Can anyone suggest a Spectrum emulator which will run on Linux for decoding this? I've found plenty for Windows...

<comment><USER4> World of Spectrum [1] has the biggest list of ZX Spectrum emulators I know. Most of emulators support tape images, but I'm not sure about tools for converting audio to tape images.

[1] [http://www.worldofspectrum.org/faq/emulators/emulators.htm](http://www.worldofspectrum.org/faq/emulators/emulators.htm)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Are these 33 sounds the only endangered sounds? It feels a bit sparse for a effort spanning multiple years...

</comment><comment><USER6> Love it, the ICQ sound brings me back.</comment>


The Number of Fusion Energy Startups Is Growing - <AUTHOR> https://www.fusionenergybase.com/article/the-number-of-fusion-energy-startups-is-growing-fast-heres-why/ <comment><USER2> I don't really buy into the premise that it's based on materials and technology advancements. Look at the first chart - it's a direct match with the start of historically low interest rates creating an unprecedented easy money environment for investors. To me it's pretty clear this is more of a financially induced situation than a technologically induced one.

<comment><USER3> Author here. No doubt that low interest rates are driving investment dollars. In my talking with the physicists who are starting these companies low interest rates and funding availability is only part of the equation. What's motivating them to start new companies is strongly influenced by new technologies.

<comment><USER4> Former fusion startup founder here.

It would have been interesting to note how many (and which, if possible) startups were specifically taking advantage of each item you mentioned. This would make a much stronger case that it is technology driving the expansion rather than money. Obviously, REBCO tape is being used by a few (Commonwealth comes to mind) since better magnets are usable everywhere in magnetic fusion. However, it would be useful if you could point to, for example, a startup that was using engineering decisions from ITER to derive their plasma-facing materials. Of course, if this information is not public-facing, I totally understand why the article is so vague about it.

Regarding the graph, well, it reminded me of an old HN comment I made a while back: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16552007](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16552007)

<comment><USER3> Tracking the use of different technologies used by companies is a good idea and it's on the todo list.

As for the materials, yeah I'd like to go deeper there, maybe another article down the road.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Why I'm never flying again - <AUTHOR> http://qz.com/129477/why-im-never-flying-again/

<comment><USER2> I'm not convinced that stepping out of air travel would really have that large an impact on any carbon footprint except yours. The flights are still going out; my assumption is that your not being on them doesn't mean much difference.

How much fuel is spent per person on a flight, and how much CO2 emission does that translate to? That would be helpful data. Without that, I can't really say if it's meaningful or not.

Edit: I already don't fly, by the way. No need to.

<comment><USER3> I reckon the argument is that if less people fly there will eventually be less planes in the air and more stimulation for alternative modes of transportation (or efficiency goals made more prominent for airplanes). But I reckon the effect of buyers is probably not gonna cut it and the only way to truly make travel more energy efficient is incentives/penalties on a corporate/government level.

I absolutely can't back that up though ;).

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm scared to do my numbers. I fly twice a week, every week.</comment>


Show HN: FastDocs – Speed up creating Google Docs at home or work - <AUTHOR> http://fastdocs.co <comment><USER2> Somewhat relevant to this topic: If I'm editing a Google Doc in a Driver folder, and I create a new document, I want that document to be in that same folder, like all other programs that have this functionality. Does anyone know how I can do this? I keep getting my new documents showing up in my root folder so I end up with a bunch of missing docs when I'm creating a lot of them at once.

<comment><USER3> yeah that's the trick. I don't want a million untitled docs at my root. Launching the doc from a Drive folder is critical for many/most user's mental organization. Will be interesting to see how fastdocs will solve this without reinventing the Drive, err.. wheel.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> ....I love it already. I practically _live_ inside Google Drive for work.

Question for the maker or anyone else: how can I turn these into bookmarklets so I can save them with favicons to my bookmarks bar?

<comment><USER5> Bookmark [https://docs.google.com/document/create](https://docs.google.com/document/create) ? Or am I missing something?

<comment><AUTHOR> There are unique URLs for each document type, and they are also different per platform (web/iOS/android). So, yes bookmarks are great, but it's helpful to have all the necessary links in one place.

<comment><USER6> the different urls are in the source:

        var urls = {
    				"web": {
    					"doc": "https://docs.google.com/document/create",
    					"sheet": "https://sheets.google.com/create",
    					"presentation": "https://slides.google.com/create",
    					"drawing": "https://drawings.google.com/create"
    				},
    				"ios": {
    					"doc": "googledocs://docs.google.com/document/create",
    					"sheet": "googlesheets://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?new",
    					"presentation": "googleslides://docs.google.com/presentation/create",
    					"drawing": "https://drawings.google.com/create"
    				},
    				"android": {
    					"doc": "intent://#Intent;package=com.google.android.apps.docs.editors.docs;end",
    					"sheet": "intent://#Intent;package=com.google.android.apps.docs.editors.sheets;end",
    					"presentation": "intent://#Intent;package=com.google.android.apps.docs.editors.slides;end",
    					"drawing": "https://drawings.google.com/create"
    				},
    			}

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Useful. Interestingly, starting a clean and blank new doc is notably faster from this page than from the Google Docs/Drive file listing page.

<comment><USER8> The act of starting the document takes roughly the same time (a few miliseconds of difference on my average work PC).

However, this doesn't apply to the "waiting" time required for the Google Drive UI to load, which _does_ take an awful lot of time (compared to the minimalistic FastDocs UI).</comment></comment>


Never use hard tabs  - <AUTHOR> http://opensourcehacker.com/2012/05/13/never-use-hard-tabs/

<comment><USER2> Exactly wrong unless you only have access to an editor that doesn't let you set tab spaces. Spaces are for separating things. Tabs are for indenting. How the indent is displayed is a user-controlled editor preference, just like font size.</comment>


Slack App Store - <AUTHOR> https://slack.com/apps <comment><USER2> I don't really get it. This is more of an integration showcase than app store right? Can developers charge money for their Slack integrations and get paid- out? Is there a marketplace?

<comment><USER3> Agreed, the title is a bit of a misnomer. It's not an "app store".</comment></comment>


Show HN: I built a FOSS service to protect against link shorteners tracking us - <AUTHOR> https://unshort.link/ <comment><USER2> Related, the Archive Team realized a while ago, that when a link shortening service goes dark, all the links that went through it instantly break. This has bad implications for future historians trying to figure out how the present-day web was interlinked.

So there's a project called URLteam to index and save them. I just started running a Warrior instance on the URLteam project, and it's really straightforward. I figure folks reading this may be interested. More info:

[https://www.archiveteam.org/index.php?title=URLTeam](https://www.archiveteam.org/index.php?title=URLTeam)

[https://www.archiveteam.org/index.php?title=ArchiveTeam_Warr...](https://www.archiveteam.org/index.php?title=ArchiveTeam_Warrior)

</comment><comment><USER3> Where and why are you guys still seeing/using shortened URLs? I don't think I've personally made a shortened URL since Twitter built one into their service, and I stopped _seeing_ shortened URLs around the same time.

There are two exceptions:

• I still see service-specific short URLs, e.g. goo.gl, nyti.ms, etc. Because these can only be created by the service in question, they don't introduce security/privacy concerns.

• When a URL shortener is used to create a sort of vanity link to e.g. a Google doc. (OP's service could be useful for these!)

Outside of those times... why would you use a URL shortener? When are you limited by number of characters?

<comment><USER4> _• I still see service-specific short URLs, e.g. goo.gl, nyti.ms, etc. Because these can only be created by the service in question, they don 't introduce security/privacy concerns._

This isn't necessarily true; I've seen companies that offer to do the 'custom shortlink' thing for various companies. It's safe to assume that there are privacy concerns with at least some of them.

<comment><USER5> Bitly runs nyti.ms, so yes, you aren't trusting just the NYT.

<comment><USER6> Yes, and nyti.ms only ever pints to New York Times, a well known entity (well, that's what's intended, right?)

<comment><USER5> Sure. Noting that you have to trust that bitly isn't fingerprinting your browser and tracking you across their domains.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Reminds me when security researchers used data Bit.ly exposes to go from one url shortened by Russian military intelligence to the hundreds of other short URLs they made for phishing emails, many of which had state embedded in query parameters that gave away who they were targeting. All because the GRU forgot to set their accounts to private.

[https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/mg7xjb/how-hackers- broke-...](https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/mg7xjb/how-hackers-broke-into- john-podesta-and-colin-powells-gmail-accounts)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Oh wow thanks for all the feedback. Should not post a link on HN and than sleep directly after.

I came to work on this as I wantend to not get bothered with the short link services (and the links behind them) tracking me. So unshort.link also tries to "learn" (by trying different url parameters) which paramters on the long url are required and which are not and are only tracking you (with a HTML diff).

The service learns new shortlink services the moment you enter them on unshort.link and they than are also automatically used in the extension.

</comment><comment><USER8> Yes yes yes! I hate URL shorteners. It's not just privacy - I can't decide if I want to click it or jot before I do.

I suppose that issue could also be solved with a browser extension.

It'd be nice to do this with DNS rather than an extension though, above point aside, e.g. if already running Pi-hole or similar, send shortener URLs to unshort.link, and redirect immediately.

<comment><USER5> Pi-hole would only see the hostname, and not the "slug", so that wouldn't work.

<comment><USER6> Pi-Hole sees the bit.ly DNS lookup,that responds with HTTP/30x to full.domain.tls, which is a second DNS lookup the Pi could catch/filter.

<comment><USER5> But bitly.com/xyz can be mapped to full.domain/abcdef

The pi-hole doesn't see the /xyz, or any of the http redirects either.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Pretty cool. You might consider adding some of the more popular vanity names that bitly runs for big sites. Like nyti.ms (New York Times), wapo.st (Washington Post), etc.

<comment><AUTHOR> You can add them yourself :D Just unshort them on unshort.link (not the browser extensions) and the service learns that it found a new shortlink service and it will be deployed right away.

After the next browser restart also the extension knows about that new service. (No updated required)

You can see if your updated worked if e.g. wapo.st is listed in [https://unshort.link/providers](https://unshort.link/providers)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> How do we know this site is not tracking us?

<comment><USER10> You can run it yourself, and audit the source if you like: [https://github.com/simonfrey/unshort.link/](https://github.com/simonfrey/unshort.link/)

<comment><USER11> If you run it yourself, do you not lose some of the privacy benefits?

<comment><USER10> I believe you gain privacy by running it yourself, since you're no longer submitting a portion of your browsing history to a third party. The README for the server claims "You can build & run it yourself for even better privacy".

<comment><USER8> Shorteners are frequently used to hide/prettify query parameters used for tracking; so if you run your own you're losing the aggregate anonymity-ish, and gaining that OP can't see what URLs you're unshortening.

I suppose it depends on your use, but IMO if you run it yourself as the only user, you lose more privacy than you gain.

<comment><USER10> If the website you're ultimately visiting can see your IP address anyways, I fail to see the lost privacy. Their traffic will be sliced and diced into cohorts along many axes, and this is only one axis on which you are slightly anomalous. If anything, you'll be targeted less as a result since you won't show up in their funnels.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Is it possible to make such a thing working if using command-line programs such as curl or wget to download a file rather than opening it in the web browser?

<comment><AUTHOR> It should totaly be possible. Same as with the DNS solution you can get the data via the api of unshort.link and than build a small bash script for it. If I have time I may try to do such a script, but not sure if and when I will be able to make it.

Would be awesome if you build something like that! You can get the currently to unshort.link known short link providers in a nice json format from [https://unshort.link/providers](https://unshort.link/providers)

You can get the redirect info from unshort link also via its api without redirecting, just replace /d/ with /api/ in the GET request: e.g. [https://unshort.link/api/https://tinyurl.com/unshortchromeex...](https://unshort.link/api/https://tinyurl.com/unshortchromeex..).

If you build a solution, please do not forget to add the documentation on how to do it via a pull request to the unshort.link repo, so everyone could profit from it

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> This is really cool. And it's all written in Go? Interesting.

Do you have any plans on releasing the static JS/HTML? Or is there a way this could be run on standard Apache/Nginx/IIS web servers?

<comment><AUTHOR> No I do not play to make it runnable on Apache/Nginx/ISS as there is more logic in it, than just the redirect.

The js/html assets are in the subfolder server/static/ for your use

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Add: Replacement of affiliate or referral links with your user' affiliate link and you can charge for this service.

</comment><comment><USER14> I wanted to make something like this with my C.GG domain but couldn't refuse an offer to sell the name for $10k</comment>


How we built Watsi Coverage without stable electricity, WiFi, or email - <AUTHOR> http://blog.watsi.org/engineering-challenges/ <comment><USER2> I wish all app designers would consider designing apps that function offline. It's infuriating to visit a web page that has been read before only to find that the browser won't show it because the network is unreachable.

<comment><USER3> Up until less than a year ago, offline web apps were not really possible. Until service workers became commonplace, the only option was AppCache, which is one of the most broken and convoluted specs ever to weasel its way into the web platform.

You should start to see more and more offline-ready web apps making an appearance as the tooling around service workers improves!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Nice.

Would have been more helpful if specifics were mentioned. E.g what Remittance service was used to pay with your US bank account? What network of telco? What did you use to build your app. PWA?

That way people that are well versed with Uganda can give feedback.

I never thought of the idea of using PIN terminology rather than password. I'll have that in mind.

I'm quite surprised that 100GB is $450. Uganda is known to have better rates. MTN is less than half of that [1]

[1] [http://ugbusiness.com/1183/looking-for-the-best-internet- pla...](http://ugbusiness.com/1183/looking-for-the-best-internet-plan-in- uganda-heres-some-data-for-you)

</comment><comment><USER5> Wow, we came across the same thing while building epimetrics.in back in 2014-2015. We built the analytics engine and tested it in one mega Indian festival called "Kumbh Mela" with over 20 Million people gathering at one place. In our case, we had to struggle with the sheer amount of people as well.

We learnt a bunch of stuff and right away decided to have offline storage option and send data back to db when connection resumes. We also did the research on how to save battery life and use muscular memory to enable our users to use our system in that setup as efficiently as possible.

But at the end, it was very satisfying when we were leading on the front to spot the diseases. We helped attend over 2 million patients efficiently. If interested, I would love to share our insights plus few decisions which were very helpful for our adoption from health workers as well as govt health department officials.

Good work guys! Keep plugging! :)

Edit: Added festival name.

<comment><USER6> Nice. Would love to read blog post around this. If you have one

<comment><USER5> Unfortunately not as of now. But I will write it down and share here over the weekend.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> If this sounds fun, we're hiring a senior engineer: [http://blog.watsi.org/engineers/](http://blog.watsi.org/engineers/)

<comment><USER8> Out of interest, what stack are you using to achieve offline first?

Where I work[1] we are currently using CouchDB + PouchDB, with our app being a SPA webapp wrapped in an android wrapper[2]. I'm interested what your approach is and how it differs.

[1] [https://www.medicmobile.org](https://www.medicmobile.org)

[2] We bundle something called Crosswalk because a) it's a way to get a newer webview on older phones and b) it allows us to get around the webview offline idb data limit of 5% of available disk space

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> If they have to buy data 1Mb at a time, which websites or apps do they use that load with the smallest download?

<comment><USER10> Not shitty modern SPAs that load content dynamically and modify the DOM to save bandwidth, but load 30MB of js libs first on every visit to make all this crap possible in the first place.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> If anybody from Watsi sees this, we've spent years working on and perfecting offline-first distributed data sync, we've released it as MIT/ZLIB/Apache2.

We've had navy warships running the system on ancient hardware, and lots of people in the Open Source community have run it on low power devices, like raspberry pi and dirt cheap android phones.

Would love to chat, my email is in my profile.

<comment><USER12> Not from Watsi, but I'm curious about this. Is there a link to learn more?

<comment><USER13> From marknadal's profile page I gather that this is the link. Looks pretty cool. [http://gun.js.org/docs/Introduction](http://gun.js.org/docs/Introduction)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I'm sure I'm misunderstanding this, but it sounds like their entire user database for a medical system is copied onto every phone, and it's guarded by a six-digit pin? That can't be right?

<comment><USER15> The article mentions enrollment, so each phone has a tiny shard for writing to the actual DB when the network is available.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Great read! The bit about the time stuck out at me. With Internet access comes `ntp`, but without it... just how well tuned is the timekeeping circuit in cellphone chipsets, and how much did that even matter?

<comment><USER17> Cell phones can receive GPS signals which are a very accurate source of timekeeping.

<comment><USER18> Is that right? The way I understood it, GPS works like a kind of triangulation, with your distance from the satellites being calculated based on how long the time-stamped signal takes to travel to you. Meaning your device has to keep its own very accurate time in order to be able to compare.

But the phone can get the time from the cell towers.

I may be wrong, this is just a layperson's understanding :)

<comment><USER19> If you have an atomic clock in your GPS device, you need to see 3 satellites to get a fix. As you said, you calculate travel time for the signal from the atomic clock on the satellite to the one on the receiver and that puts you somewhere on the surface of a sphere. Two spheres intersect to give you a circle, and a third gives you a point (technically 2, but one is probably in space).

Doing it like that would require you to have an atomic clock in every receiver though, which isn't feasible (and anything less accurate would make the fix too inaccurate). Instead you add one extra variable (current time) and one extra constraint (extra satellite) and the equation is solvable again. This is why you need 4 satellites for a fix. The solution to the equation not only gives location but also precise time, which is why GPS receivers can be used as standalone time references.

The other thing you need to know to do all of this is where the satellites actually are: this information is called the ephemera and the almanac. You can download this from the satellite signal, but it is very low data rate and takes several minutes. This is why handheld GPS receivers can take time to get a fix. Mobile phones instead download this from the network which is why they can make very fast fixes - they just need to scan frequencies to get a lock while doing the download and then do a bit of maths.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Way to go! Can you explain more about Watsi coverage actually does? Very cool article and process.</comment>


How a broker spent $520m in a drunken stupor and moved the global oil price - <AUTHOR> http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/oilandgas/7862246/How-a-broker-spent-520m-in-a-drunken-stupor-and-moved-the-global-oil-price.html

<comment><USER2> _Having admitted to an alcohol problem and received treatment, Mr Perkins was banned from trading for five years and hit with a £72,000 fine, reduced from £150,000 because of potential financial hardship. Mr Perkins was not available for comment last night at his £340,000 home in Brentwood, Essex, and it is not known whether he has found alternative employment. The FSA will consider re- approving him as a broker after the ban, if he has recovered from his alcohol problem, but noted "Mr Perkins poses an extreme risk to the market when drunk". It added that there appeared to have been "no motive" for buying up the oil._

Homelessness is a major social problem, especially during periods of economic austerity. The first step in mitigating it is to understand how people respond to such sudden reversals of fortune: Mr Perkins is uniquely well qualified to study the subject, and should be allowed to begin his investigations immediately, if not sooner.

On a more serious note, I did a pile of research into global oil markets and exchanges for a documentary proposal a couple of years back. My intention was to trace the contours of the 'invisible hand' and demonstrate the importance of price signals as an input to policymaking as a counterpoint to the rampant conspiracy mongering. Instead I discovered the markets in question were being run like a large-scale shell game. The majority of oil futures gradually moved onto the ICE exchange mentioned in this story, largely because regulators in the UK and US each believed the other country's agency was supervising trades, when in fact nobody was.

This guy's irresponsibility is much easier to explain in a newspaper story than a pattern of regulatory shopping in high-volume commodity trades, but the real scandal is the way regulators kept citing economic fundamentals while assuming somebody else was maintaining an audit trail and would have mentioned if there were anything amiss. Perkins blew about $15 million of capital in an alcoholic stupor; how much evaporated during frenzied trading in 2008 is hard to say. Much depends on whether one sees the price spike as a trigger of the wider economic crisis, or a frantic attempt to stave it off by traders in search of a fast return.</comment>


Show HN: Interviewly – Interviews pulled from Reddit AMA's - <AUTHOR> http://interviewly.com

<comment><USER2> I can't be the only one that finds Reddit AMAs hard to parse. This is a huge improvement.

<comment><USER3> I'm curious to know if the reformatting is having to be done manually or not</comment></comment>


I drank Huel and Soylent for a month. This is what happened UK - <AUTHOR> https://www.wired.co.uk/article/huel-soylent-meal-replacement-drinks <comment><USER2> Soylent is the product of total amateurs who forgot to label their product for high lead and cadmium content.

You can buy complete feed for your livestock. There has been 'meal replacement' products sold to hospitals and sick people for at least 50-60 years and they actually work. You can eat them the rest of your life if you want, but they don't claim to have health benefits because they don't.</comment>


Ask HN: What was the HN thread on building own server for photo start-up? - <AUTHOR>

Hi! I was wondering what was the HN thread about some photo start-up building own servers rather than using AWS because own infrastructure was about a third the cost of using Amazon S3 for storage.
I have been Google-ing for many hours and used "site:news.ycombinator.com" along w/ date-range and several keywords, but was unsuccessful in finding that post.
The post was a discussion here on HN + link to a blog post on the company website. I cannot remember the name of the company, but I think it began with the letter "C".
Here is some things that I found that are somewhat related to what I am looking for but not exactly want I want: - http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2786066 - http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3099796 - http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=332624
The post was made several weeks ago (I think - so fairly recently). I would really appreciate it if you can help me in finding it. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciate it. Thanks! <comment><USER2> I can't find the HN discussion, but the Backblaze Pods have been discussed here a few times: [http://blog.backblaze.com/2011/07/20/petabytes-on-a- budget-v...](http://blog.backblaze.com/2011/07/20/petabytes-on-a- budget-v2-0revealing-more-secrets/)

EDIT: Sorry - just realized the bioteam.net discussion centered on Backblaze pods.

<comment><AUTHOR> No problem. Thanks for your effort! The post before you found it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Here you go: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3384606> (From Oyster.com)

This is the only one I remember, from a hotel review startup and I believe the server was just for backup.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you! You rock!! :)</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Starting a non-traditional startup - <AUTHOR>

I originally posted this a little while back but it disappeared almost instantly. I hope I'm not breaking any rules by posting again. If it drops off again I'll get the hint. I won't be doing it any further times.
--
I have a few ideas I've been floating around in my head for a while now - some I've even got a fair amount of exploratory code for - and I'm toying with the idea of making a go of one of them.
I know "lifestyle business" can be thought of as a pejorative term, but to hell with that. I'm a little older and a little greyer than the poster boy rockstar-ninja founder and I have far more important things in my life than work. This doesn't mean I don't work hard, but it does mean I'm not sacrificing the things most precious to me for a web app. Paradoxically this could mean I need to work much harder within my constraints and I'm fine with that.
I have a few thoughts on how I could go about this - and they are only ill-defined thoughts at the moment, but I would be much obliged for any input this community has to offer.
Ideally I'd like to work with others on this. I've tried the sole founder thing before but I miss having people to bounce ideas off, share the workload, share the spoils or just without them knowing it, getting me through one of the dark days that are bound to come along.
I'd want to split things as evenly as possibly, skewed just enough in favour of the person who is best to guide things along (this doesn't even necessarily have to be myself, though I don't foresee it not being). When money comes in, we each take our split. With a little luck we've all got some walking around money without any of the burn-out inducing hours and load that can happen.
Which brings me onto my next thought: time. I see this as being a part-time venture in terms of the hours put in. We all work say 16 hours/week - as much as possible on a schedule convenient to that person. I haven't thought out the exact number too much yet but I think 16 is low enough to fit comfortably around a fulltime job, yet enough to get things done if there are at least a couple of us.
This isn't something to make you rich beyond the dreams of avarice, but with a bit of luck and a bit of time, maybe it will be provide a nice little income. Maybe one day it will turn into something worth going full time at (and compensated accordingly of course). If it all blows up, then fine, we go our seperate ways and hopefully everyone had a good time, at least got a little money out of it and can still go back to the day job.
Like I said, these are still-forming thoughts at the moment and I'm sure there are huge holes to be torn in my thinking but I do believe that somewhere in here is a system that can be made to work. It won't be for everyone, but your traditional startup isn't for me so I'd rather have likeminded folks on this anyway.
I may still be a little drunk from last night but I'm a long-time member of this site (even if I'm cowardly hiding behind a throwaway) and I value the insights I know a lot of you can offer.
Have at me! :) <comment><USER2> Any hints as to the industry that you might be aiming for so that you can find a match with those with relevant experience.

As an example, I'm happy to bounce ideas around, I'm interested in photography, building simple useful utilities, I've got experience in ecommerce, data, statistics and managing networks.

However I'm not interested in engineering, mechanics, finance or marketing businesses.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ok, so I was a little too vague :)

The idea I am giving serious consideration to is a tool that I think will be primarily of benefit to designers, front end developers etc and their clients. Kind of a cross between Basecamp and Dreamweaver. If that makes sense?!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I would be very interested in joining and bouncing ideas around. To echo what the user below me said... is there a specific industry or experience you are looking for? Feel free to contact me off-line. Look forward to chatting.

<comment><AUTHOR> Do you have a contact email/skype? There isn't anything on your profile but I'd be happy to chat about it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> what is the risk and how high is it? Can you quantify the reward? Even a little bit? Ballpark?</comment>


Memo: Senators' tax break proposals secret for 50 years - <AUTHOR> http://static.squarespace.com/static/518e7de6e4b0534aaae6ee37/t/51ed4953e4b0e57a1f3e1a1f/1374505299385/071913%20FINAL%20Dear%20Colleague%20submission%20document%20management%20memo.pdf

<comment><AUTHOR> > Copies will be marked with an identifying number unique to the Majority and > Minority staff. Each copy will also be labeled:

> COMMITTEE CONFIDENTIAL. NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION. DO NOT COPY. These materials > may not be released to the public from the National Archives or by the > Finance Committee prior to December 31, 2064.

> Each digital copy will be saved onto secure, password-protected folders on > the servers of the Majority Committee staff and Minority Committee staff > respectively. Only Authorized Staff will have access to these respective > password protected folders... copies shall be kept in a locked safe in their > respective Finance Committee offices

<comment><AUTHOR> Here's a link to the letter to which the memo refers: [http://www.finance.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/06272013%20Call%...](http://www.finance.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/06272013%20Call%20for%20Input%20on%20Tax%20Reform1.pdf)</comment></comment>


How to Avoid Issues That Could Kill Your Product - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@matthiaswagner/you-can-t-be-the-muhammad-ali-of-your-domain-without-knowing-what-you-re-up-against-a10979a775

<comment><USER2> A good breakdown of an Inception.

I haven't looked into it much – are the good resources out there for the Inception process? Is this codified?

</comment><comment><USER3> good article to read and comes at a perfect time for my team. Have shared it with them

</comment><comment><USER4> Great post!</comment>


StackOverflow login and signup links are broken, Can't log in. - <AUTHOR>

Over at http://stackoverflow.com/users/login the signup link is broken, it doesn't do anything when clicked on. Apart from this, normally the login page shows images of Google, Facebook and other OpenIDs which when clicked let you login with it. They are missing too. <comment><USER2> +1 to "I'm not sure this is a good place to post this sort of issues"

Anyway, have you checked if your browser has JavaScript enabled?

</comment><comment><USER3> Works for me. Anyway, I'm not sure this is a good place to post this sort of issues.</comment>


Code Podcast on P2P protocols: BitTorrent, Git, Dat, Scuttlebutt - <AUTHOR> https://codepodcast.com/posts/2018-07-05-p2p-people-to-people/ <comment><AUTHOR> Hey Hacker News,

I'm Andrey, the host of the podcast. The episode has started off as an exploration of Merkle Trees and their role in decentralized software (spoiler: they are everywhere). As I was interviewing people I became curious about how p2p protocols work in general, what are common traits and practices, what can we as developers learn from them and how can we use them in our projects.

It was a fascinating journey! I've learned a lot and it changed my view on the future of software architecture. The client-server model that we're used to now seems outdated and flawed. So I'm curious:

* What do you think about the future P2P protocols? Will they stay a niche toy for engineers or will they become more widespread? * Did you build anything on top of IPFS, Dat, Scuttlebutt etc? How was your experience as a developer? How was the experience of the user?

Also, I'm always looking for ways to make the show better, so please send in your feedback and suggestions.</comment>


DailyCandy Bought by Comcast for $125 million - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/08/05/dailycandy-bought-by-comcast-for-125-million

<comment><USER2> congratulations to dailycandy! my sister has been an exec there for a long time, so this is really exciting haha

<comment><USER3> congrats to you and your family then... must be a nice payday hopefully. ;-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm shocked at the price, but good for them.

</comment><comment><USER5> quick math: $25m in revenues, 2.5m subscribers, which makes it $50 annual revenue per subscriber.

So I am wondering is $50/year/user a high or low figure in web advertising? I am suspecting it's a high one because of the audience (hip, young and rich urban women)

<comment><USER6> Not sure I follow your math. Wouldn't that be $10 in annual revenue per subscriber ($10 * 2.5mil = $25mil)?

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> This really makes me wonder how valuations are calculated for newsletters. Anyone?

<comment><USER8> Same as websites - but you track number of people subscribed and the key metric is how many people open it. CPMs are a little higher for newsletters than for websites with the same number of readers I've found (as an advertiser, not a content producer).

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> so . . . we plan to move to DC next summer. Would my wife want to sign up for this now that it's been sold?</comment>


An "Alternative" Scientific Career - <AUTHOR> https://www.authorea.com/users/8850/articles/143252/_show_react <comment><USER2> > As an undergraduate, I spent a lot of time surfing and very little time > cramming for tests

Web surfing or wave surfing?

<comment><AUTHOR> both! I went to UC Santa Cruz.</comment></comment>


Show HN: The only PHP library you miss - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/zakirullin/typed-accessor <comment><USER2> I honestly don't think that this solves anything that was a real problem in PHP. Super easy boilerplate to abstract away (like you did). But I don't think your way is much more pleasing to the eye than filter_var... Maybe I am being over critical because the amount of emojis gave me a minor aneurysm.

<comment><AUTHOR> Type casting doesn't seem to be an issue for you?</comment></comment>


Exact rational value of a squared cosine between two arbitrary vectors - <AUTHOR> http://www.texpaste.com/n/os1jdjd5 <comment><AUTHOR> Some context : I was learning about rational trigonometry[1] and wanted to know if it can be used in computer graphics. I thought about John Carmack inventing his own square root function[2] because vector normalization is often needed and it requires evaluating a square root. Usually this happens while computing specular reflection.

I looked at Phong's reflection model[3] and saw that the specular part requires a power of the cosine. The exponent is called "shininess".

I wondered if it's possible to compute this power of a cosine without having to normalize vectors.

Turns out it's possible, as long as shininess is an even integer.

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

2\. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_inverse_square_root](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_inverse_square_root)

3\. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phong_reflection_model](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phong_reflection_model)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, that was removed once I had realized it was silly.</comment>


FreshRSS – A free, self-hostable aggregator - <AUTHOR> https://freshrss.org/ <comment><USER2> I was a TTRSS user, but it only caused me trouble. Threw all kinds of strange errors at unexpected times. I don't know how many times it died on me after an upgrade.

About 1 ½ ago I switched to FreshRSS and it has been a marvelous experience. Zero trouble, zero adminstrative burden. Self-hosted bliss. Best of all is the fact that it uses a flat file DB so it can easily be backed up, moved around and migrated. Can not recommend it enough. Also, it's PHP, so works on any cheap shared hosting. That's how I use it.

<comment><USER3> >Best of all is the fact that it uses a flat file DB so it can easily be backed up, moved around and migrated. Can not recommend it enough. Also, it's PHP, so works on any cheap shared hosting. That's how I use it.

I've also been running my own FreshRSS instance for a few years now and this was the deciding factor for me. PHP+SQLite pretty much guarantees that any "toaster connected to the internet" would be able to serve it.

Even now that I'm using a slightly more powerful server, I don't want to run a dedicated Postgres just to store some personal RSS feeds. I know I can put everything on a docker and pretend it's not there, but that's just hiding a detail that's going to bite back when I need to backup my data or change servers.

I wish that more self-hosted applications would support SQLite out of the box.

<comment><USER4> Use docker compose and mount volumes, move the folder move the service

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I mention this frequently but an alternative is [https://miniflux.app/](https://miniflux.app/) \- it's easy to self host, fast and written in Go. It also syncs with every RSS app that supports the Fever API. It's one of my favorite self hosted tools.

<comment><USER6> I love Miniflux and have just started using the Instapaper integration. I am still yet to find a good Fever client for Android unfortunately, any suggestions?

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> You know what "self hosts" and doesn't require this excess web hosting and database baggage? Native RSS reader applications.

<comment><USER8> You can't seamlessly use native RSS app across your home, work computers and mobile. P.S.: It uses fairly standard LAMP stack. Put it in a docker or qemu if you don't want to "pollute" your machine.

<comment><USER7> You can. I do. Synchronization of read status between devices is a matter of taste. Without it it's as easy as running a native RSS reader (and it doesn't even have to be the same one!) on each computer. It's easy with opml export to keep the subscriptions the same when you do add or remove on a device.

>Put it in a docker or qemu

I'm trying to avoid inserting extra abstraction layers (browserOS on top of OS) in the first place. Adding more just to contain the needless complexity of the separate webserver+database isn't my jam.

<comment><USER9> I guess your RSS reading habits are quite different from those of me and other people that are the target audience for these kinds of self-hosted solutions. Not having read status synced across my devices is not an option, I might just as well use only one device in that case.

<comment><USER10> That's right. The computer is there to automate things for us, and having to deal with the same, already read articles manually on multiple devices is inconvenient.

<comment><USER7> What's _really_ inconvienient is having to run an extra webserver and database 24/7 and keeping it all secure and up to date. Seeing a RSS entry twice is barely noticible.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Personally I prefer RSS2Email, so I have a good single place to read anything and a good storage and classifications software to save posts I like.

notmuch-emacs + a good maildir sync solution (like MBSync, OfflineIMAP etc) are far superior IMVHO than any feedreader/podcatcher.

</comment><comment><USER12> If the authors are reading.. I'm not one to suggest JS easily, but I found it a bit weird and unexpected that clicking through a single "category" was seamless, but selecting something on the left side it did a full page reload. Might be my slow connection right now that I noticed it so much, though.

<comment><USER8> It also hijacks space button. I usually use it to pgdn, but in FreshRSS it opens currently selected article. Please make the keyboard shortcuts configurable, especially if you are changing the standard ones.

<comment><USER13> Yes, this is my only problem with FreshRSS for the rest it is everything I want from a RSS reader. It's great!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I have had zero problems with Tiny Tiny RSS staying updated via Git. Love seeing people using RSS no matter what you prefer. The demo install did not seem as seem as smooth at Tiny Tiny RSS.

</comment><comment><USER15> I've been using this for about a month now, with the Firefox add-on for checking it on my desktop, and the FeedMe app for using it on Android.

Works well, I moved away from Tiny Tiny RSS to this and am pretty satisfied.

<comment><USER16> To save others trouble: [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.seazon.fee...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.seazon.feedme)

There's a fair amount of apps in the Play Store named "FeedMe".

<comment><USER17> Those permissions though... I'd rather use an RSS Reader that doesn't access my camera, look at my pictures, control my wifi, and look and my call information.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> This looks fantastic. Looking forward to giving this a go over Docker.

</comment><comment><USER19> Has anyone compared this to Selfoss? It uses a similar stack and I've been using it for a while with good results

</comment><comment><USER20> Great! Could you add a GitHub button to the top menu bar next to the RSS & Twitter buttons?</comment>


Ask HN: Building an Open Source Doctor - <AUTHOR> Hey HN,
My grandfather, who is in otherwise great health, recently got diagnosed with late stage cancer of the kidneys.
How feasible would it be to build an open source suite of diagnostic programs that people can use to build longer term, longitudinal health system?
The idea is that by building transparent, open source diagnostic models and looping it into a platform where you can track your health data, we could build a preventative system.
Am I being completely irrational, or missing something? <comment><USER2> Here are a few projects that bring nice ideas:

[https://hackaday.io/project/12352-low-field-mri- continued](https://hackaday.io/project/12352-low-field-mri-continued) by Peter Jansen

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADN9__zOmls](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADN9__zOmls) by Jean Rintoul

[https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeanrintoul](https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeanrintoul)

There are others also.

</comment><comment><USER3> The hardware is the hard part, though I expect things to change over the next decade. Image devices will become better and cheap, blood and microbiome sensing will improve.

The barrier is getting the input data for software, ML / AI is not perfect, health rules and FDA.</comment>


Come to the Silicon Valley Google Wave Discussion lunch today (5/31) - <AUTHOR> http://www.socializr.com/event/976099347 Come, Bring a Friend and let's discuss Google Wave over lunch.
Please use the following link: http://www.socializr.com/event/976099347 to RSVP.
Feel free to forward to anyone who might be interested. <comment><AUTHOR> Come, Bring a Friend and let's discuss Google Wave over lunch.

Please use the following link: <http://www.socializr.com/event/976099347> to RSVP.

Feel free to forward to anyone who might be interested.</comment>


Idea: anonymous salary data - <AUTHOR>

Set up a simple web site where people can enter their job title, location and salary.  Totally anonymous plus all data from the survey is made public.   To get salary data you'd have to give your own salary information.<p>Why is salary data so hard to find? <comment><USER2> Could people spam it with inflated salaries in hopes of being able to point to it as an argument for getting a raise? :) ("All the other software engineers in this city are making $15k more than I am, mang!!")

</comment><comment><USER3> I'd question the accuracy of data gathered that way: people inflate how much they make.

Allowing people to submit that information anonymously only compounds the problem.

<comment><USER4> I'd also be concerned about how 'anonymous' the data is. As you all know, they can tie any submissions back to an IP address or back to meddlesome cookies.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> <http://salaryscout.com/>

<comment><USER6> I was just about to type that one in. Here's the techcrunch coverage- [http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/11/20/salaryscout-simple- soci...](http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/11/20/salaryscout-simple-social- salary-comparison/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The spam has historically been a problem with this but how about an OCR capable component where the contributor is able to upload a picture of their check (not available to the public) thereby becominge 'confirmed'. That might keep out the riff raff enough to get good results.

</comment><comment><USER8> Blog: IT salaries hit the ceiling : (this is for New Zealand)

[http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objec...](http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10468986)

</comment><comment><USER9> check out payscale.com

</comment><comment><USER10> How would this be different than salary.com?

<comment><USER11> Salary.com does not return results for a lot of queries for one.

<comment><USER10> What problem are you trying to solve? What is the need for "a lot of queries"?

Just curious. This seems like a good(ish) idea, but also one that is not as easy as it sounds. There are no ISO standards for titles, so something like "VP of Business Development" can mean wildly different things from person to person, or company to company.

You would have to (IMO) do a lot to standardize the input options and verify the data to make it really useful.

<comment><USER12> Well instead of job titles, have it based on other parameters. Example: Degree, College graduated from, years in field, field, area

Then you can do all sorts of fancy stuff (income vs. location; true after-tax income; ratio of income vs. COLA)

Then you could monetize it quickly by linking to off-site job postings, creating your own job board, offering banking opportunities.

yep, gonna file that one away in my idea book.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Blindsight: Some people who have lost their vision find a "second sight" - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150925-blindsight-the-strangest-form-of-consciousness <comment><USER2> The hard SF novel _Blindsight_ , by Peter Watts, is an excellent and extremely interesting exploration of this idea and its ramifications.

<comment><USER3> Not just this idea, almost every question of consciousness/intelligence/self awareness is approached in some form or another, from different angles.

I could go on about it, but I'll just say it's the best SF I've read in a long while.

<comment><USER4> I love it too. Conscious self-awareness is arguably not very useful. It pretends to be in control, but mostly it's just observing what the mind has already done, and makes up stuff to rationalize it. At best, that's merely superfluous. But at worst, consciousness gets in the way, and generates counterproductive emotional states. But fortunately, ones mind can trick its consciousness into being useful :)

<comment><USER5> Worth trying to differentiate between "consciousness", which I think it's obvious cats and many other animals have, and the human "voice inside your head" / narrative self, which is much more a tower of babel built on symbolic cards, which is a very recent human invention, and arguably that moreso than "consciousness" is what can cause us so much harm.

<comment><USER4> That's a good point. I was thinking of narrative self. And I am conscious of my narrative self, so they're distinct. So arguably they're all levels in a self-referential stack.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> If you look at the visual system[1] the signal passes through many preliminary nodes before it reaches the back of the brain aka the visual cortex (which is responsible for the conscious visual field, i.e. "seeing").

For example, one of these preliminary nodes is the _Superior colliculus_ , which is part of the 'midbrain'[2]:

 _> The general function of the tectal system is to direct behavioral responses toward specific points in egocentric ("body-centered") space. Each layer of the tectum contains a topographic map of the surrounding world in retinotopic coordinates, and activation of neurons at a particular point in the map evokes a response directed toward the corresponding point in space. [...]_

 _> Even in primates, however, the tectum is also involved in generating spatially directed head turns, arm-reaching movements, shifts in attention that do not involve any overt movements. [...]_

 _> Thus, cats with major damage to the visual cortex cannot recognize objects, but may still be able to follow and orient toward moving stimuli, although more slowly than usual._

That is just one of the preliminary areas. The SC is part of the brainstem. People think of the brainstem as just controlling essential functions like breathing, but it's also capable of more complex motor function.

[1]: [https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7e/Gray722-...](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7e/Gray722-svg.svg) [2]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superior_colliculus#Function](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superior_colliculus#Function)

<comment><USER7> I studied blindsight in grad school, and actually analyzed the data of patient GY, probably the most widely-studied blindsight patient.

I forget the authors, but there was an anatomical paper showing that blindsight requires all the secondary connections in order to happen.

So, everything from the retina synapses onto the thalamus first, and then 97+% goes on to the primary visual cortex. The last few percent go to areas like the SC, the frontal eye field, and V5/MT. This paper showed that if the damage was _prior_ to, or including the thalamus, no blindsight was ever shown, but if the damage was between the thalamus and V1, or involving V1 itself, blindsight was possible.

The real question still is, why are these minor regions capable of supporting tasks, but not experience?

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I would not expect the part of a brain that deals with self-awareness is all- pervading and all-entwined. I would expect that you could disconnect cognition from self-awareness. Apparently we don't even need a self to _synchronize emotions_! That is a fantastic find!

I also think we can see a huge bias about some of our theories of what human beings are: Many emphasize the self; a self-aware brain can become self- obsessed. Many societies are obsessed with selves. Clearly human beings are more and less. Decentralized. A plurality of cognitions embodied in one brain.

What is the implication for sociology? Has the emphasis on individuals been too strong? The human fabric is ensembles interacting with each other, not atoms. Models of rationality talk about discrete agents. What if we can't be modeled as discrete agents? What is rationality now? Processes in my brain have competing interests, but also cooperate. Cognitive processes are probably not discrete. Can one come up with a model of rationality where the 'agents' form a continuum?

<comment><USER9> There is a study that made the rounds back in 2008 where scientists claimed they could prove that people's brains make decisions about 7-10 seconds before they consciously "decide," suggesting that cognitive thought is really just rationalizing decisions that our brain already made for us. blah blah free will we're all turing machines, no but it's interesting stuff

[http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080411/full/news.2008.751.ht...](http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080411/full/news.2008.751.html)

<comment><USER7> My old labmate works with them as a post-doc now.

I would argue that most of what we do is automatic, and we are quite good at post-facto rationalizing our decisions.

BUT, I would also argue that consciousness allows us to make fully-conscious decisions, so we are not 100% automatic.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> _" Just how many of our decisions occur out of our awareness, even when we have the illusion of control? And if the conscious mind is not needed to direct our actions, then what is its purpose? Why did we evolve this vivid internal life, if we are almost "zombies" acting without awareness?"_

Slow thinking vs fast thinking?

<comment> norea-armozel IMO, conscious thought is the result of being a social animal. Keeping up with social relations is simple but when it comes to one-on-one situations you have to drop everything and focus. Such focus has the side effect of allowing us to reflect on ourselves (how we function, why we exist, etc). So, instead of assuming why we're conscious at all, maybe it's better to ask why socializing requires so much focus? Just a wild idea, I know.

<comment><USER11> I think you mixed up the complexity and cognitive demand of many to many and one on one relations, in the second sentence. You present an intriguing idea, anyway.

<comment> norea-armozel No, think about it. Handling a group of people as a society is easier to handle in the background since it's more about who you know not what you know about them in precise form. In a one-on-one setting you're responding to continually changing behaviors of that person (day-to-day life changes like mood, health, and so forth). In that situation you have to put all your effort to focus on them. It's why some people are better at picking up those cues than others (personal example for me would be not picking up on when someone is feeling ill or down about something). The more you get personal with someone the more you have to get to know them, basically.

<comment><USER11> Counterpoint: the more personally involved you become with someone, the more you are expected to devote your attention because it's getting easier as the number of participants in the social interaction decreases.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I've personally experienced this decoupling of vision and second sight. When I've had bad migraines in the past, I typically experience scintillating scotoma, which isn't that unusual.

But the odd thing is: even though I can visually "see" certain objects, I don't feel like I'm observing them. For example, I can look directly at text on my screen, but have a difficult time reading the text. It's quite an odd experience.

</comment><comment><USER13> Reminds me of Julian Jaynes' ideas: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicameralism_(psychology)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicameralism_\(psychology\)) (And if I remember correctly, the original study is referenced in his book)

<comment><USER14> It's referenced in Echopraxia, but only to explicitly state that the Bicameral Brotherhood isn't named for that study. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Advertisers use what is known as the Low Attention Processing Model.[1] With this particular advertising strategy, brand information, and even an emotional attachment to a brand, can be 'acquired' at low and even zero attention levels using implicit learning.[2] Implicit learning cannot analyse or re-interpret anything. The information goes directly to the subconscious mind.

Depending on the message, this can be positive or detrimental to our well- being, and it puts into question how much free-agency we are really exercising in our lives. The fact we are silently influenced by ambient images and messages around us was the inspiration for these posters I designed: [http://zenpusher.com](http://zenpusher.com)

Basically, if anyone is going to advertise to my subconscious mind, it's going to be me. And I'd rather acquire positive habits and character traits than an emotional connection to a product.

[1] [http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPag...](http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=364813&fileId=S0021849905050282)

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

<comment><USER16> Well done. This could be a sub-genre across all media formats: intentional supraliminal messages overlaid on carrier media.

Silly example: a paid subscription service to insert contextualiy appropriate supraliminal images into online articles, with revenue split between the article publisher and the image creator.

<comment><USER17> You might enjoy reading [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Space_Merchants](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Space_Merchants)</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What do you do to achieve your financial independence/early retirement? - <AUTHOR> As US citizen, do you invest in 401(k) plan? Do you do any additional stocks or funds investing on your own (Vanguard, Fidelity)? How do you choose stocks or funds you are going to invest in?<p>How about European citizens, do you do any additional investing to achieve financial independence earlier than your country's pension scheme predicts? I have a feeling that phrases like financial independence and early retirement don't really apply for Europe, because most countries have pension scheme and citizens don't need to worry about it. The downside is that you can't really affect the amount and the time you are going to retire. Did you accept that or do you do any additional investing? Where do you invest? <comment><USER2> I'm EU citizen, experienced two different attempts to `pension schemes` in two EU countries. I believe no scheme in EU will lead to anything more than to equal benefit that will fill peoples stomachs and maybe provide shelter; and only those who took care and saved/invested independently will get good living. Have not been to US but as far as I understand pension schemes are not ran by the country (please correct me here if I'm wrong) so there is some sort of competition between pension scheme providers. And this is very different from situation here in EU where government is `taking care` of it and you don't really have a choice - so quality of service cannot be compared to what you get in US (these are two very different systems with different aims and end goals).

<comment><USER3> Most companies in US don't offer pensions anymore. They will match about 50% up to about 3% to your 401k which is a a tax deferred retirement account. I would say dump as much as you can into 401k especially up to the match. I wouldn't risk more than 10-20% total on anything speculative(Single stocks, real estate, businesses) And most of the time you will wish you just left it in your 401k.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Pension funds invests in patent trolls:

[http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2011/0808/features-nathan- myhrv...](http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2011/0808/features-nathan-myhrvold- intellectual-ventures-trolling-suckers.html)

"Myhrvold even managed to raise money from the pension fund set up by the World Bank for its employees."

</comment><comment><USER5> Maximize your 401K, IRA.

Keep less than 10% of your net worth in stocks, commodities(i.e. gold) or mutual funds.

Don't count on anything like a pension in the US and hone your lifestyle to fit your preferences and financial resources.</comment>


US charges 2 Chinese citizens with hacking [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.usatoday.com/videos/news/politics/2018/12/20/us-charges-2-chinese-citizens-hacking/38774449/ <comment><AUTHOR> Is it telling that USA Today puts this under "politics"?</comment>


Ask HN: How do you cope up with mental harassment at work? - <AUTHOR> Workplaces, be it big firms or startups, have become toxic environments where many are mentally harassed by a few. How do you cope up with mental harassment at work? Quitting? Complaint to HR? Legal help? <comment><USER2> It is done to force you to quit so they don't have to pay unemployment. I had it done to me and I complained and they kept writing me up for stuff I never did to fire me. It drove me to a mental hospital and short term disability. The state sided with me because on days I missed work they wrote me up at work for doing all kinds of things.

Talk to a lawyer, document record the harassment. Maybe you can fight them in court for harm done to you.

</comment><comment><USER3> Had to deal with this once. Very corporate environment. Based on my experience:

1\. Talk to good lawyer on the topic. I waited too long to do this but it was the best thing I did.

2\. Take detailed notes about any incidents. That was advice from the lawyer.

3\. Look for a new job. (I was already looking.) Lawyer advised me not to quit. I didn't but I would weigh any decision against your mental well-being.

4\. Don't talk to HR at least not without legal guidance. This was the first thing I did and it was a mistake.

It's probably also worth looking into medical counseling if it's taking a toll on your health.

I'm sorry you're going through this. Best of luck.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for your kind words. I'm trying to find legal help online that can help me.

I'm also planning to go to a psychologist.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I have faced this a few times. Firstly I would say who is causing harassment. If its a colleague in your team then maybe a conversation with your manager can have a positive effect. If its your manager then try getting in touch with their manager and explain the situation. If its higher up the chain, director, cto/ceo level, people that can't be fired or disciplined easily then I'd say just give up and find new job. Your mental health and well being are more important.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's my direct manager (who is director/c-suite level) and certain team members close to him. I have tried talking but he stopped my growth!

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> What are some examples of mental harassment? Snarky comments on codereviews?

<comment><AUTHOR> Snarky comments, especially in public only to me and a colleague who does similar work. Stopping growth by changing nomination to a leadership devp program at work. Forcing me to complaint about the same colleague to get rid that colleague.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I faced this once - i prioritized my health over the job, and quit immediately. Needless to say, it was a very bad experience. Zero professionalism. I paid them to get rid of notice and left immediately.</comment>


Arduino-based, urban aquaponics in Oakland - <AUTHOR> http://faircompanies.com/videos/view/internet-food-arduino-based-urban-aquaponics-in-oakland/ <comment><USER2> If I understand correctly, this 'aquaponics' solution:

* does not require arable land, because the plants grow on containers filled with stones through which water constantly circulates;

* uses _an order of magnitude less_ water than traditional agriculture, because the water is constantly recycled back from a nearby fish tank, and because the rock layer prevents water from evaporating;

* allows plant density (i.e., number of plants per unit of area) _an order of magnitude_ greater than traditional agriculture, because plant roots don't have to work as hard to find nutrients, so they grow straight down;

* does not attract traditional bug pests or weeds, because there is no wet soil to attract them;

* makes plants grow much faster, because they're getting a constant supply of nutrients fed through the water recycling system; and

* is also an inexpensive fish-farming solution!

Unless I'm missing something big, this solution looks BRILLIANT to me. All it needs now is for a talented entrepreneur to come in, find an early-adopter market for it, and turn the technology into a _standardized product_ that can be sold at scale.

<comment><USER3> Indeed, the economics of hydroponics would suggest that it should already dominate commercial vegetable production. The main reason they're not, is because municipalities greatly undervalue water, and because agriculture is so highly subsidized and so it's hard for hydroponics to compete.

1\. Underselling water

Municipal water prices set by local government greatly undervalue the actual rarity of water. With so many aquifers running out, and rivers stretched to the max, especially in the west, I'm surprised there could be this much myopia on an issue that is clearly far more serious and immediate issue than energy. Right now the only pressure to reduce water use seems to be on consumers (watering policies, low-water use appliances), but they only use 11% of it.

2\. Subsidized agriculture.

This is a more well known issue so I don't think I need to repeat it here.

<comment><USER4> The real question is whether aquaponics can create higher quality food than organic produce, which is not subsidized. Subsidies are also unsustainable in the long run. The major costs in aquaponics are in the technology, which will inevitably get cheaper. If aquaponic agriculture truly represents an order of magnitude improvement in water use and space use, and can produce better food, it's only a matter of time before not even subsidies can keep traditional agriculture economically sustainable.

This is just what I needed to see after the front page of HN was dominated by bullshit about Surface and iPad mini. Finally, technology used to make something other than toys for bored rich people.

<comment><USER3> Yes, hydroponics produces the best possible quality food that can be made. Being a closed system, it also doesn't require pesticides so it's essentially organic anyhow.

You are correct that Organic produce is the obvious immediate competitor. I wonder if hydroponically grown good can be labeled as organic. it could certainly come with no label at all.

As to whether there's a marketing benefit to actually being labeled as hydroponically grown, I've no idea.

As for subsidies, I assume that Organic food takes advantage of all of the same subsidies as non-organically grown food.

<comment><USER3> I wonder if it would be smart to labeled it "Organic Hydroponically grown" or "Hydroponically Grown Organic" or something similar

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> You can find more info about Aquaponics here

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYR9s6chrI0>

<http://www.aquaponics.net.au/forum/>

<http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum/>

Murray Halams DVD's are a great resource for beginners, though his systems can be improved. <http://www.aquaponics.net.au/product/prod105.htm>

This DVD tracks an Aquaponics system that was installed over a period of 1 year <http://www.aquaponics.net.au/product/prod158.htm>

Unlike hydroponics this being an almost closed system makes it more efficient. You can use solar panels to run the motors.

But this system requires one to check the ph and ammonia levels of the water daily and maintain the balance of the system.

<comment><USER6> Well, it's a closed system expect for the sunlight, which is arguably the most important component of any agricultural system.

<comment><USER7> You still have to feed the fish, so it's not really closed. But it is reasonably self-contained in combination with using vegetable waste to breed fly larvae which go on to feed the fish.

The difficult thing about aquaponics is the cyclomatic complexity (to use a software term). Basically everything feeds into everything else. At first you might think that the system is in balance, but in fact it rarely is. Plants and fish will be added and removed regularly, each agent having different nutritional needs at different stages in their lifecycle. Disease or infestation of plants or animals can be difficult to deal with, as any pesticide or herbicide will cycle through the complete system. There simply aren't any cheap off-the-shelf sensors to monitor things you care about, so you need to do regular physical checks with chemical kits.

Aquaponics is a fun, but very hard, problem to solve correctly. You can learn a lot from it, and it is a great system for people who like to learn a bit about everything.

<comment><USER8> Allow me to nitpick about physical checks with _chemical_ kits-- I'm sure we can build a sensor for that. The potential problem I see, however, is that by the time you detect a dangerous chemical change, it's too late. Visual inspection is still important (to see that Nemo's gimpy fin is caused by an infection rather than a birth defect) until we figure out AI enough to detect certain kinds of things.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> There is a swiss startup doing this on a larger scale: <http://urbanfarmers.ch/>

They have a container farm in a box (<http://urbanfarmersbox.ch/flyer/UFB_EN.pdf>).

Sadly their Crowdfunding Initiative – Globe didn't get funded: <http://www.indiegogo.com/HEDRON>

However they are in the process if building a large roof top version in Basel: <https://www.facebook.com/UrbanFarmers>

</comment><comment><USER10> I know this guy. I competed with him at a hackathon two months ago. He built of automated power tracking tools to tell you your power usage and would turn off lights and things. Took home second place. I ended up winning with my solar subsidy ipad calculator (told if you could save money in your local area if you bought an electric car and install solar panels in your home over gasoline and unsubsidized power). Was fun as hell. Pounded out a lot of code over a few beers on a weekend.

</comment><comment><USER11> That is quite an awesome system ! I wonder how efficient this is. But it tackles the toxicity issue that exists with usual hydroponics systems.

Here is another implementation :

[http://faircompanies.com/videos/view/backyard-aquaponics- diy...](http://faircompanies.com/videos/view/backyard-aquaponics-diy-system- to-raise-fish-with-veggies/)

<comment><USER12> What toxicity issues exist with hydroponics? I know nothing about growing plants.

<comment><USER11> When you grow plants with no soil (only neutral substrate such as clay or gravel), it is necessary to provide extra nutrients (esp. nitrates) that are hard to dispose properly. In the case of vegetables or edible plants, it is also necessary to "rinse" the system by running only water through eat before it's ready for consumption. (Disclaimer : I'm not a hydroponics specialist.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> This might be a controversial thing to say here, but I think that clandestine marijuana farmers are really heavily pushing the limits of urban agriculture.

The things you're working for when growing pot:

1) A minimal energy footprint. A giant power bill is a dead giveaway that you're running grow lamps

2) Maximum plant density -- lots of plants close together is good for both absorbing light and using space. More plants = more money.

Obviously that isn't what this person is growing, but I find pot growers to be an interesting bunch. They're ag-hackers, and they seem to be really good at it, and really good at trading information about it.

<comment><USER14> Hydroponics is a great space for hackers, never realized how much I would enjoy growing veggies, legal or otherwise.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> It's super cool but spoiler alert: just youtube aquaponics, it's not new (thank's reddit). People have been doing it even commercially for over a decade. That said I think what he says about future generations learning and getting excited about farming techniques is important and it's a really awesome concept.

I'd be lying if I said that I didn't think about building one of these after first learning about it! Also thinking how to maximize produce per/sqft/unit etc..

<comment><USER16> I think access to cheap, small and powerful computers would probably improve and it make it turnkey. My guess is it is pretty complicated to get all the factors right. Figuring out things like why are my fish dying, why is there a disease in my lettuce, etc., can get complicated.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> To build smart agriculture systems I think more needs to be known about the food chain. If you had a large inventory of the inputs and outputs for each organism then it would be possible to design miniature ecosystems which work cooperatively and minimize waste - like the fish and plants idea - while also producing whatever type of produce you want.

<comment><USER18> Yeah, that's the basic idea behind both permaculture and aquaponics: Build a tiny ecosystem that can sustain itself with as little input as possible (and like all agriculture, obviously with useful output like food as well).

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Very interesting stuff. Got interested in permaculture a couple years ago, and this seems a great complement in many ways.

Obviously much more sustainable than how most people get their food. I wonder what the energy & water requirements for this sort of system are.

</comment><comment><USER20> _The land in West Oakland where Eric Maundu is trying to farm is covered with freeways, roads, light rail and parking lots so there's not much arable land and the soil is contaminated._

There is no light rail in Oakland. BART is heavy rail.

<comment><USER21> I also assumed systems like BART were considered "light rail". Below is a definition for others who may also not know the difference.

The American Public Transit Association defines light rail and heavy rail respectively as follows:

Light Rail is a mode of transit service (also called streetcar, tramway, or trolley) operating passenger rail cars singly (or in short, usually two-car or three-car, trains) on fixed rails in right-of-way that is often separated from other traffic for part or much of the way. Light rail vehicles are typically driven electrically with power being drawn from an overhead electric line via a trolley or a pantograph; driven by an operator on board the vehicle; and may have either high platform loading or low level boarding using steps.

Heavy Rail is a mode of transit service (also called metro, subway, rapid transit, or rapid rail) operating on an electric railway with the capacity for a heavy volume of traffic. It is characterized by high speed and rapid acceleration passenger rail cars operating singly or in multi-car trains on fixed rails; separate rights-of-way from which all other vehicular and foot traffic are excluded; sophisticated signaling, and high platform loading.

Reference: <http://metro-cincinnati.org/?p=1566>

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I really enjoy seeing how the simplicity and power of Arduino empower people. Also how objects become an active medium instead of becoming a consumed things.

<comment><USER23> On the other hand it would seem that this guy would have been empowered even without arduino. In the video he mentioned he has a background in robotics.

<comment><USER22> True but in general the Arduino community is very lowering the bar for these kind of things.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I'm very curious to see how this kind of thing scales. I've yet to see what I think are truly sustainable plans for vertical farming but I'm hoping they come soon.</comment>


The Missing Ethics of Mining (2013) - <AUTHOR> https://www.ethicsandinternationalaffairs.org/2013/the-missing-ethics-of-mining-full-text/ <comment><AUTHOR> This essay has high signal/noise ratio. There's a lot to grok and each paragraph tells something new. It's a bird's eye view on modern mining practices. I highly recommend you to read it.</comment>


Intel Optane DC Persistent Memory Operating Modes Explained - <AUTHOR> https://itpeernetwork.intel.com/intel-optane-dc-persistent-memory-operating-modes/ <comment><USER2> My question is why does it become volitile in memory mode? Is there some different way of writing the data?

<comment><USER3> Since the module has both RAM and Optane storage on it, and only the Optane storage is non-volatile, all memory writes would have to be written to the Optane storage instead of the RAM before they could be treated as complete. This would probably be significantly slower and would somewhat restrict how cleverly the device could manage the RAM/Optane resources. (For example, with the current architecture, if a memory region is being repeatedly rewritten, it can just keep it on the RAM and not touch the backing Optane storage.)

It's also unlikely that this feature would be deemed useful given that they already provide the App Direct interface; for a server (which appears to be the intended market), if you've removed power from the memory, you're probably intentionally rebooting the server and would prefer that it reboot cleanly rather than have the random contents of the previous boot in memory.</comment></comment>


Is US prudishness ruining the internet? - <AUTHOR> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/09/12/international_censorship/

<comment><USER2> This is a pretty weak complaint.

What it comes down to is the observation that certain very large US companies (Google, Facebook) believe "no boobs" and "no drugs" policies are best for their bottom line. They've made the guess that fewer people will leave over "not being able to show boobs" than will leave over "getting spammed by boobs". So they enforce the policy they think will make them rich.

If you think they've made a mistake, go get rich by making a website with a different policy, and quit whining about how prudish Americans are ruining the internet.

<comment><USER3> I think you're not seeing the mechanics of tyranny of the majority. US companies can reach scale because of the wealth of the market and its relative cultural and linguistic homogeneity. Non-US companies find it very hard to compete against those economies of scale. Meanwhile, US companies inherit the mores of their native culture, the obsessions of their elites, and not to mention the practical implication of laws for content hosted in and served to the US.

<comment><USER4> Nonsense. If the only Jew in Buenos Aires can't find a kosher deli, that is not 'Tyranny of the Majority.' Tyranny of the Majority is when a majority actively pursues legislation that is harmful or marginalizing to a minority. If a Jew in 1938 Berlin can't find a kosher deli because the Nazi government outlawed them, then that is Tyranny of the Majority. The situation you describe is just a market difficulty.

Not being able to post topless photos of oneself on Facebook is hardly oppression.

<comment><USER5> _Not being able to post topless photos of oneself on Facebook is hardly oppression._

It is a arguably a matter of degree, not kind.

<comment><USER4> I disagree. Oppression is a loaded term. At he very least it implies a certain unreasonableness. For example it is not unreasonable to expect me, when visiting Italy for example, to realize that certain hand signs are offensive and to avoid them. In the same way, it is not unreasonable to expect that Europeans, when visiting an American website, understand that Americans have particular sensibilities and respect that. The fact that many Americans don't realize that this is a two way street makes them jerks. The fact that Americans are a majority on the Internet and most successful sites target them is an inconvenience to non-Americans. But none of this is oppression. To claim otherwise is melodrama and hyperbole at best.

Letting different website set their own rules about what is appropriate on their pages, is no more oppression than forcing to have to look at your ugly torso whenever we look you up on Facebook.

<comment><USER6> exactly. It is not oppression when I don't let you use MY printing press. It is oppression when I don't let you use YOUR printing press.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> No. Unless you define the internet as 'a certain few US-based sites'.

Facebook is not the internet. It is just one site. If facebook were based in Australia, they'd be following Australia's laws and morals more closely. And the same for any other country.

<comment><USER8> Um, what about those gambling companies which operated quite legally from Europe, yet whose executives were basically kidnapped by US authorities and tried for violating US law.

Apparently US laws governs the whole world, but everyone else's laws are only local?

<comment><USER9> " _basically kidnapped_ "???

More like "foolishly placed themselves in the jurisdiction of a country who's laws they were breaking". They had two choices if they wanted to avoid this: don't accept money from US citizens residing in the US or keep themselves out the reach of US law by staying outside of the US.

And do you really think the US has no legitimate interests in what non- citizens do with US citizens in other countries?

<comment><USER10> >And do you really think the US has no legitimate interests in what non- citizens do with US citizens in other countries?

I would say they don't, since it happens on another states soil.

<comment><USER9> To take an extreme example, if a non-citizen kills an American on foreign soil, America has _no_ interest in the matter?

I'm not implying they have the primary interest, just trying to ascertain if you think they have no legitimate interest.

ADDED: To take one iconic example, " _Perdicaris alive or Raisuli dead_ "....

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> don't worry, chinese prudishness will make this seem like the era of boobs.

<comment><USER12> And Islamic prudishness will make the chinese era seem like a cornucopia of smut

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> In New York, both women and men are allowed to be topless in public. Fewer women do it, but it's still legal. The fact that the market demands social sites to be the moral police on boobs is disappointing.

National boobs on facebook day anybody?

<comment><USER14> Same as in Portland, OR actually and at some college...like Reed you will see it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> yeah, I went on the Internet today and found it completely ruined. It was fine when I tucked it in last night.

</comment><comment><USER15> The web outside of Facebook and the like? I don't think so. It seems to me that the US have one of the more liberal laws with regard to that.

I'm also not sure whether stricter rules on Facebook and similar sites ruins anything. If you want to there are always ways to get nude pictures of yourself on the web. Use tumblr or Blogger or Flickr or whatever else.

</comment><comment><USER16> Isn't 4chan hosted in / run from the US?

<comment><USER9> Yes, or at least a traceroute of boards.4chan.org resulted in a destination of as29761.ae1-320.ar1.lax1.us.nlayer.net for me. One hop from dfw1 (Dallas/Fort Worth) got me to lax1 (Los Angeles) which according to their network map is their western most core node after the Bay Area.</comment></comment>


The Lava Lamps That Help Keep the Internet Secure - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1cUUfMeOijg <comment><USER2> I have a lava lamp on my desk. It generates a lot of heat. That wall must be pretty hot.

Here's the link to Lavarand the reporter references at the end: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavarand](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavarand)</comment>


Thoughts Around Leaving Facebook - <AUTHOR> https://wegnerdesign.com/blog/thoughts-around-leaving-facebook <comment><USER2> I deleted the app from my phone about 2 years ago, and since then have rarely looked at FB. If I did, it was because someone was being annoying and doing some kind of group coordination on a FB page instead of text or email.

I think I am at the point now where I'd feel comfortable deleting FB entirely. I think I might want to download some of the photos, but I'm not even sure about that either.

Back in my day, we had film cameras, and the fact that you only had a limited amount of film, you didn't snap pictures unless it was something you really wanted to remember. Ever since I got a digital camera, the number of photos I have grew exponentially, making it literally impossible to look through all of them. I imagine I have more photos than I have time in the rest of my life assuming I looked at each one for 5 seconds.

</comment><comment><USER3> People who talk about deleting their Facebook profiles are all talk and zero follow through.

The ones that are really going to delete their Facebook profiles have already done so.

I can't wait to buy more Facebook stock.

<comment><USER4> good for you little tiger</comment></comment>


Flow: Not All It's Cracked Up to Be - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/myplanet-musings/flow-not-all-its-cracked-up-to-be-459207631ed9#.ivgkjd5tc <comment><USER2> This article seems to be tearing down a straw-man. I don't see people arguing that you must be in a "flow" state 100% of the time, or suggesting that all time not spent in "flow" is useless. The argument, as I've seen it, is just that when you have the opportunity to get into a flow state, it's a Good Thing, and that one should try minimize distractions ( _cough_ open plan offices _cough_ ) that are likely to keep on from being able to achieve "flow" or sustain in for useful periods of time.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's the idolization of the flow state that I take issue with. Flow, as the article states, has advantages.

But the tech industry puts it on a pedestal, to the detriment of teams and active collaboration. It discourages discussion and communication for fear of disrupting a precious, fragile work-state; it makes those who don't get into that zone feel lesser-than and like they are failures; and it makes those that _do_ get into that zone chase it with single-minded zeal and drive themselves to exhaustion in the process.

To paraphrase another commenter from a different channel, the "fetishization of overwork" that comes with the constant, heady pursuit of flow is what I push back against. Flow itself is fine. The culture surrounding I find very problematic.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I suspect the author is pro-mob programming and pro-open office spaces. ;-)

<comment><AUTHOR> I am pro both of those things with options provided for alternate work solutions. I think mob programming and group work sessions have enormous benefits. I also think having quiet, alone work time is important for even the most social workers.

Similarly, I think open office spaces provide opportunities for group bonding and collective thought that simply aren't available when everyone silos in corners with doors closed and blinders on. But I also recognize the need for quiet time and uninterrupted spurts.

What I am against is a dogmatic adherence to "one right way" and the special status afforded to those who demand it, something I have seen with regularity in the tech sector.</comment></comment>


NYT graph of historical price of gas since 1920 - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/ref/us/20070524_REFINERY_GRAPHIC.html

<comment><USER2> This graph is in error. Historically the price of gas has been declining over the period shown, if actual inflation figures were used.

The NYT uses government provided CPI based inflation- and CPI is based in part on the price of gas, etc... and chronically under-reported... thus trying to represent the price of gas adjusting for "inflation" measured by the price of gas doesn't really work.

Real inflation-- which is defined as growth in the money supply- would show that the price of gas has declined strongly over this period-- primarily because of the effects of the "robber barrons" who drove down prices to gain market share, and because productivity has made gas a much safer and easier item to get from oil... though I expect in recent years the prices would be going up because of increased government regulation and asinine "environmental" requirements.

</comment><comment><USER3> The real question is why people complain about the rise in gas prices. Other prices rise and fall. Other goods are ruled by a semi evil few (diamonds, cuckoo clocks, etc.).

I think it's because the price is posted. That's all.

If the price of milk were posted on every street corner, the braindead megaphone of mainstream media would amplify the concern for milk prices.

<comment><USER4> The price of milk is a _result_ of inflation. The price of gas and oil are _drivers_ of inflation. Big difference.

<comment><USER3> Actually, inflation is caused by the increase in the money supply. While certainly goods derived from high energy usage will become more expensive as the cost of energy increases, that isn't the same as inflation.

Measures of the CPI that remove these derivative effects are better. They demonstrate the true responsibility of the fed, much more than a half measure of the cost of petroleum.

<comment><USER4> Fed responsibility matters - but what matters more to the average consumer is the actual dollar price of goods in relation to their incomes.

<comment><USER3> The average consumer couldn't tell you why productivity matters. Productivity happens to be the single greatest indicator of long term changes in wealth and standard of living. The lesson learned: don't pay attention to meaningless indicators just because the average consumer thinks they are important.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>