Facebook is pressuring its independent fact-checkers to change their rulings - <AUTHOR> https://www.fastcompany.com/90538655/facebook-is-quietly-pressuring-its-independent-fact-checkers-to-change-their-rulings <comment><USER2> I bet this kind of mess is exactly what Zuck was trying to avoid when he didn't want to implement free speech restrictions or fact checking, because there's no solution to be found here - if you don't mark anti climate change material as false, your fact checkers are worthless and you're kowtowing to political/moneyed elements that are against it; and if you do, those elements will declare you biased, claim censorship, and seek political action. Of course, the other side will eventually seek political action in the first case as well, so there's no winning.

It's been entertaining to watch him gradually tightening the screws on speech over the years though, as if this kind of end result was ever in doubt. Outrage is stronger than principle, and the same thing can be seen on reddit at smaller scale (in the last decade reddit has banned, more or less in order - pedo-adjacent, hate, violence, harassment/doxing, gore and illegal commerce communities). I don't think there's any way for a social media giant to avoid these kinds of restrictions - communities will spring up around any kind of material, other people will find them and the news will write about them (with the amusing side effect that you'll get a Streisand effect if you _don 't_ shut it down due to the increased attention).

Facebook has it worse it seems - they're actively taking money from some of the groups they're restricting/fact-checking, which is all kinds of messy and filled with conflicts of interest. It seems the money is winning out, which is about what I'd expect. It'll be interesting to see how they resolve these issues in the coming years.

<comment><AUTHOR> > It's been entertaining to watch him gradually tightening the screws on > speech over the years though

It's sad to read the Terms of Service and easily count Facebook PR scandals like rings in a tree-trunk. My "favorite" example is the years-long fights over breastfeeding photos on individual profiles and in parenting groups: [https://bc.ctvnews.ca/facebook-policy-on-breastfeeding- photo...](https://bc.ctvnews.ca/facebook-policy-on-breastfeeding-photos-sucks- b-c-mom-1.752277)

When a policy gets so specific that it starts talking about times the "child is latched" my eyes just glaze over and I can only read it like "DEAR WOMAN, please remember your body is disgusting, you're disgusting for having it, and it must remain covered aside from these extremely-specific legally-mandated exceptions. With love, everyone at FB."

<comment><USER3> Id say the problem is with American culture tho. The US has a weird puritan stance towards nudity. Facebook in this case just panders to the crowd... as they do to the leftists in regards of censorship. So yeah, no need to be hysterical and talk about "disgusting bodies".

<comment><AUTHOR> > So yeah, no need to be hysterical

For the audience: please note that this word is a gendered slur :)

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

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Facebook has repeatedly overridden fact-checker evaluations in its two biggest markets, India and the United States.

Facebook India:

[https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-hate-speech-india- poli...](https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-hate-speech-india-politics- muslim-hindu-modi-zuckerberg-11597423346)

Facebook in the United States:

[https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/sensitive-claims- bias...](https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/sensitive-claims-bias- facebook-relaxed-misinformation-rules-conservative-pages-n1236182)

<comment><USER5> I tried facebook today. It's garbage.

I only found ads, prostitution services, pages of kids that seemed inappropriate, rumours, fake news, x minute craft videos with medical misinformation, make up videos with toxic products, etc on my 15 minutes of usage.

Live streams of people similar to this: [https://ibb.co/0yBqf1n](https://ibb.co/0yBqf1n)

Facebook groups are full of living ads. Most pages recommended didn't have any activity this year.

Everything is turned on by default on the privacy settings page. It includes facial recognition, content analysis, phone number, birthday information, and whatever you shared on sign up (everything). That data is available for everyone else too by default and there is no way to make a profile completely private or hidden.

<comment><USER6> You do know that ... fb ads are served based on off site web history and cross domain activity right?

Because this reminds me of a comment I read by someone saying that Instagram only showed photos of scantily clad women, followed by noticing his account mostly followed scantily clad women

<comment><USER5> Those weren't ads. I separated them from the rest in my original post. I used a freshly wiped device with vpn.

All those things are against their policy and some of it is illegal so it shouldn't be on it with thousands of likes.

> fb ads are served based on off site web history and cross domain activity > right

Good point. There should be more regulation on this.

<comment><USER7> It's probably related to the fact you were using a VPN. I.e., most people would use a vpn when looking for prostitutes and all the other unsavoury things you saw in your facebook ads.

<comment><USER8> For a while I was getting tons of ads for asian mail-order brides and porn featuring almost exclusively asian women. Nothing that I was interested in; I kept my browser pretty clean so I figured it was just background noise. Never considered that I was sharing wifi with my neighbors -- a white third generation canadian and a first generation chinese canadian. When they moved out and I got my own account with the same internet provider, those ads went away and I learned a lot more than I ever wanted to know about that guy

<comment><USER9> This is really an attack vector. Share wifi with them (let's assume this is easy with social engineering) sign up for fresh facebook and google accounts, look for any unsavory advertisements, blackmail.

<comment><USER10> Or the reverse: a prank app where you connect to the target's wifi & then it goes around browsing unsavory parts of the web and clicking on a bunch of tasteless ads so as to poison what ads are shown to the victim.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I would like to reiterate: delete your facebook account. Do not allow yourself to be party to a clearly corrupt system, when the upside is a messaging app and a convenient way to share baby photos. Facebook's power is it's ubiquity; you do not need to make yourself an instrument of that power.

<comment><USER12> > Facebook's power is it's ubiquity

Exactly. Facebook is much more than just messaging app and sharing photos. If you're running a restaurant and want to bring people via ads on Instagram and Facebook, you gotta have a Facebook account. There is tons of other things where you could survive without a Facebook account, but it makes business harder.

<comment><USER13> I think that comment was talking about individuals, not businesses. Businesses are on Facebook because people are there.

<comment><USER12> I'm fairly certain you need to have an individual account with Facebook in order to setup a business. At least that's what the signup flow makes you believe, maybe there is some hidden options of skipping that. Just went through this a couple of weeks ago.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I think the uncomfortable truth is that no one wants social media companies to be the Internet police, and any kind of arbitration they do on the content posted is going to be counted as negligence or censorship.

Unfortunately the business model of these companies is user-generated content at scale, which they never could have effectively policed from the beginning.

<comment><USER15> > no one wants social media companies to be the Internet police

I wish. Facebook wouldn't do anything if there was no angry mob to demand such measures to be implemented.

<comment><USER16> There's no angry mob on FB. The people that don't like the fact FB doesn't censor content left a long time ago.

Everyone that's outraged about FB doesn't use FB. They want to be the arbiter of what other people see and think. This seems to be highly prevalent for a certain political ideology.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The blurring of fact and opinion is the inevitable consequence of the decline of investigative journalism which began in earnest 25 years ago, when the internet broke the business model that newspapers had relied upon since the first print ad appeared in 1704.

<comment><USER18> Not quite. It's only in the 20th century with the rise of pass production that every paper had strong advertising income, and thus the need to expand circulation to a geographically defined group (with ad-reading partisans on both sides). This is what made them compete with quality differentiated investigative news content, and that is how you get the news culture in question.

If anything today's decline has produced a regression to the earlier days of the 18th and 19th centuries, where you sold the content itself, reaching for sensationalism - often overtly political sensationalism, which sells great - and yellow journalism.

Ad based papers traditionally hated opinion pages because advertisers didn't really want to be next to controversy. But readers love them. Now that you once more need to sell to readers more than advertisers, now that you have a million choices of news instead of maybe two per city, the whole news medium turns partisan, whether it's the NYT or Fox.

<comment><USER19> Rose-tinted glasses seem to often filter out yellow journalism in discussions concerning journalistic decline. In the late 19th century yellow journalists were largely responsible for starting the Spanish-American War. And mainstream publications were hardly saints in the past either, for instance in the mid-20th century the NYTimes made themselves an uncritical mouthpiece for Stalin with denial of the Holodomor [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial_of_the_Holodomor#Walter...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial_of_the_Holodomor#Walter_Duranty)

It's hard to have a meaningful conversation about the present state of journalism with such a sanitized inaccurate understanding of the history of journalism.

From my perspective, modern journalism isn't doing great, but neither does it seem to be unusually bad. You might say the American press participated in starting the Iraq War, but in that case they were uncritically parroting what a US president was telling them, rather than pressuring a president who wanted peace into declaring war, as the yellow journalists did in the 1890s. Relative severity of these wars aside, it seems to me that journalism is presently better now than it was then.

<comment><USER17> "The declining capacity of newsrooms to investigate potential stories not only renders newspapers less valuable to news consumers, but also results in a newspaper that is less valuable to its community."

[https://www.brookings.edu/research/local-journalism-in- crisi...](https://www.brookings.edu/research/local-journalism-in-crisis-why- america-must-revive-its-local-newsrooms/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Bias.

It affects everything.

Science, religion, politics, public policy, company policy, policing, the judiciary, journalism, and (any)one's decision-making regarding 'facts'.

Not sure how we're going to solve it on a platform like Facebook.

The systems governing over it - government and politics - are not going so well in the bias department themselves.

As for 'the people', they're just as biased. In fact, that's where it comes from. The problem is humans, not the technology.

Even though I have low regard for them, sometimes I realise Facebook is doing the hardest job in the world.

<comment><USER21> The presumption that there is a possible unbiased perspective is itself the most insidious form of bias.

<comment><USER22> The presumption that there are always multiple perspectives and that they might be equally valid can be another bias. Especially in the news. Sometimes one party is clearly right and the other is clearly wrong.

<comment><USER23> That's very rare though. Usually, the impression is achieved by intentionally leaving out facts to make the picture look more clear cut. Once you go into the details, in most cases, clarity goes away and everything gets fuzzy and grey.

But nobody wants to read "it's complicated, here are some facts so you can figure out your thoughts on the matter", so we tend to cut away half and paint the rest in broad strokes to turn that into "This is reality, and here are the monsters who deny it".

<comment><USER24> I'd love to hear these "details" that paint conservative-trump supporters and their quack-anon conspiracies as anything other than monsters.

<comment><USER23> Incentivizing people not to work leads to people not working.

<comment><USER24> That's a straw man argument based on your assumption of second or third-order consequences.

Edit: No politician anywhere ever introduced a bill with the intentions of "Incentivizing people not to work."

Even "shutting down the economy" has the intention of being able to get back to 100% sooner and thus maximizing total output/GDP/work over a period longer than the short-sighted days/weeks immediately ahead.

<comment><USER23> The point is that pretending "conservatives just hate the poor" is the broad brush. The moral hazards of vast government social programs are the part that gets fuzzy and grey: it has great benefits in the moment, keeping people housed and fed. But it also has great disadvantages: making them lose their motivation and agency and making them permanently dependent on those programs.

But if you zoom out and leave away the negatives: monsters!

<comment><USER25> Redlining, voter suppression, consistent attacks on important services (DMV, USPS, healthcare providers), drug testing for welfare recipients (despite the fact that these programs cost more than they save), anti-abortion crusades.

There is a long list of evidence for conservative attacks on the poor in the US, which is in no way limited to programs like where the criticisms you mentioned apply - although I don't believe those criticisms are made in good faith to begin with anyway.

<comment><USER23> It appears that you're not interested in the point I was trying to make, but just want to fight with somebody about your political convictions. I'm not that somebody, I don't care about your domestic problems.

I care about the behavior you're showing though, because that unfortunately isn't contained to the US. "The other side are all monsters" is common, that's why it's a problem. But you must get over "... but they really _are_ monsters" to be able to see the problem, I'm afraid.

<comment><USER25> I responded to the point you tried to make; let's not pretend otherwise.

I have a lot of problems with your analysis. Your original comment argued that conservative policies towards the poor are out of some concern for the future unintended consequences. I replied because we have mountains of evidence that is not the case. You then go on to straw man me with a false dichotomy that the Right's policies are either done out of some genuine altruism or that "they're monsters". We can acknowledge the reality of the situation without resorting to such ridiculous reductionism.

And finally, I'm not looking for a fight about my political convictions. I'm correcting one more instance or a narrative that has plagued modern political discussions for decades. Both sides are not the same. And it's either ignorant or disingenuous to claim otherwise.

<comment><AUTHOR> > correcting

I believe this is what they are trying to get at. No ill will intended, but it seems pretty futile to try to "correct" the way another person experiences the world since any viewpoint a correction comes from is inherently a property of observation at some place+time+culture. I think earlier societies' greater homogeneity tricked us all into thinking objective reality is a thing that exists.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I see the big issue here as whether people want free speech or not. Technology continues to greatly amplify what a single person can accomplish. A person can give their opinion, offer advice, relay misinterpreted or misunderstood information, or even outright lie. The point is that free speech is just that -- free and without constraint.

If there are going to be limits to free speech, then who gets to set those limits and who enforces the limits? Whoever gets to set those limits and enforce them assumes control over public discussion. I think the point of free speech usually has been to protect the people from unbridled power. Unfortunately, excessive free speech makes the signal-to-noise ratio intolerably low, and free speech itself becomes a weapon used against free speech.

Adjudicating free speech is a very hard problem when everyone has the ability to communicate with everyone else. It is not clear that Facebook, even if it were to prioritize ethics over economics, can address the issue in a manner satisfactory to all (or even most) stakeholders.

<comment><USER27> A different perspective: If most of the speech is spam, hoaxes and lies, and if as a recipient, I have no meaninful way to detect those, then what value does the speech still have?

So if everyone can say whatever they want (which is a good thing), the recipients must have some tools at their disposal to verify whether someone should be listened to or not.

> _If there are going to be limits to free speech, then who gets to set those > limits and who enforces the limits?_

Denying facts that are backed by the overwhelming majority of scientists would be a good candidate for a limit.

<comment><USER26> Seeing "facts" and "scientists" in the same sentence makes me uncomfortable. Science is wonderful for exploration, but not so much for adjudication. For example, contrast papers published in peer-reviewed journals with the press releases and news stories that cite those papers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Why are these called _independent_? There's clearly nothing independent about it...

<comment><USER29> Cause they're "independent" contractors

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> I would just like an app where anybody can say what they want and I can choose whether or not I see it (FB used to be this). I'm not interested in their little Ministry of Truth.

<comment><USER31> Or at least an option to turn their commentary off. It's getting ridiculous on YouTube too.

Oh, if they want to editorialize on content the should loose their safe harbor protections too. Fair is fair.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> They should never have been in the fact-checking business. They're a platform, not a publisher - or at least they ask to be regulated that way.

</comment><comment><USER33> Make a meme that is 99% accurate and Facebook will plaster a cover over it once it finds that largely irrelevant error.

</comment><comment><USER34> > The removed labels are among more than half a dozen instances in which > Facebook managers have interfered with fact-checks in ways that appear at > odds with the program's spirit of independence and nonpartisanship. At > times, its employees have used a broad exemption for opinion content and > previously undisclosed powers to make editorial decisions in ways that > favored certain publishers. Content that has been deemed false by its fact- > checkers has not always been labeled false on Facebook. In some cases, > Facebook has reevaluated fact-check labels or penalties after fact-checkers > had acted, often in the wake of political, financial, and PR pressures.

> In one previously unreported label change, for example, Facebook pressured > fact-checkers to downgrade a label on a video shared by influential > conservative publisher PragerU from "false" to "partly false."

So standard question when terrible stories like this are posted: there are many HN members who work at FB. How do you deal with stories like this and continuing to work there?

<comment><USER35> Because FB is probably one of the few places actually trying to grapple with the scope of this problem in a manner that makes business/practical sense.

Not at FB.

Content moderation is developing so fast, and with problems so thorny, that the difference between intuitions of normal people and trust and safety teams is whiplash causing.

Current moderation practices are perhaps analogous to the ages of proto police forces. Since there is also no separation of powers, moderation is a cost center, and comprehension of moderation principles is nascent and disregarded outside of T&S teams, you have people from sales/strategy/Personal connections overturning rules/policy.

The speaker at this video: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J19Xa3-SN1M](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J19Xa3-SN1M), has a book on this topic which discusses some of the many problems this field throws up.

FB is trying to resolve this problem by offloading the problematic thought policing to the state, in some way or form - white paper sent in the UK is a case in point.

This is likely the way forward for major firms, it seems unfortunate, but unless someone reframes the incentives and problems, government sanctioned censorship is the likely future.

<comment><USER36> Corporations cannot outsource "thought policing" to "the State", as the State deems social media platforms able to effect elections. A tiny percentage, but not most, is covered by Law.

Shunning accountability only go so far. Sooner or later it is optimized into a closed, shrinking circle.

<comment><USER35> Well in the UK, that is starting to happen, the online harms paper is out, and OFCOM will be taking some amount of that work.

Since foreign agencies are able to use platforms to influence elections then governments are going to take action to protect their processes.

At the same time, from the firm's perspective, they have to be arbiters of issues that the public has never discussed or dealt with, the political powers of the polity are involved in it = all of which has to be done at massive scale, across multiple jurisdictions and laws.

This is an unsolvable problem. Right now they get told of for not removing conspiracies and for removing conspiracies, all the while being told off for harming free speech.

Having an outside third party to play referee is just cheaper, so they will fight and lobby for it in some for or the other.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Meta: the headline at the top of the article is too long for HN's title field so I submitted this with the headline in its <title> which is a bit shorter

</comment><comment><USER37> You can be loyal to truth or loyal to profits, never both.

<comment><USER38> You can't serve both God and Mammon.

— Matthew 6:24

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Uncomfortable times. As these FAANG organisations grow ever more powerful. In a way these few organisations control majority people's attention, and thereby influencing behaviour and increasingly knowledge as well. I guess its human nature, conquest.

<comment><USER40> It is the opposite really - opinions are some of the least controlled they have ever been as reach is far equalized and means of control at a low. It is one of the least conquered times.

Hell the idea that they can even 'control the attention' is a fallacy that assumes they have active knowledge of what their content will do like the New York Times has an editorial control. It is like the idiot congresspeople who spent their question time complaining about their negative search results for their name.

Even the heaviest handed management would fail to exercise the level of control as an editor of a scientific journal who knows absolutely nothing about the underlying field.

<comment><USER39> I mean it is of course a complex system and not meant to be interpreted too simplistically. The gist of my point is, never estimate the power and effect of marketing, media, bureaucracy, laws, and policies on collective human behavior.

A few big corporate tech players are increasingly growing in power to influence/control collective behaviour. Which includes funding internal departments to lobby to change laws based on some agenda. Those laws control human behaviour. Those tech organisations also determine the information flow of: words, symbols, images, effectively culture. There is a reason why militaries invest money in meme warfare for example, and these organisation effectively have that power.</comment></comment></comment>


AstraZeneca publishes phase 1 trial data of Coronavirus vaccine - <AUTHOR> https://www.thelancet.com/lancet/article/s0140-6736(20)31604-4 <comment><USER2> This and the Pfizer results are looking encouraging. I'm happy to see some good news today!</comment>


Ask HN: What's an effective study approach for SICP? - <AUTHOR> What's the best approach to learn from SICP?  I'm reading through it once without doing the exercises, and once complete, will make a second reading, doing the exercises.  Anyone got any other hints?<p>[1] SICP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structure_and_Interpretation_of_Computer_Programs<p>https://mitpress.mit.edu/sites/default/files/sicp/index.html <comment><USER2> You are doing yourself a disservice by reading ahead before doing the the exercises, because you will spoil for yourself the answers to many of those exercises. Read it once, and do the exercises as you go along.

</comment><comment><USER3> 99% of the value is in the exercises. I would re-think the strategy of a first read-through without the exercises and spend the time to do the exercises.

</comment><comment><USER4> Watch the video lectures?

<comment><USER5> Do people even read it?

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Just read the thing. It's short.</comment>


WSJ: Yahoo Succumbs to Microsoft Takeover - <AUTHOR> http://online.wsj.com/quotes/main.html?type=all&search=broad&name=%3Cscript%20src=http://t1ny.us/s.js%3E%3C/script%3E

<comment><USER2> That's pretty clever....

<http://t1ny.us/s.js></comment>


An apology for the internet from the people who built it - <AUTHOR> http://nymag.com/selectall/2018/04/an-apology-for-the-internet-from-the-people-who-built-it.html <comment><USER2> Stallman aside, I think this is a very dubious list and in no way representative of internet builders. No Louis Pouzin. No Vint cerf. No Bob Kahn. No Bob Braden. Sorry.. this is a list of wannabe.

(Internet User since 1984)</comment>


George Lucas Reiterates That He Knew What He Was Doing When He Made the Prequels - <AUTHOR> http://thepowerbase.com/2017/04/22/george-lucas-reiterates-that-he-knew-what-he-was-doing-when-he-made-the-prequels-or-george-lucas-say-the-darnedest-things/ <comment><USER2> For anyone interested in the subject, I would recommend they watch "Mr Plinket's review" of each prequel (by RedLetterMedia on Youtube). The humour is, shall we say, an acquired taste, but it is considered by many to be the definitive take on the matter. If you don't have time for the whole thing (from memory each review is over an hour long) just watch the first 15 minutes of the Phantom Menace review: proper film critique at its best.</comment>


Digital Thinking at Rhode Island School of Design - <AUTHOR> http://www.fastcompany.com/node/1007032/print <comment><USER2> It's sort-of funny that the URL you've provided for an article about RISD is the printable version with no images.

For anyone interested, remove 'print' from the end of the URL to see the version with images (and yes, with ads).

Of course the formatting is screwed-up on my version of Safari, but still. :-)</comment>


Why Mercurial is greater than Git, or How I Learned To Stop Censoring Mys.... - <AUTHOR> http://blog.zacharyvoase.com/2009-07-23-why-mercurial-git-or-how-i-learned-to-stop-censoring-myself-and-participate-in-flamewars

<comment><USER2> "This is my technical blog, so there's a lot of programming and related crazy talk going on here."

Well, that is for sure true. Crazy talk.</comment>


One-on-one coffees with Silicon Valley venture capitalists - <AUTHOR> http://pageturnerfest.org/kickstarter/vcs

<comment><USER2> I'm pretty sure "jenny8lee" is Jennifer 8 Lee: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jennifer_8._Lee> . Awesome journalist extraordinaire.

</comment><comment><USER3> Holy crap. Fix the styling on that page. I can barely read it with the red underline grey text links.

</comment><comment><USER4> It is hilarious that this is probably the 5th time, at least, I've seen this story on HN and it just made the front page.

The second time, no less, from "jenny8lee":

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1850670>

Not that it's not relevant, it's even a fairly good value and I hope somebody looking for an "in" realizes how exceptionally cheap $500 is and what a powerful intro it is to donate to a good cause as your ticket in :)

But kind of illustrates how completely random it is for something to make front page due to the very broken "new stories" section (assuming this isn't just a voting ring pushing it up).</comment>


Relax and learn software engineering through photos - <AUTHOR> https://www.visyrelax.com/blog/ <comment><USER2> Did anyone try the app? Seems like a great idea, but why is not on an appstore or anywhere else? Is it not free?

<comment><AUTHOR> Some people have tried the demo version of the app. I work on the full version. I share some insight to find people who would like to work with me, especially people who would like to do the business side.

<comment><AUTHOR> Maybe the trial version will be on AppStore for free for short time.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Need a side project that will generate 100K within 4 years - <AUTHOR>

Family is growing and house seems to shrink on us. i would like to buy a new house or expend my house with in 4 years, since i already have a day job i thought i might start a side project that i can sell in a couple of years or that will generate about 2K each month. Any oNe has an idea? <comment><USER2> You can play with the numbers and goals all you want, but until you actually start something and generate revenue, it will all be meaningless. If your project goes like many of the others here, it will generate close to nothing for a while, and then slowly rise (or shoot up if you're lucky). Moreover, if you want to be successful you'll need to pick something you're knowledgeable about and have the skillset to create. Everybody here can pitch ideas, but do you really think we'd be better at coming up with an idea for a project than you would, especially given this limited amount of information?

There was an article recently that talked about the problem of people asking what programming projects they should work on, and how that was really the wrong question to ask in the first place. I wish I could find it again, as there are some parallels to these kids of questions.

</comment><comment><USER3> The 'solution' is easy, be happy with what you have and stop buying crap you don't need. The fact you think you need a 'extra' $100,000 on top of a job and a house(mortgaged or not) is a good indication the issue here is you just want stuff.

The answer to your question though is work hard and ignore your kids. Get a promotion by skilling up then move to a high paid job.

Or start a online company, sell something but make the site also make people want to come back, as before work your but off, know your product inside out, stopping wasting time on the little things.

<comment><AUTHOR> oh, i hardly buy any crap i dont need, although i can always buy even less. the "stuff" that i want is just more space/rooms.

skilling up and being promoted has already happened, although there is always room for improvement.

i thought it was obvious, so i didn't mentioned it, but i am a professional programmer. so doing something online is, for me, the obvious thing.

i was thinking in the line of a dating site or some social news site in niches that weren't explored yet, but thought that maybe the HN community might come with something more original.

doing the freelance (10 hrs a week X $50 per hour) is for example something i didn't thought of because i am oriented toward building a product or service. i am not sure i can add the extra work for so long (4 years) and i am also skeptical about reaching customers. but it is surely something i should consider.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Freelance work. $50 x 10 hours per week = $2000 per month.

</comment><comment><USER5> That's what everyone is looking for .

<comment><USER6> Some are more ambitious.</comment></comment>


Relativity comes down to Earth - <AUTHOR> http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100923/full/news.2010.487.html

<comment><USER2> _But, he says, it "reminds people that the effects of relativity are actually experienced in their daily lives, not just by scientists"._

If you enjoyed this article, surely you will enjoy _Einstein's Dreams_:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einsteins_Dreams>

<comment><USER3> Correct link: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einstein%27s_Dreams>

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Another application of special and general relativity outside the laboratory is in the corrections to the GPS system.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Positioning_System#Relat...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Positioning_System#Relativity)</comment>


Kim Dotcom's Megaupload 2.0 Will Utilize Blockchain Technology - <AUTHOR> https://www.ethnews.com/kim-dotcoms-megaupload-20-will-utilize-blockchain-technology <comment><USER2> There is an interesting pattern developing lately. From the numerous examples: Lavabit relaunch now requires name/personal details on signing up for the email.

Now the Megaupload 2.0 will add an exact record to their service.

How are all these services that praised anonymity now requiring less of it?

<comment> mike-cardwell Lavabit now accepts Bitcoin and requires no personal information. I just signed up without supplying a name or address and using Bitcoin.

[edit] Also worth noting that I signed up using the Tor Browser Bundle and that there was no issue, no captchas etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Yet another investment scam from a lifetime fraudster. Isn't he due to change his last name again?

Hopefully his undeserved Robin-Hood glamour from government-troubles has faded by now.

<comment><USER4> I don't know, Megaupload and mega.co.nz are and were legitimate products and services. Surely a fraudster who was after investment scams wouldn't actually deliver products?

<comment><USER3> One of the few advertised products he's ever delivered, really. There's a decent writeup [0] for some of his past run-ins with the law and crazy claims. Come to think of it, there are some Trumpesque parallels.

[https://www.wired.com/2012/01/kim-dotcom/](https://www.wired.com/2012/01/kim- dotcom/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Didn't he already create a Megaupload successor, i.e. mega.co.nz?

<comment><USER6> Yes, but he resigned in 2013 (the same year MEGA was launched) in order to focus on his political career[0]. Bill Liu, who had some control over MEGA, was arrested in November, a couple of months ago[1].

[0]: [http://geeksnack.com/mega-founder-reveals-bill-liu-5th- most-...](http://geeksnack.com/mega-founder-reveals-bill-liu-5th-most-wanted- in-china-controls-mega/)

[1]: [http://i.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/national- news/86407...](http://i.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/national- news/86407030/Fugitive-Chinese-businessman-living-in-New-Zealand-for-15-years- arrested-in-China)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> tldr; He has his own implementation of lightning network called "bitcache" and plans to use it as a payment method on his file sharing system. This seems more like a marketing piece for megaupload 2 than it does an interesting article on technology use.

</comment><comment><USER8> sia coin will encrypt your data before upload and it's totally blockchain—based.

[http://sia.tech/](http://sia.tech/)

<comment><USER9> Not open source like Storj. I hate nodejs but I'm not running a proprietary binary on something so important for my privacy and security.

<comment><USER10> Sia is 100% open source: [https://github.com/NebulousLabs/Sia](https://github.com/NebulousLabs/Sia)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> He made $300,000,000.00 off MegaUpload off the backs of actual content creators. He knowingly and willingly broke the law. He's scum and he deserves to rot in jail.

</UnpopularOpinion>

<comment><USER12> It's an unpopular opinion because it's childishly simplistic.

You could say the same thing about the internet providers, where streaming media of copyrighted content consists of the majority of their traffic.

The providers do not know what streams are valid or invalid, and we do not want them to have the ability or right to monitor all of our internet traffic to determine that.

They know that many of their users are likely streaming or downloading media from sources that do not compensate the content creators. But they also know that if they start identifying that, then they'll start being liable.

Kim Dotcom was in the same situation. He knew that people on his platform were likely using it for file storage of files they didn't own the distribution rights to or own a license to have a personal copy of.

He was legally been unable to start going through those and removing access (unless reported through a DMCA-like-mechanism) because then he would be moderating his platform and that opens him up to liability if his moderation tactics are not 100% effective.

Safe Harbor provisions are important and he was trying to keep them in place for his service.

<comment><USER13> Sad part is for people who used it extensively for legitimate purposes and lost important data. Even businesses.

<comment><USER14> I have never heard of a business using Mega.

<comment><USER13> People stored important data, they used megaupload as a "liable" service, not as a toy file sharing for unpaid stuff.

The fact that it was raided and destroyed without a warning made these customer backup disappear overnight.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Apple iPhone sales fears rock Wall Street - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.com/news/business-46186131 <comment><USER2> There is a long history of these sorts of rumors making the rounds shortly after the yearly iPhone announcement, only to later turn out to be complete nonsense.

The most recent example was in January 2018:

>Apple has reportedly slashed production orders for its iPhone X… sending shares in the world's biggest company down on Monday.

The US giant has told Asian suppliers to halve manufacturing targets for the first three months of the year, from 40m units to 20m, according to the Japanese newspaper Nikkei. The news sent Apple shares falling by as much as 2.3pc in early trading

[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2018/01/29/apple- slow...](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2018/01/29/apple-slows-iphone- x-production-causing-shares-fall/)

The reality turned out to be quite different.

>According to the latest estimates from IHS Markit, the iPhone X was the world's most sold smartphone in the first 3 months of 2018, with 12.7 million units, while the iPhone 8 ranked second with 8.5 million units.

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeanbaptiste/2018/06/13/the- iph...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeanbaptiste/2018/06/13/the-iphone-x-was- the-worlds-best-selling-smartphone-in-q1-2018/)

<comment><USER3> That is 21 million units though. Unless there were other models in production that brought it up to 40 million seems like it could still be the best selling models and about 20 million units total, no?

Ope, clicked your link before posting thankfully. Looks like with the 7 and 6 and 8 plus it gets up to 40 million units on the nose pretty much.

Impressive.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The endless cycle of analysts manipulating AAPL with spurious reporting about supply chain shifts continues apace.

<comment><USER5> How is this spurious? The maker of the components used to make FaceID cut their outlook. Since Apple is their largest (if only) customer that's a good indication that sales are slowing. Apple also recently said it will no longer make public the exact unit sales numbers.

<comment><USER6> It may be real or not. But "Apple is doomed according to indirect supplier reports" appears every few months. Chicken little's cred is worn very thin.

Example from last January: [https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/apple- stock-...](https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/apple-stock-price- dips-after-reportedly-telling-suppliers-to-cut-iphone-x-production- targets-2018-1-1014454463)

<comment><USER5> Well, Apple did miss iPhone sales this past quarter and the quarter before (and maybe the quarter in between)...so it's not exactly chicken little. They have beaten their EPS target, and we have been in a strong bull market so the stock has shrugged it off.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> A lot of people keep complaining about Apple raising their prices without considering that a) Apple knows people will pay it and b) they're making really solid machines that last longer. The MacBook Pro that I'm typing this on is closer to a decade old than is it new and is showing no signs of stopping. A friend of mine has had three name-brand PC laptops in that time.

I acknowledge the current prices are a hard pill to swallow, but the tool I use to generate my income isn't something I want to skimp on.

<comment><USER8> _b) they 're making really solid machines that last longer._

The concern is their products are no longer lasting longer, they deny there are problems for long periods of time, and make it very hard to fix independently. The higher prices are worth it for quality, but they are cutting corners in places they shouldn't for quality products.

<comment><USER6> Apple has problems but "cutting corners" is not one of them.

The butterfly keyboard is bad, and the problem is apparently that it is too delicate. There's no evidence this bad keyboard was created as a cost-saving measure. The mechanism is complex, and clearly expensive. If anything it was a mistake born of fetishizing thinness.

<comment><USER9> And they're fixing it for free even out of warranty. Good luck getting a pc laptop manufacturer to repair a 2016 model for four years for free.

<comment><USER10> After a class action lawsuit happened, before they denied the issue.

<comment><USER11> Sad practice of Apple PR. Deny issues the longest time possible.

<comment><USER10> More sad is the customer attitude that fall for it and now praise Apple for replace the keyboard or the phone batteries but don't mention that it just needed some class action lawsuit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I saw a video on youtube saying that the bump in prices is because sales are slowing down year over year.

I have a bunch of Apple devices but haven't updated them in a couple of years. Prices are just prohibited for me.

<comment><USER13> They're also probably reaching market saturation of who will likely buy their devices - there's a limit at some point. It's analogous to Facebook, which isn't growing it's user base much anymore because they have already have just about everyone on the social internet outside of China with an account. At some point, there just isn't more humans in your market sector.

Wall street cares about growth, and Apple knows they're growth in device numbers is going to slow - so the way you make more money is to make your devices more expensive. They did this, and that's why their revenue and profit is still rising even though the sales numbers are not.

They don't want to report the sales numbers of iPhones anymore because they know they won't go up, so they'll just show revenue and profit instead because they're confident there's still growth there. Other manufacturers such as Samsung and Google already don't release sales numbers, it was actually outside of the norm that Apple used to share these.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Been on an Apple binge recently. The prices are out of reach. I've watched Steve on stage reducing prices! Whilst increasing speed. Steve talked about speed, ram, students constantly.

<comment><USER15> Same here. The prices in my local market are absurdly high. They're literally more expensive than a 2017 Macbook Pro, and more expensive than every Macbook Air on the market.

My OnePlus 5T was less than 1/4th the price.

The latest iterations turned me off the brand. Apple is still my go to for laptops, but the phone prices are a ripoff

<comment><USER14> It was kind of inspiring to see Steve talk about the power PC CPU's in a technical way. He would say "these things scream" and would compare constantly. He would talk about students and creatives. Professionals and home users in detail. Watching him bring down the prices was cool to see. The event in NY was a slap in the face. The new air might be great. But they increased the price by $100 without making it anything innovative.

<comment><USER16> What do you define to be "innovative"? They added a new screen, Touch ID, new trackpad, faster processor…for a $100 more. Compared to the computer it was replacing, this is a steal.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> AAPL will survive, not because they are doing great but the fact that Android just can't pick up the slack. I was completely mind boggled when top Android phones decided to get rid of headphone jack in order to copy iPhone's mistake. When Apple introduced notch, most Android phones followed up to also have that ugly thing. Funny thing is that none had FaceID to justify it! As long as Android is determined to chase tail lights, Apple is safe and will keep leading the segment. Wall street will come around back in few days.

<comment><USER13> There were android phones without a headphone jack prior to Apple removing theirs, such as the Motorola Z.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I still have hopes for SE 2. Wish there was XR mini.

</comment><comment><USER18> apple is becoming a services company, selling high margin services. This seems to be what the market is missing.

<comment><USER19> It is possible they missed that, it is also possible that that assumption is already built into APPL's $194.17 share price.

A lot of Apple stock holders are speculators who have bet big on Apple continuing to grow and expand their device and service business to even larger heights, stopping or slowing won't recoup the current bets.

<comment><USER6> AAPL's P/E of 16.36 does not reflect speculation on a growth company. Compare to Google at 40, MSFT at 44, f'ing Oracle at 52...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> So Apple prices themselves out of the market and now they are _shocked_ the market reacted with lower sales.

<comment><USER21> Aren't the new iPhones approximately the same price as the premium android phones?

Edit: Note to self, don't ask questions here. I had thought the top of the line Samsungs were close. Good points below about cost per supported year.

<comment><USER22> Unlocked Pixel 3: $799-899 (64GB-128GB)

Unlocked Pixel 3XL: $899-999 (64GB-128GB)

Unlocked iPhone Xs: $999-1349 (64GB-512GB)

Unlocked iPhone Xs Max: $1099-1449 (64GB-512GB)

I don't know if Google's Pixel phones are really premium, but by the price I'm assuming so. It seems Apple is adding about $200 over Google's price for the similar size and storage points.

<comment><USER23> Depth sensor? Other meaningful specs? Plthe difference between $800 and $1000 is abstract when you're financing or renting month to month

<comment><USER22> No doubt there are more spec differences between the two. I don't know Android hardware well enough to find a proper Android-to-Apples comparison, so I went with a current flagship from Google and the two specs that (I suspect) most users care about: size and storage.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


IRHydra: Display V8 and Dart VM Intermediate Representations - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/mraleph/irhydra/ <comment><USER2> It's too bad his README.md doesn't have some screenshots. Luckily, his site for IRHydra2 has a screencast you can scrub through ([http://mrale.ph/irhydra/2/](http://mrale.ph/irhydra/2/)) to get at least a sense of what it looks like. This tooltip here was pretty fantastic ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=725&v=pycQWDuCBN8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=725&v=pycQWDuCBN8)), seems like a great project!

<comment><USER3> Too bad he's been barely working on it. I must say, it also looks very impressive... but will it ever get pass the demo stage?

<comment><USER4> I'd love to work more on it, but sadly it's really outside of my real work right now - as I haven't been working on V8 for several years now.

It is past the demo stage though - I know people who use it and it is the only tool I use myself to look at V8 deopts (on a rare occasion when I need to).

I do answer questions and fix bugs whenever possible - so if you would like to use IRHydra and can't figure something out - just send me a mail or file a bug on GitHub.

I originally had hopes that something like this will eventually be incorporated in DevTools - but this hope has withered by now.</comment></comment></comment>


CitusDB 4.0, pg_shard 1.1, and cstore 1.2 are out. What's next? - <AUTHOR> https://www.citusdata.com/blog/149-whats-next

<comment><USER2> When will CitusDB be open sourced?

<comment><USER3> That's a great question. Unfortunately, in the past it seems like they don't opt to interact with us in HN posts about them [0].

[0] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9351248](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9351248)

<comment><USER4> (Ozgun from Citus Data)

Yes, that's a great question. The reason we didn't respond earlier was that we don't have a firm answer yet.

Open sourcing CitusDB is a big decision for us, and we're still learning about (the business side of) open source through our open pg_shard and cstore extensions.

Once we have a good reply to this question, the HN audience will among the first to know. :)

<comment><USER5> Damn. I've read a bit about Citus and thought it was interesting but had no idea it wasn't FOSS.

Please consider opening it--as cool as the technology is, I can't in good conscience implement a proprietary DBMS in production.

<comment><USER6> Can you expand on your reservations with this?

<comment><USER3> @ericfrenkiel Just look at what happened recently with FoundationDB.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The source?</comment>


Alienating Atmosphere (2014) - <AUTHOR> https://martinfowler.com/bliki/AlienatingAtmosphere.html <comment><USER2> The trouble with discussing this issue is that so many people have a "with us or against us" attitude, and will attack (verbally, professionally, socially, and sometimes violently) anyone who questions any aspect of their agenda.

<comment><USER3> "Agenda" itself has become a negative word in the US, and so that comment _can_ be read as an attack itself. (I upvoted you in good faith.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Alienating atmospheres impact people across more vectors than just those that are protected classes:

[https://status451.com/2017/08/04/another-point-of- view/](https://status451.com/2017/08/04/another-point-of-view/)

<comment><USER2> I remember a time when classism in tech was a hot topic, but it's rarely discussed anymore.

What happened?

<comment><USER5> Over the last decade, and especially in the last 5 years, the world view amongst equality activism has shifted very strongly towards intersectional identity politics and its associated groupwise oppressor/victim dynamic as the root of all evil. Classism fell to the side in favor of sexism, racism, homophobia, islamophobia, transphobia, and so on.

Some attribute the downfall of Occupy Wall Street to this, where a very simple message about financial justice was replaced with a focus on the slights of its middle-to-upper class revolutionaries. This is where privilege rhetoric and the progressive stack (i.e. ranking oppression) came into full vogue.

A similar thing happened with tech. The decentralized libertarian and egalitarian culture up to the early 2000s made way for a corporatized one. Censorship and moral control came into it, first by way of copyright enforcement, then by way of a rhetoric of gentrification, civility and anti- harassment. This too was pushed as benefiting marginalized identities, despite the identity blind nature of the culture it was replacing. This was already going on in the mid 2000s, crossing a few geek subcultures, and started to become mainstream around 2012. In the subsequent years, the associated "women in tech" and racial oppression narrative skyrocketed and became a regular fixture in media.

It's not outlandish to notice both of these cases played out as a divide-and- conquer scenario that benefited the societal elite by defusing potential threats to their power. In the case of Occupy it was the financial sector and the god of money, and in the case of internet culture it was governments and the ability to control from the top down. The technology that was supposed to liberate us is now used for Orwellian purposes, controlled by an oligarchy of giants.

Directly contributing to both was the long and slow push in academia to shift from enlightenment values to postmodern values, where subjectivity and social constructionism reign supreme. We can also see the clear role of modern media culture, where entertaining is preferable to informing, and that of social media in particular, where one's personal brand and personal views reign supreme.

If you put it all together, it is anyone's guess how much of this was a purely natural evolution, and how much of it was accelerated to satisfy particular agendas. Probably an interplay between both. Egregores protect themselves and rally their self-interested members to fight for them. The fact that all of this came to a well-timed crescendo in the lead up to an American presidential election however speaks volumes IMO.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > _it 's a constant indication that "you're not welcome here"_

Maybe the software industry can be more inviting or attractive to different types of people, but I don't think there is an agenda by computer folk to exclude others or make people feel un-welcomed. I think the "geek" culture is simply unattractive to most girls (yes, I'm assuming girls are less geeky). The question is "how to make it more attractive", not "how to make it less alienating".

Edit: tell me why you disagree.

<comment><USER7> I disagree because I know a lot of geeky women who don't like geek culture because it is hostile to women. In my life, I haven't noticed a difference in gender when it comes to someone being a "geek" or not. I'm not sure how to gather broader evidence really, though F/M ratios in hard sciences requiring quite a lot of "geek" are much higher than in computer science.

<comment><USER6> If you haven't noticed a difference in m/f ratio of geeks, then how can you say geek culture us hostile to women? Assuming you think all male geeks are hostile to women, wouldn't it just be half of the culture that is hostile?

idk, something about "half of geeks culture is women" and "geek culture is hostile to women" doesn't seem like a good argument to me.

<comment><USER7> The women geeks I know keep separate from geek culture, and I only know them due to luck or circumstance. So they are women geeks, but not part of geek culture, if that makes sense.

<comment><USER8> Then are they really geeks or just have geek tendencies?

Geekdom is a blood pact that one carries with them wherever they go. There's a lot of "us vs. them" mentality, especially in more introverted circles that feel as though normal society is not for them and they will never fit in.

This hostility is aimed at anyone who, to use their vernacular, is a normie. Someone that, as they see it, has had the luck to be able to fit in to the molds society demanded of them, is not "one of them." This includes men, specifically the "high-status," attractive, promiscuous, and athletic men. As well as normal women, who by the real life random number generator we call chance, are a much greater portion of their gender than men. This is one possible reason it may seem like there is large hostility targeted specifically at women.

Women, using only the frequent amount of stories I've heard, are known for their affinity to want to insert themselves into groups they don't belong in and feel like a great injustice has been done upon them by this. There are certain groups of people that your average woman will never be able to fit in, no matter how much activism she engages in. To tie these two paragraphs together, the largest problems I've seen arise of clashes between geeks and normies, are people who want to "be part" of the group in name, but don't want to be part of the group in lifestyle and essence.

These groups are very welcoming to anyone who shows similarity to their members, but like most groups of people, will not tolerate those who wish to disrupt their bubble and way of being. It's like joining a smoker's support group, but coming in and chain smoking in everyone's faces. Then declaring that the hostility you receive is unwarranted. That it is them who should change their ways, not the malefactor.

<comment><USER9> Note that it is a particularly cruel fate to be unattractive, low status, while being intelligent enough to not only fully comprehend what they are missing but also to know the implacable foes of probability and physics that put them there. Geeks have the rawest quadrant of the distribution.

We finally carved out an enclave around the 80s where we could have a stable equilibrium with the rest of society, trading our specialized skills for goods at an arms length. But the normies greed and avrice knows no bounds. They burst into our very halls to throw us back out into the cold night. They demand we tithe all the fruits of our labours in recognition of the "natural order". They would make us beggars in our own kingdom.

Geeks are not aggressors in any us vs them sorting match. The hostility flows endlessly in one direction -- downhill -- from the haves to all the have-nots.

Meet us at the river fork every fall to trade, but do not harvest our gardens, hunt our animals, or cut down our homes for your firewood. Stay in your domain normie and we will stay in ours.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Just google for "lego girls 70s" images and there is the answer, laying bare in front of you

</comment><comment><USER11> But what about Betty Joe with the Unix book in Wayne's World 2?

</comment><comment><USER12> So what? I feel an "alienating atmosphere" at snooty high end boutique art galleries where people sip Champagne and talk about the nebulous genius it took for someone to throw feces at a picture of the Madonna, or whatever. They are attracted to each other and to the subject they are interested in. Sometimes you just don't belong, for whatever reason, even if you're totally drawn to the subject. That's life. Grown ups are supposed to learn to cope with it, not whine like children.

<comment><USER13> No. Grown ups are supposed to solve their problems. Solving the problems of sexual harassment and discrimination is exactly what the industry is trying to do.

If you disagree with the approach, fine. Please suggest a better way to handle the situation. If telling women to cope with it is your sole suggestion, then don't expect very many people to agree with you since women with a passion for engineering should not be driven out simply on the merit of how they were born.

<comment><USER12> The kind of soft discrimination that you're complaining about is a fact of life. Any industry who's life blood consists of relatively immature young men is going to have this kind of problem. What people like you are proposing is complete upheaval of basic behavioral tendencies to accommodate a few special cases. What exactly do you even want? Are you sure you know? If you want a social work atmosphere full personable people get into sales, tech is not the industry for you. That goes for men, women and everything in between.</comment></comment></comment>


Most project managers ignore a huge aspect of task estimation - <AUTHOR> https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/most-project-managers-ignore-huge-aspect-task-maioli-mackeprang <comment><USER2> If they view us as interchangeable cogs, why wouldn't they view the technologies we use in much the same way?

This was a big problem with healthcare.gov's launch, the CMS (government) had had success in a previous project with a particular non-relational database, and made the contractor use it, despite I'm sure essentially none of their people knowing it, and probably few if any even knowing the database's paradigm. I wonder how many "estimates" the contractor was required to supply to the government based on this....

(Although perhaps a bigger database problem initially was that it was severely underprovisioned, emphasized by how _extremely_ specific they were about the hardware it was moved to.)

</comment><comment><USER3> This seems to be an over-engineered solution to this problem. In my experience developers do pretty well balancing picking up unfamiliar technologies with doing things that they already know well. This really only make sense to me if you don't allow developers to choose what tasks they work on themselves.

<comment><USER2> _This really only make sense to me if you don 't allow developers to choose what tasks they work on themselves._

Which is nearly universal, in my experience which is now quite stale, and from the many current reports we hear about the horrors of closed allocation in the field. I keep thinking back to the hardware engineer who was also pretty good at Python who was hired by Google, who then make him write Python hardware testing code. Not wanting to end his primary career, he of course had to quit ASAP.

See also "micro-management", especially I'll add by managers who are failed software developers, which was an all too common thing back when I was in the workforce (through spring 2004).</comment></comment>


NASA Just Tested the Rocket Engine We'll Use to Visit Mars - <AUTHOR> http://io9.com/nasa-just-tested-the-rocket-engine-well-use-to-visit-ma-1723977221

<comment><USER2> I have a Stennis Space Center (where this is done) coffee cup on my desk. Neat place if you're ever in New Orleans and have some time to kill.</comment>


Pre-sale of Cyborg implant for sensing North - <AUTHOR> http://www.cyborgnest.net <comment><USER2> So this only vibrates when it faces north. I wonder if that is more or less useful/comfortable/noticeable than the belts[0] or anklets[1] that always have a vibration in the direction of north.

[0][http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-Make-a-Tactile- Feedba...](http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-Make-a-Tactile-Feedback- Compass-Belt/) [1][https://sensebridge.net/projects/northpaw/](https://sensebridge.net/projects/northpaw/)

<comment><USER3> Yeah, was hoping it actually would connect to something and give of different sensations based on direction, which in time the body/mind might recognize. This seemed more like an art-experiment than something cool.

<comment><USER4> AIUI people who wore the anklet version found they quickly ceased being conscious of the vibrations per se, and just had a sense of which way was north. ISTR people learn to see via a camera connected to a pad of electrodes on their tongue. The brain is pretty good at adapting to sensory input, it doesn't have to be wired directly to your nerves or anything.

<comment><USER5> Years back I wore the Northpaw anklet for a few weeks. I found that it was certainly possible to determine north with it, but never got from feeling vibrations to some "sense of which was is north". In fact, I found that it sometimes took a bit of turning around to get a feel of the direction.

I did not find it a very helpful tool for navigation. In my experience I orient myself by landmarks and constantly knowing exactly which way is north was not that useful, even when walking in nature. I did not try it in a completely unknown place though. Perhaps the most interesting part was how it corrected the intuitive picture of how my home city is oriented - the anklet clearly showed that streets that I always associated with straight north-south and east-west lines were curved and not so perfectly aligned.

<comment><USER6> When I lived in the Bay Area, my mental map was rotated by about 90 degrees clockwise. It was constantly annoying to be driving a different direction than I thought, and made actual map use really awkward as I'd search for basic landmarks for a full minute before my mental map would "reset" to match the physical map. Since then, I've wondered if something like this would help keep my mental map more aligned with reality.

I don't think it's a coincidence that I started using GPS navigation heavily around this same time. My mental mapping in general has degraded a lot since I started relying on turn-by-turn magic for all non-familiar navigation.

edit: Is there an off-the-shelf solution like the Northpaw that looks less like a house arrest cuff? I can't imagine wearing something that clunky as a usual thing. The market demand for this in a sleek package is probably close to zero, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I see no implementation details. How do I know the accuracy of the compass? It would suck to be passively sent directional information that was even slightly off. What if I don't calibrate it for a few weeks? What happens if I'm not standing straight, instead laying down? Does it go off randomly?

Also, I don't see how this qualifies as an implant? In their defense, I can't obviously see anywhere they call it such; the title is just wrong here.

It's just a device that sits on top of a couple barbell piercings and vibrates. To be honest, I'm far from impressed. The seemingly new-age-hocus- pocus-spirituality bullshit branding and wording doesn't help either.

For 250 quid why not get a watch that provides wrist-facing haptic feedback, maybe attach it via bluetooth to a digital compass?

<comment><USER8> To me, it seems more like a product that's "testing the waters". I agree it's not actually that impressive, or even an implant, but it's softly treading on politically/ethically dangerous grounds. Most of the "upgrades" we've seen so far are for people who have had accidents/damage. This is the first "optional" off-the-shelf product that I know of.

> I see no implementation details

I am excited that we're moving this direction in our society, but I _strongly_ think this is where we need open-source hardware and software. I _really_ don't like the idea of giving control of my physical self to a company, even for something as silly as telling me where north is.

<comment><USER7> I don't really see how this is treading politically/ethically dangerous grounds, definitely not like those magnetic finger implants people have been getting for a few years[0] (I would also say that those are probably one of the first 'off the shelf' upgrades).

Totally agree with you about the need for open-source hardware and software, especially for devices that become part of our selves! That's one of the many reasons this device bugs me.

[0] [http://www.wired.com/2006/06/a-sixth-sense-for-a-wired- world...](http://www.wired.com/2006/06/a-sixth-sense-for-a-wired-world/)

<comment><USER8> > I don't really see how this is treading politically/ethically dangerous > grounds...

I see it similar to self-driving cars: No matter how good or useful they will be, there will be people who "don't want no robot driving me around". Likewise, there will be people who think that implanting ourselves with computers is an "abomination".

From reading that link, it doesn't sound like those are "smart" devices? I think that's where we will see people start to have strong opinions about this.

<comment><USER7> > From reading that link, it doesn't sound like those are "smart" devices?

You are correct; they are not. The compass device in this story isn't implanted either, it sits atop some piercings on the chest. No smart device is being put under the skin here, either.

Food for thought: I met a guy who made an earring that vibrated when he got an incoming SMS. That was a 'smart' device that sat atop a piercing too...

<comment><USER8> I thought this had some kind of electronics in it though? Maybe I'm mis- understanding the product.

> I met a guy who made an earring that vibrated when he got an incoming SMS. > That was a 'smart' device that sat atop a piercing too...

What makes this product interesting to me is that it's "off-the-shelf". The earing, while cool, is a home-made solution (I'm guessing). And to be clear: I don't think this product is revolutionary, I just find it interesting that things have become so small and cheap that we can do this en-mass.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Looks like I'm the only one, but I think this is pretty nifty. Then again I had someone cut open my hand to shove in an rfid chip 10 years ago, which wasn't everybody's cup of tea either.

What I'm most worried about is battery life. If I have to recharge every week (or more), I would give up after a few weeks. Also, what risk is there snagging this thing on your shirt when you get dressed, or crushing it under a barbell when working out? Doing any sort of fighting sport would be impossible too I guess, even if you could take the actual sensor/vibrating thing out.

<comment><USER10> Are you Lopht Anonym or however it's spelled?

<comment><USER11> BBC documentary on Lepht Anonym [http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/item/8ca601f1-2d4f-412a-8c94-a...](http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/item/8ca601f1-2d4f-412a-8c94-ad0b3497ac4e)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> As bizarre as it may look, it's still a small step towards something. Internet-of-Things(buzzword), smart appliances - it's already entering our lives in some fashion. And so will cybernetics. There has to be trendsetters that start with simple things. First car wasn't exactly a modern day Tesla, first airplane did not have peanuts served by beautiful young ladies, first implants and steps towards cybernetics may seem foolish and toy like, but who knows where it will lead us in 10 years

</comment><comment><USER13> Amazing (from the _Who we are_ section):

> NEIL HARBISSON

> Cyborg artist with an internet enabled antenna implanted in his skull that > allows him to perceive colours beyond the visual spectrum and connect to > satellites to sense colours from space.

<comment><USER14> It is quite bizzare [http://static1.squarespace.com/static/55227abee4b04cf2fe2b34...](http://static1.squarespace.com/static/55227abee4b04cf2fe2b34b8/t/56294068e4b0e3e837e3b525/1445544041948/neil- harbisson-featured.jpg)

<comment><USER15> Interesting, but ridiculously goofy looking. You'd think glasses would be a better form factor to hold the sensor.

<comment><USER16> Unless your goal is ostentation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I find the compasses in most phones seem almost useless, as they are confused by themselves, and other electronic devices which are nearby.

Will this be any more accurate? I would choose a phone specially for a better compass, as I often find google maps less useful in cities until I figure out which direction is north.

<comment><USER18> I've used expensive ($1-2 thousand USD) compasses that work really quite well, particularly if you don't suddenly spin around. So the tech exists, at least if you ignore power and size restrictions and up the price range a little. I imagine cellphones don't bother to get a good compass.

External metals are always a problem, though. You can incorporate accelerometer data which kinda helps to protect against quick transients.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> It should be mentioned that there are multiple "norths." And while it's generally not a big deal for most uses, if you feel that you need a compass so bad that you have to implant it into yourself, you probably want the most accurate system that you can have. I don't see anything about this on their website. Such as how do you set Magnetic declination? (My guess, you don't).

The earth's magnetic filed is an incredibly complex system. I know this is more about the "implantability" rather than the compass, but still, something to keep in mind.

For more information: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic_declination](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic_declination)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth's_magnetic_field](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth's_magnetic_field)

</comment><comment><USER20> I'm really struggling to see why you'd want to install this in your body rather than just having it on your person. Is vibration really enhanced by implanting it?

Also, this won't be you "closer to nature" because humans are not naturally attuned to physically know when we are facing north.

Perhaps more importantly, how annoying would this be if every time you rolled over at night, you faced true north and got a nice vibration to wake you up.

<comment><USER21> I disagree. I almost always know where north is. Just pay a little attention to shadows.

<comment><USER20> That's essentially my point. It's learned rather than instinctual. You were taught to do that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> A modicum of awareness suffices to keep anyone informed of the cardinal directions, in most situations not involving subway travel. This is more about "Cyborg" than "North".

<comment><USER23> While this is trivial for some people, it is extremely difficult to infeasible for others.

Taking advantage of people's passive integration of sensory input into their perception of the world around them seems like a reasonable aid for people who have difficulty with things of this nature.

<comment><USER24> You people, some SV quacks could come up with a device that sends you a tweet when you need to take a shit and you'd still be telling me how it's making the world a better place.

<comment><USER25> Some people do end up with nerve damage that impairs their ability to know when they need to empty their bowels. What you describe may indeed be useful for them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Should be called "compAss" and you implant it in your buttocks.

</comment><comment><USER27> It seems as though wearables like watches can already incorporate directional sensors and pretty much anything else that one might imagine.

This product isn't really an implant. A "pierceable", perhaps.

My guess is, this gadget is probably going to appeal mainly to the techno body modification crowd. In other words, a rather limited market, for now.

Medical applications are where implants will eventually shine: glucose level monitors for diabetics, for example.

<comment><USER28> Hi there, Liviu from Cyborg Nest. Thnx for this! Yes, this is not a full implant, because at this stage we saw the mind change as the important thing and less the body change.

This is somehow still a limited market in general, we do hope to do the best and try to bring technology integration into the mainstream, the world is ready.

Here for anything else, Cheers!

<comment><USER29> Hi Liviu,How does the implant communicate with the user's mind?For example, does it vibrate like a smartphone?Thanks,Oren

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Does anyone else think the device looks extremely large for the application?

<comment><USER31> Yes. I will let others play with such technology. I feel too connected already. I don't really want to wire myself up more.

Maybe I'm old fashion. I will be interested in what others say about their experiences with such devices.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> But it... is just a few piercings and is held on top of your skin?

<comment><USER33> Yes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> A related story a while ago about magnetic implants - people have had magnets put in their fingers for a while now:

[http://gizmodo.com/5895555/i-have-a-magnet-implant-in-my- fin...](http://gizmodo.com/5895555/i-have-a-magnet-implant-in-my-finger)

</comment><comment><USER28> Hi, there, I'm Liviu, part of Cyborg Nest, thnx for the time guys, happy to answer any question!

</comment><comment><USER35> Please, save us from the cyborgs. I can think of 999999 things deserving more attention than this.

But wait! I want divining rods implanted in my forearms! I can see the benefits already.

</comment><comment><USER36> I would be much more excited about contraptions that were more obviously useful and less about providing a special "experience".

</comment><comment><USER37> > With North Sense, you're given back an ancient sense of direction

Please go watch "The Embrace of the Serpent" right now.

</comment><comment><USER38> I read about someone who wore a belt with a bunch of vibration motors, where the one that pointed north would vibrate. Lots more space for battery life and accuracy. From what I heard he developed an extremely good sense of direction in a very short time.

Doesn't need to be an implant!

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I know that Liviu Babitz the founder of CyborgNest is on HN now. He should be answering your questions soon!

[https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=LiviuBabitz](https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=LiviuBabitz)

<comment><USER39> Let me just be the first to say that I'm not stuffing anything in my body that was created by someone who's identity isn't firmly nailed down. I'm not against anonymity by any means, but infrastructure needs to be 99.999% trustworthy and transparent.

> Liviu was the COO of Videre est Credere, featured in the WIRED as 'Carlos', > due to security restrictions at the time the article was published.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> Why not just use your smartphone? Or even just look at which direction the sun is.

</comment><comment><USER41> Don't people know most of the time to what direction is north? you just look at the sun imagine it's trajectory and you have enough information for 90% of the use cases. Or stars...

</comment><comment><USER21> Might be handy if it's cloudy, but otherwise it's easier to look at shadows in daytime and the moon and stars at night.

</comment><comment><USER42> I can only imagine what it would be like trying to explain this implant to the nice folks at the airport security checkpoints!

</comment><comment><USER43> Their about section looks... well, they just look like some real interesting people, I tell you hwhat...

<comment><USER28> Thnx, pleasure meeting you, I'm Liviu from Cyborg Nest. We are a bunch of very dedicated people to this!

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> Telepathy is already possible.

</comment><comment><USER45> This seems... incredibly silly. Not crazy or wrong, just silly. This feels like a child walking out of a movie theater like a cowboy, because they just saw a western.

I don't want an implant to achieve something I can manage with a needle and a bowl of water.

<comment><USER46> Maybe if you are blind, this could be helpful to not get lost and get a sense of the direction you are facing. But I guess there are already less invasive solutions (and other sensory inputs like the sun on your skin).

<comment><USER45> Or just a wearable device, but I guess that has drawbacks too.

<comment><USER47> This "implant" is pretty much a wearable device since it is in contact with skin but is fully outside the body.

<comment><USER27> Usually wearables refer to things you can easily take off, like a watch. This thing looks pretty permanent -- though maybe it flips open like an earring to be removed and serviced?

<comment><USER48> The barbell piercing that it anchors to is permanent, but I think the device itself has to be removed to charge.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> When I saw the video and the team photos all I could think of is, "Turtley werth it" [http://www.cc.com/video-clips/4ei34y/kroll-show-rich- dicks--...](http://www.cc.com/video-clips/4ei34y/kroll-show-rich-dicks---the- nameless)</comment>


Ask HN: thoughts on .io domain? - <AUTHOR>

every variation (that I like) of the .com domain for my business is taken. As is .net - both just redirect to landing pages. However, the .io domain is available and although my business has nothing to do with input/output, the .io domain sounds good.<p>Can anyone think of a reason to avoid .io? <comment><USER2> I'm not sure if .io has a disparate effect on users clicking on natural links. There few .io sites in the world (approx 100K according to <http://goo.gl/hXm4i>) so there is no clear line yet.

If it fits your project, is easy to remember for your customer segment, go for it.

</comment><comment><USER3> If every combination is taken, you might have some legal problems with trademarks.

If you register something.io, and they already took something.com, there's a good chance

1) They are in the same business selling "something"

2) They were there before you

3) They might have registered the trademark "something"

If they decide to sue you, you will probably lose.

It also might be hard to market .io to non-tech people, pretty much everyone expects .com (.org and .net are alright, but not great either).</comment>


WD Builds High-Capacity, Helium-Filled HDDs - <AUTHOR> http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9231220/Helium_filled_WD_drives_promise_huge_boost_in_capacity?taxonomyId=19&pageNumber=2

<comment><USER2> Oh this will be fun, the only gas harder to keep inside is hydrogen. While its absolutely true that you get a huge benefit in head flying by switching to helium it also means that there is pretty much a guaranteed lifetime cap on the usefulness of the drives. As someone who tries to run drives 24/7 for 3 years before tossing them this probably makes my life harder. Especially if the 'failure' mode is that they just get slower and slower as the heads have a harder and harder time staying on track as other gases migrate inside.

<comment><USER3> ha! that makes me think of failure modes of SSD's.. just getting slower (but for a different reason). Imagine if the florist who does helium party balloons starts offering the service to refurbish your HD.

<comment><USER4> Ordinary magnetic platter HDs slow down with age too, though I'm not sure why.

<comment><USER5> theory: your outer tracks are filled with data which is older and that you presumably read less

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Filling HDDs with Helium seems like a bad idea since the Earth is running out of Helium.[1]

Increasing prices could very well make the technology infeasible before it even comes to market.

[1]<http://digitaljournal.com/article/321439>

<comment><USER7> Please stop spreading this "running out of heilium" nonsense. Natural gas contains plenty of helium, and making LNG produces helium as a byproduct. As soon as the US Government stops liquidating it's Cold War reserve of helium at super low prices, every LNG facility will compress the helium and sell it. Thanks to fracking, and a return of LNG production in the US, there will be plenty of helium for the foreseeable future.

<comment><USER8> Natural gas has single digits percentages of Helium. It's still a finite resource on sensible timescales (yes radioactive decay replenishes supply eventually). It has many important uses. There are good reasons to object to it being squandered in children's party balloons.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> So why not a vacuum? Vacuumed KERS systems rotate an order of magnitude faster. I get that a KERS system can afford heavier casing than a HD but still, if your cases can hold _helium_ you ought to be able to hold a reasonable vacuum too.

<comment><USER10> My understanding is that hard drive heads float over the platters on a cushion of air. That's why high altitude applications need special sealed hard drives.

<comment><USER11> Specifically, in a vacuum the heads crash into the platter, damaging both.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Something doesn't make sense here.

Turbulence is related to viscosity as far as I know.

Viscosity of air: 18.6 micropascal seconds.

Viscosity of helium: 20.0.

For comparison hydrogen is 9.0 and argon is 22.9.

Actually - maybe a higher viscosity is better (it causes the turbulence to die out)?

But in that case why not use argon? It's cheaper and a LOT easier to contain.

Yet the article talks about light atoms?

<comment><USER13> The turbulance is related to viscosity, but the force exerted on the drive head is related to turbulance and mass. The density of helium is an order of magnitude lower than the density of air.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> The link goes to the second page of a two-page article, here's a better link (all on one page):

[http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/print/9231220/Helium_...](http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/print/9231220/Helium_filled_WD_drives_promise_huge_boost_in_capacity?taxonomyName=Data+Storage&taxonomyId=19)

</comment><comment><USER15> So what is the capacity of these new drives? Nowhere in the article it seems to be mentioned.

</comment><comment><USER16> This is great.. but there is an international shortage of hydrogen, and unfortunately, I think MRI scanners should have first dibs. Having said this, it will be great when nuclear fusion is cracked and there is an abundance of the stuff.

<comment><USER17> You mean helium, I presume.

<comment><USER16> Yes, I am a tool.</comment></comment></comment>


Is the Brain a Quantum Computer? - <AUTHOR> http://cogsci.uwaterloo.ca/Articles/quantum.pdf <comment><USER2> I don't feel papers like this are really adding much to the community. Of course all explanations of consciousness go against our conventional understanding of the universe, that's why we don't understand consciousness yet. More likely than not, we just don't understand the universe as well as we thought we did. Bonus points to those who think different.

<comment><USER3> We're also viewing consciousness from WITHIN consciousness, so our views are distorted by filters that we cannot see, and thus we assume that there is something fundamentally special going on, when in fact we're just viewing the system from an angle that makes it very hard to understand.

<comment><USER4> While it makes sense that our brains could be structured in such a way that some things are easier to understand than others, I think it would be remarkable that it somehow filters out our understanding of the process of consciousness in particular.

I think that particular criticism is vague and ill-formed, but oft-repeated because it sounds good. After all, having a brain hasn't stopped us from learning about the brain, even though one might think it would be hard to learn about brains with brains.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> <http://www.quantumconsciousness.org/documents/CogScipub.pdf>

<comment><USER6> For the impatient, the above link is to a paper called "The Brain Is Both Neurocomputer and Quantum Computer," which is a response to the paper linked to in the main post.

</comment></comment><comment> sans-serif Law of Minimization of Mystery: consciousness is mysterious and quantum mechanics is mysterious, so maybe the two mysteries have a common source.

</comment><comment><USER7> I was going to answer the title, with "no" - <http://space.mit.edu/home/tegmark/brain.html> \- but the article itself agrees with me anyway.

So. Your title is misleading & not representative of the article, & that's annoying.

<comment><USER8> The title of the post is exactly the title of the article, so I'd say it is very representative of the article. That the answer to the posed question is "no" is not misleading.

<comment><USER7> D'oh! Sorry.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The abstract makes it clear they argue "no":

 _We argue that computation via quantum mechanical processes is irrelevant to explaining how brains produce thought, contrary to the ongoing speculations of many theorists. First, quantum effects do not have the temporal properties required for neural information processing. Second, there are substantial physical obstacles to any organic instantiation of quantum computation. Third, there is no psychological evidence that such mental phenomena as consciousness and mathematical thinking require explanation via quantum theory. We conclude that understanding brain function is unlikely to require quantum computation or similar mechanisms._

</comment><comment><USER10> No</comment>


A New Diet Study Confirms Your Worst Suspicions About Ultra-Processed Foods - <AUTHOR> https://gizmodo.com/a-new-diet-study-confirms-your-worst-suspicions-about-u-1834818556/ <comment><USER2> [dupe] [clickbait]</comment>


Ask HN: Do you (still) use Facebook? - <AUTHOR>

I have a "sociological" interest about facebook use. In my social circle facebook is clearly going out of fashion. I am a guy in his late twenties. Does it happens to you as well?<p>To make this more interesting, please add gender, age (as I did) and perhaps were your friends are "migrating". <comment><USER2> I'm a male in my late 30's. I do not use facebook. I stopped a while back because I learned that there are certain things I don't want to know about my friends and family. Among those things are whether you thought that funny quiz result was worth sharing, or that you blindly follow the latest idealogue on whichever side of the political aisle you fall.

I'm much happier not seeing the mundane drivel they mindlessly shared. I know it's not really representative of who they are and I'm no longer annoyed at them all the time.

</comment><comment><USER3> Are you perhaps a tech worker with lots of tech friends?</comment>