Reddit's user revolt is the best thing for Reddit and the internet - drew-y http://www.engadget.com/2015/06/11/reddit-user-revolt/ <comment><AUTHOR> What a terribly written, poorly researched, ignorance laden article. Not that any of the other similar articles about this issue have been any better.

Yes, free speech is exactly about saying and hearing from others that which one may find "offensive" or "tasteless" or "cruel", etc.

The real issue here is that while the reddit admins and owners are completely within their right to mold the website and the community it contains to take a shape of their choosing, there are better ways to go about this than the hamfisted and juvenile methods they've used up to now.

The real question is this: is their poorly thought out and even more poorly executed plan actually accomplishing their goal?

Obviously not.

As the admins, you don't create a higher quality community by poking users in the eye and dancing gleefully at their howls and ignoring any and all legitimate concerns they bring up in their attempt to engage you.

Here I'm referring to the /r/announcement comments where the admins go to great lengths to avoid any real dialogue to the many polite and well informed questions and comments that brought up the painfully obvious issues they won't or can't address.

It is very very difficult to mold and moderate an online community but it can be done. There are great examples out there. Go and study them and see what they did. Each experience is unique but they all have at least one lesson for reddit admins, should they care to listen and learn from them.

Bringing down the ban hammer indiscriminately on a 'fat hate' subreddit while allowing hundreds of others even worse (/r/coontown for example or /r/gasthekikes or many others) may be easier in the short term but it will accomplish nothing but worsening an already bad situation.

Here's just one example of a community doing it right:

[http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/apr/03/monster- hu...](http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/apr/03/monster- hunter-4-video-game-communities)

Want more examples? Metafilter, hackernews, etc.

<comment><USER2> >The real question is this: is their poorly thought out and even more poorly executed plan actually accomplishing their goal?

You're assuming that the politically convenient goal of "improving the community" is the primary motivation behind the decision. Banning those subs makes a hell of a lot more sense if it's viewed as a political favor. Imgur staff recently had a tiff with the admins of FPH, /r/neofag criticizes a specific forum that's popular with the social-justice crowd.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's certainly a possibility. I wanted to give the admins the benefit of the doubt. Even in such a best case scenario they come across as grossly incompetent. In your case scenario they come across as corrupt.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> "All too often cries of "free speech!" are about not being able to say something that legitimately hurts or offends someone else"

This is exactly what free speech is. The freedom to say things that are wrong, hateful, misinformed, misleading, vicious, cruel and hurtful as long as no actual violent or criminal acts are incited.

<comment><USER4> As I've said over and over, the key problem with freedom-of-speech on the internet and harassment is how to handle people using the point-to-point facilities to antagonize others in volumes beyond what they could filter reasonably.

Having ten thousand people on twitter continually tweet at one person, or email them, or whatever, is kind of like a psychic DDoS. This is a thorny problem for freedom-of-speech absolutists who can recognize the harms such things may allow.

However, shitty subreddits? There's nothing there to offend anyone until they go to the subreddit and become offended. People in those cases are basically autoharassing themselves.

It's just so shitty to see a few crybabies and a few shitheads drum up enough drama to cause everyone to forget just how _awesome_ it is that we had this nice, open platform for idea exchange--even the ones the majority dislikes.

EDIT:

And lest we forget, the newsgroups and BBSs and everything were more than happy to allow people with nonstandard gender configurations and sexual tastes to merrily congregate, as they did other weird and sometimes hostile subcultures.

That people want to remove the facilities to support such formations, now that $PREFERRED_CULTURE is mainstream enough, is pretty harmful.

<comment><USER5> > However, shitty subreddits? There's nothing there to offend anyone until > they go to the subreddit and become offended. People in those cases are > basically autoharassing themselves.

Fatpeoplehate would often brigade other subs and other sites.

<comment><USER4> Sure, you can maybe get a brief respite by cracking down on the forums where the chat with each other--but that hardly fixes the problem.

"These people we don't like used this coffeeshop to organize their protests. Therefore, let's shut down this coffeeshop."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Well, a while back, Reddit picked up a bunch of users that used to be on Digg.com. Maybe it's just time to let certain users go.

It think it's a bit humorous these people complaining about their "free speech rights being curtailed" when what they have to say follows some specific subjects. How come the free speech activists haven't created /r/HowISISShouldCreateItsFirstAtomBomb ?

I think the real issue here isn't censorship, it's legitimacy. These free speech types want the legitimacy that Reddit has. And Reddit is not allowing that to happen on their site. But the world isn't coming to an end, people can type another address in their browser and go to whatever little place they want to.

And perhaps if the free speechers are concerned that their legitimate arguments are falling on deaf ears, perhaps they should re-examine the legitimacy of their hate speech. Reddit doesn't have a responsibility to share their legitimacy with hate speech. The managers of Reddit have been trying to build brand equity, why should they sacrifice their efforts to appease people who spend their free time explaining how awful they are?

Yeah, go to Voat. Or wherever you're welcome. Or make your own web site. But you can't freeload on the legitimacy that Reddit's brand name provides. If you're going to make a site about hating fat people, then you're responsible for making it wildly popular.

Good luck.</comment>


2019 Best of the Midwest: Startup Cities Rankings - <AUTHOR> https://blog.midweststartups.com/2019-best-of-the-midwest-startup-cities-rankings-2460f3ceaafa <comment><AUTHOR> I was overjoyed to see my home area, Lansing, break the top 25 beating the much larger city of Grand Rapids. What's amazing is this stuff wasn't even tracked just a couple of years ago.</comment>


(More Explicit) Advice to Summer Applicants - <AUTHOR>

The exploding termsheets
http://ycombinator.com/exploding.html
have started to arrive.  I just talked to a group who got one, and they hadn't realized we were willing to interview groups early when this happened.
So I should be more explicit: If you get an exploding offer, send us an email, and if we were going to interview you, we'll do it early. <comment><USER2> Exploding termsheets are beyond rude. They're aimed at minimizing your ability to negotiate. They prevent you from forcing several funding groups to arrive at the table at the same time and cause more pricing competition.

I recommend you consider that signing a term sheet is like entering into a relationship. Do you want a relationship with someone that's behaving badly beforehand? They're already on their best behavior.

<comment><USER3> Agreed-- EXCEPT in certain cases where there are only N slots to fill (like TechStars and some others).

Techstars, for example has 10 slots (I think). If they have 300 applicants and 10 slots, how do you think it'd work if they said, "take your time, let us know whenever". If they accept you, they aren't accepting the next startup on their list... And basically, they can't send accept/reject notices to folks until they fill all of their slots.

Or am I missing something? If a YC competitor has a fixed number of slots, is there a way they could NOT have an exploding term sheet (other than not have a fixed number of slots)?

<comment><AUTHOR> If you have a fixed number of slots you have to have a deadline. The problem is when the deadline occurs. If the firm in question made their first round of offers expire in 20 days instead of 2, it would be a moot point.

<comment><USER3> Ah, that makes sense and seems startup friendly.

i.e. they offer first round of 10 companies and give 'em 20 days. 8 accept. They then work there way down an alternate list.

They could even have 2 types of acceptance. i.e. 10 offers and 20 alternates (so the rejected companies could get on with their lives). They could tell the alternates: "You didn't make the top 10, but you were really close. It's possible a slot could open up within 30 days. If it does, we might call you."

If it's TechStars, they purportedly have their deadline set based on academic calendar. You oughta try hopping in front of them to test that assertion. :-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> > (YC asks people to decide that day whether or not to accept an offer from > us, but we do this because at that point they already know all they need to, > not to pre-empt other offers. There is no other seed firm that decides after > us.)

How is this behavior any different? Offering last is a _unique_ position which allows a group to already know the other options. It's not surprising that other firms also want decisions ASAP - they certainly don't want to be floating long term offers that function as backup plans for the best groups.

If YC wants seed funding to be synchronous like college admissions, then it should make its own process conducive - give time to accept an offer during which groups can interview elsewhere.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's different because it doesn't force anyone to forgo other opportunities.

While we ask people to decide that day, we don't insist on it. As I explained earlier, if people have some specific reason they need more time, we've always given it to them.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=528064>

And when people do accept, we never ask for more than a verbal "yes"; we don't make groups sign an LOI agreeing to participate.

I hear a lot of what goes on behind the scenes in these situations, and I can assure you that it's not merely out of a desire for administrative neatness that other seed firms give applicants offers that expire quickly. It is 100% certain they do it to pressure people into deciding before they can talk to us. That is not the intention, or the effect, when we ask people to decide that day.

<comment><USER4> Ah, I hadn't realize this had been hashed out in another thread. I took exception to that excerpt because it sounded pretty hand-wavy; I've read your justification of why you ask for an immediate decision, and it makes sense up until you start introducing the possibilities of multiple offers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Investors must smell blood in the water to be trying this nonsense. Do you think they'd be doing this in a better economy?

<comment><USER6> I hope this is not TechStars because I really like their operation as a viable alternative to ycom from what I've seen and read. Exploding term sheets seems pretty short-sighted, and not something anyone should do if they are embodying the motto of "helping young entrepreneurs". If a "mentor" is going to use force tactics, they've lost my respect and I certainly have no interest in giving them 5pts for a lousy 20k. Rather just sell my car and bike all summer than deal with that type of investor.

I think this applies to most people (at least for me), ycom is a #1 choice for two reasons: 1) Huge respect for PG for his knowledge generosity and true leadership qualities 2) ycom's presence and relationships in the media.

So my personal note to yclones: figure out YOUR value add so people want to come to you. Force is not the answer, it's shows weakness in your operation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Why don't you move the dates up for everybody?

<comment><AUTHOR> Mainly because we're not finished yet reading all the applications. When someone gets an exploding termsheet, we can all read their application immediately, but we can't do that for everyone.

Also, Robert flies in for the real interviews. When we interview people early, we have to do it without him.

<comment><USER8> He's located in Boston?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes; he's a professor at MIT.

<comment><USER8> Gotcha.

Also, purely curious question: when you're looking through applications, is there a bar of "this is how many people we'll interview"? Or do you set a bar for quality-of-app, then take as many people as place above that bar?

<comment><AUTHOR> There's a numeric bar for how many people we'll interview, based on how many groups we can physically talk to in 3 days. We usually interview 50 to 60 groups; it's hard to talk to more than 20 per day. At interviews, though, we care more about quality than numbers. We wouldn't reject a good group because we were over some number.

<comment><USER9> Are there any stats on if more people get accepted on Day 1 or Day 2 or Day 3, in the mornings, afternoon's or in the evenings?

For startups that were accepted, if the startups that interviewed prior and/or after were accepted?

<comment><USER10> Well, people who interview when there's a full moon tend to get in, but of course it all depends on what pg had for breakfast that particular day.

Joking aside, it's probably best not to publish that kind of thing so that people inadvertently worry about something they can't control. The only reason to do those sorts of stats might be for pg & co. to check and make sure they don't have some sort of biases, but it doesn't seem likely.

<comment><USER9> some context.

The first part regd. time of the day was asked since PG mentioned (not sure if it was an essay or a comment on HN) that he used to get mundane stuff done during the day, and then code from 9 pm to 3 am.

This is not to say, PG ignores the early interviews and kicks it into high gear for the evening ones; just that if you look at the results, are there any insights or patterns.

Re. the 2nd one, look at #9, _Cialdini cites the case of the real estate broker....._ : [http://www.vinvesting.com/docs/munger/human_misjudgement.htm...](http://www.vinvesting.com/docs/munger/human_misjudgement.html)

I agree that YC should not publish these stats, but if they did learn anything interesting that could be shared with everyone, it would make a good read.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Wouldn't it help applicants in the future, if the current round of folks that applied to multiple programs to list:

1\. The last day to accept for a particular program

2\. The ones that offer exploding termsheets

<comment><USER11> 2\. Is this generally known in advance? I'm under the impression that exploding termsheets appear on a company-to-company basis.

<comment><USER9> The idea is to figure out the list of firms that provide exploding termsheets.</comment></comment></comment>


Walter Isaacson on Bill Gates at Harvard - <AUTHOR> http://harvardmagazine.com/2013/09/walter-isaacson-on-bill-gates-at-harvard#.UkcLBWZGWrs.twitter <comment><USER2> That was a fascinating read. The difference that makes the difference appears to be Gate's ability to focus sharply and in-depth and dedicate himself to that purpose. Notable from this piece is his ability to 'think different'. It's a challenging strategy for success which few can dedicate themselves too.

This piece by Malcolm Gladwell in the Guardian similarly covers 'think different' strategies - in this instance using examples of high achievers with Dyslexia or who were early orphans, and the strategies they construct to survive and thrive. [http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/sep/28/blessed- weak-...](http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/sep/28/blessed-weak- underdogs-malcolm-gladwell)

</comment><comment><USER3> My takeaway: launch fast from the bleeding-edge.

That makes me wonder — what is the edge today? What would be the equivalent of the Altair and the BASIC interpreter? What would be today's intersection of new hardware and old software?

The Oculus Rift comes mind. There's been some interesting work to bring the Rift to the masses through the Web:

[https://github.com/Instrument/oculus- bridge](https://github.com/Instrument/oculus-bridge)</comment>


IBM battles dire mainframe myths  - <AUTHOR> http://www.networkworld.com/news/2012/031612-ibm-mainframe-257345.html

<comment><USER2> Despite what IBM claims, COTS support for the mainframe is actually pretty limited (and often far more expensive), even if the MF is running zLinux. The mainframe is also a huge single point of failure and failover solutions to a second data centre are again, really frickin expensive. I'm not a mainframe expert, but I'm not convinced by this story.

</comment><comment><USER3> Wasn't there a news the other day that NASA has completely eliminated their mainframe system?

<comment><USER4> Yes there was.

[http://www.zdnet.com/blog/service-oriented/nasa-retires- its-...](http://www.zdnet.com/blog/service-oriented/nasa-retires-its-last- mainframe/8508)</comment></comment>


A comparison of regex engines - <AUTHOR> https://rust-leipzig.github.io/regex/2017/03/28/comparison-of-regex-engines/ <comment><USER2> This is fantastic news. Never heard of Hyperscan</comment>


Wizard School - <AUTHOR> http://steve-yegge.blogspot.co.uk/2006/07/wizard-school.html

<comment><USER2> I'd love to read the YA novel of this. Larry Wall teaches Hermione archery and Scheme...

But I wonder if this will ever happen in real life? It has been 7 years and while there are lots of structured decentralized experiences online, and a few coding camps ([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6123937](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6123937)) and HS classes ([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6111375](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6111375)), we don't yet have anything that both (a) is a real live centralized landed integral _substitute_ for traditional HS/college and (b) rivals HYP/Stanford/Oxbridge/etc for prestige. Prestige (b) would be the tricky part...

Seems PG once said something about why K-12 "Hacker School" wouldn't work: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44896](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44896). (Click parent link for context.)

Thank you for posting this! I am inspired. If I get to homeschool my kids, I am definitely putting Unix/C/Lisp on the curriculum now.</comment>


Original working Apple-I computer fetches $375,000 at auction - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-45647449 <comment><AUTHOR> I guess he's well-known, but I don't remember ever hearing the name [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jony_Ive](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jony_Ive) before!</comment>


GMail Security Checklist - <AUTHOR> http://mail.google.com/support/bin/static.py?page=checklist.cs&tab=29488

<comment><USER2> _Watch out for messages that ask for your username and/or password. Gmail will never ask for this information._

While it's obvious what they're trying to say, this is oddly worded: of course it asks for your username and password when you log in.

</comment><comment><USER3> It's nice to see this list, but the sub-steps for each point should be integrated not external links. They also don't recommend not running as admin, which seems a glaring omission.

I'd also like to plug Secunia PSI quickly (I don't work for them): Windows is so painful for updates: every piece of software has their own update mechanism. Some want to uninstall/reinstall. There is no one place to tell them all "go on, download your updates", then "go on, install them all then reboot once". PSI scans your computer then tells you what needs updating.

</comment><comment><USER4> Interesting how odd it feels to use check boxes in an actual checklist, rather than in a form dialog.

</comment><comment><USER5> > Error saving checkmark: 404 (dismiss)

Happens every time I check a checkmark. (Not that Google ever has a way to report bugs, except for tracking down and posting in a neglected Google Group)

</comment><comment><USER6> It's a little strange in how it's implemented, but I think this is a good off the shelf awareness campaign for anyone using google apps.</comment>


Climatologist Judith Curry leaves academia over field's politicization - <AUTHOR> https://judithcurry.com/2017/01/03/jc-in-transition/ <comment><USER2> Could someone explain what is her overall position on global climate change is? Of the various positions I have seen advocated by skeptics, is it:

We can be certain the climate is not getting warmer.

The climate might or might not be getting warmer.

The climate is getting warmer, but it definitely has some other cause than human action.

The climate is getting warmer, and it might or might not be due to human actions.

The climate is getting warmer, and it is due at least to a considerable extent to human actions, but this will be on the whole good for the human race.

The climate is getting warmer, but it will have no overall impact on human well-being.

The climate is getting warmer, and it will be harmful, but it ought to be dealt with by free enterprise with little or no government action.

Or several other positions I have not mentioned.

Also, what does she think of those who hold one of the positions above that she does not hold--does she think they are irrational and ill-informed?

<comment><USER3> Skeptics might not be saying what they really believe. Some beliefs do not make for good sound bites in the political arena. For example:

The climate is probably getting warmer, and humans probably are causing this. This will help some people while hurting others, and we are more fond of the people who might benefit from warming. (compare Canada with Saudi Arabia, or Alaska with Hawaii) We can't do anything to prevent climate change without devastating our economy; the climate change is probably less harmful, at least to us. Whatever we do to reduce fossil fuel usage will reduce the global price of fossil fuel, thus encouraging fossil fuel use in other countries that would like an economic advantage over us. Other countries will cheat on any agreements we make. If the climate situation becomes really bad, the best- prepared countries will be the ones with the strongest economies. In conclusion, we won't do a damn thing.

That sure doesn't play well in a sound bite, does it? OK, plan B is to deny the issue.

It doesn't even have to be intentional. When people find potential conclusions unacceptable, they seek alternate facts until an acceptable conclusion is reached. That's just how the human mind works.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Extremely interesting, and - I believe - extending to the whole academic world, not only climatology.</comment>


Ask HN: Do you keep a collection of shell scripts and commands in your company? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> People often seems to be keeping git repositories with the commands, but I'm not sure how often is this approach used in companies.</comment>


Neanderthals Traversed Vast Distances - <AUTHOR> https://www.sapiens.org/archaeology/neanderthal-dispersal/ <comment><USER2> Here's a short but informative 'lecture' by anthropologist Stanislav Drobyshevsky, which finally comprehensively answered the myth of 'cavemen' for me. It's not about Neanderthals, but still: [https://youtube.com/watch?v=IihGveExaqU](https://youtube.com/watch?v=IihGveExaqU)

(English subs aren't stellar but they're there.)

He mentions that territory from Siberia to Central Europe was a well-trodden path in Paleolithic, and there's an example of one person traveling from some sea to the centre of Europe.

</comment><comment><USER3> Kudos to the article for having 2 clear maps that show exactly the various migrations that they are hypothesizing, including the different time frames.

One sad note: the maps show the present reduced state of the Aral sea, whereas historically, I think it would have had its original size. Unless the cold and dry climate of the time caused the same sort of shrinkage. To think that an entire sea (albeit fragile) has been wiped out by humans in my lifetime...

<comment><USER4> Note just that; the entire maps are showing present-day landscapes instead of ice-age landscapes. There should be glaciers, lower sea levels, and Doggerland.

<comment><USER5> Basically every historical map of Rome which includes Britannia also depicts the Netherlands as having its current coastline.

<comment><USER6> Though in that case, correct me if I am wrong, the old coastline was actually further inward.

<comment><USER5> Yes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> "This article was originally published at The Conversation and has been republished under Creative Commons."

Original article [https://theconversation.com/stone-tools-reveal-epic-trek- of-...](https://theconversation.com/stone-tools-reveal-epic-trek-of-nomadic- neanderthals-129886)

</comment><comment><USER8> This shouldn't be a big surprise. Just 150 years ago, tens of thousands of people simply walked across the continental US.

<comment><USER9> Tens of thousands of people still regularly walk across continents. The Appalachian trail and pacific trail, for example.

<comment><USER10> Most do so now supported by the infrastructure of modern society that requires them to carry less than ten days of food with them at any given time. And most of those hikers will travel into towns and cities and take long vehicle rides or even plane rides during their long hikes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> One question that nags me is why did people move so much?

Pop density was _very_ low. So I can't think they exhausted foodsources and it can't be that they hunted favorite pray to local extinction and were forced to follow...

So I guess they kinda liked to be separate from other clans to avoid strife? Or as a pop reproduced they have halvings and one of them had to migrate and one had to remain?

<comment><USER12> I always assume people probably weren't that different from you an I, just different skills. Assuming they had a handle on getting food, they probably just want to see what's over the next hill just because that's human nature. Meet women. Or look for better places to live. Or some belief gods are powerful over there. Much of the same reasons people travel today.

It's amazing how we travel today, but put a long walk in google maps and see how much distance you can cover in a week. Obviously roads help this but it's amazing how far you can get on foot in relatively small amount of time. When hiking rule of thumb is 6km/hr on road and 4km when in bush, unless really thick so you don't slow down that much.

Obviously this is me musing rather than evidence based so take with pitch of salt.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> This is still nothing compared to the migrations of "modern" humans, no?

One of my favorite ideas about human nature is that we are absolutely driven to explore. We walked all the way from Mesopotamia across all of Europe and down to the top of South America! Some ancient madlad hollowed out a boat and paddled to Australia! Why would someone do that?? But we continue to do the same thing trying to get to the moon, Mars, etc. It's a defining feature of the human race.

It's interesting that the neanderthals walked from Europe to Asia, but it's nothing compared to our ancestors explorations.

<comment><USER3> BTW, I think there was a land bridge to Australia for a time, though not all the way to the Asian continent: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wallacea](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wallacea)

It is perhaps unknowable whether someone went of exploring for years, then actually came back and got his/her remaining clan to migrate great distances. More likely that those migrations were multi-generational: the clan moved 20-50 miles every season following the game, and the descendants eventually got to a different continent.

However, there are examples of somewhat shorter distances in more modern times: I find it fascinating how the different cultures of Europe moved about: the Scandinavians to England and Normandy, later the Normans to Spain, Sicily, and Africa, the Slavs to the Balkans and Adriatic, etc. These are perhaps 1000 miles at most, but it seems like an entire warrior class and parts of the population went far away, conquered and installed themselves for generations in a foreign (and fully populated) place.

<comment><USER14> A couple of interesting articles I read concerning early arrival in Australia recently:

[http://theconversation.com/when-did-aboriginal-people- first-...](http://theconversation.com/when-did-aboriginal-people-first-arrive- in-australia-100830)

[https://www.sciencealert.com/50-000-years-ago-hundreds-of- an...](https://www.sciencealert.com/50-000-years-ago-hundreds-of-ancient- humans-made-the-first-voyage-to-australia)

The theories contained in those articles include the ideas that they arrived initially in relatively large numbers in a somewhat organized fashion, and migrated around the Australian coastline in both directions.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Can someone explain to me or point me to some sources as to how Neanderthals and Denisovans came about?

Was it just an older form of human that left Africa and turned into Neanderthal/Denisovan once they got to their "final" localities?

When did this happen? What was the form that left Africa and eventually turned into Neanderthals?

<comment> swagasaurus-rex Yes!

The current consensus is that Homo Erectus left africa ~2million years ago. Homo Erectus were upright tool wielders, but were likely replaced by another wave of hominid from Africa - the ancestors to Neandertals and Denisovans - Homo Heidelbergensis around 500,000 years ago.

Ancient Eurasia had a variety of upright apes mostly originating from these. When Homo Sapien-Sapien, most probably both you and I's ancestors, left Africa (again in several waves between 40,000-70,000 years ago), they encountered, interbred with, and maybe warred with upright, almost human looking people, though the differences would be visible in the frame of the body and likely the face.

More info can be found here:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_human_migrations](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_human_migrations)</comment></comment>


Republic – Now everyone can invest in startups - <AUTHOR> https://republic.co/ <comment><USER2> Interesting. These appear to be JOBS act short-form mini-IPOs.[1] That's something new, which just became possible this year and hasn't been used much.

Here's Farm from a Box's SEC filing.[2] Typical crappy terms - no voting rights, no anti-dilution, no transferability for one year, insiders have control.

Nobody associated with the project has a farming background. They have two employees. One is a liberal arts majors from UC Berkeley and one has an unspecified degree from UCLA. They do not have a working prototype farm according to the SEC filing.

The filing for Youngry [2] is more interesting. They want to start a glossy web site for young entrepreneurs. They claim lots of good contacts. (Miss Las Vegas?) They're only asking for $50K, which isn't enough. Two-person business.

Republic takes a 5% cut; that's how they make their money.

This is a reasonable concept, but the current set of deals isn't very impressive. These are people looking for Series A funding and would probably be rejected by YC. The idea behind the JOBS act short-form IPO was supposed to be that when your startup got too big for angel/friends and family/Kickstarter funding, there was a next level and an exit strategy for the original funders. It wasn't intended for startups this early.

You can look up these companies on the SEC's EDGAR system. If you scroll down all the way to the end of Republic's pages, there's a link.

[1] [https://media2.mofo.com/documents/120416-pli-quick-guide- job...](https://media2.mofo.com/documents/120416-pli-quick-guide-jobs-act.pdf) [2] [https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1679373/000167937316...](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1679373/000167937316000001/FFABFormC.pdf) [3] [https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1679372/000167937216...](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1679372/000167937216000002/YoungryFormC.pdf)

<comment><USER3> Regardless of the terms, all of these companies appear to be just terrible investments.

<comment><USER4> That's my impression too. Some, like Cringle on Companisto, looks OK-ish, but most of it is crap. At worst it's "delightful" candy subscriptions and at best it's a _slightly_ better implementation of something that already exists.

EDIT: Having just looked at Companisto's page I now get lots of advertisements all over the web from them. So that's why no good start-ups bother with crowd- investing - because the portals take a big fat cut and so the start-up effectively gets a lower valuation.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> You don't get shares if you invest -- you get something called a "crowd safe": [https://republic.co/learn/investors/crowdsafe](https://republic.co/learn/investors/crowdsafe)

More info here: [http://www.crowdfundinsider.com/2016/06/87034-republic- adds-...](http://www.crowdfundinsider.com/2016/06/87034-republic-adds-creates- crowd-safe-investing-vehicle-for-reg-cf-issuers/)

I'm a bit leery of these. According to the article, "unless specifically negotiated, SAFE holders do not have any voting or information rights." I also suspect that the shareholders get taken care of before crowd safe holders in legal or bankruptcy proceedings. The rights of crowd safe holders haven't been tested in court.

I think the lack of rights and additional risk inherent in crowd safes would need to be compensated for by some kind of discount relative to what investors pay for shares. Otherwise, the risk-adjusted return is lower.

I would also be skeptical of the potential of a startup that can't convince normal VCs to fund them. If people who do this for a living don't think a startup is worth investing in, why should I?

<comment><USER6> > I would also be skeptical of the potential of a startup that can't convince > normal VCs to fund them. If people who do this for a living don't think a > startup is worth investing in, why should I?

There are plenty of SaaS companies that are naturally limited in revenue potential.

In my experience, VCs are not interested in a company with a conservative forecast of 10MM ARR in 5 years. These are still viable businesses that need capital to actualize the plan.

Alternative lending sources are crucial to these companies. While the terms of this particular idea are not ideal, I think we will see a lot of new ideas in this realm over the coming years and some will be great!

<comment><USER7> How is an investor in such a company supposed to actually get a return? Unless the company is paying dividends or something similar, the only payout comes from selling your shares or if the company is acquired at a premium. But who is going to buy these companies with a conservative "slow and steady" growth rate and market share?

<comment><USER8> There are lots of ways to get a return. I helped start Lighter Capital (originally "RevenueLoan"), which invests a lump sum that gets repaid as a percentage of revenue (like a royalty). That model, Revenue-Based Financing, is harder to game than dividends (management can and often does make profit "disappear" but rarely has any incentive to make revenue disappear).

You can also have redemption rights or dividends. Depending on tax treatments these can be reasonably lucrative.

Of course, if you tautologically declare that the only payout is from an "exit" then no exit, no returns. But historically speaking "exits" are the exception, not the rule -- yet businesses have been aggregating capital and rewarding investors for centuries.

<comment><USER7> I totally agree, but in cases like Republic with a Crowd Safe, none of those options seem to apply unless I'm missing something. My question was for crowd funded smaller companies that have low potential of an exit - in those cases how is a crowd funding "investor" going to realize a return?

<comment><USER8> Very fair critique. The SAFE for all its merits is an exit-centric security.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The general counterargument to the "we're in a bubble" observation has been that it's all private equity, that people aren't risking their houses or 401(k)s on startups this time around. This would appear to be a move in that direction.

<comment><USER10> It's the modern day equivalent of public investment in penny stocks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> There are a number of similar sites (wefunder was YC, and Angellist dominates the space).

We shouldn't treat the "public at large" like kids, and they have the right to do what they want with their money.

HOWEVER, I do hope that people don't get hopped up on TechCrunch stories about gazillion dollar exits and then cash out their 401k to invest in some company or another.

They should know that the vast majority of startups fail, and that the chances are any particular one will fail. They should also understand that it isn't worth the due diligence for $100 or something, so you're really taking a flier unless you piggyback off someone else's diligence (which you should).

</comment><comment><USER12> Startups as investments are very risky with long payoff horizons. With their limited funds, this is a poor investment for the average investor. I can't help but feel like this will hurt more people then it will help.

<comment><USER13> I think it is healthy strategy to dedicate 5-10% of investment portfolio to high risks investments like this, even for average investor.

<comment><USER14> "SAFE holders do not have any voting or information rights".

With this kind of agreement, it's basically gambling since most info on start- ups is basically PR fluff. At least public companies have to publish annual reports and real investors get information rights.

<comment><USER13> Most of the startups have negative cashflow anyway. Early investors invest into potential, idea, team, tech, know how, market share.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> It appears that the Startup/issuer sets a static offering price [0]. When I envision how crowdsourced investing would reinvent this space, a huge component of the value added would be a degree of price-elasticity and feedback. It doesn't have to be a full-on auction, but getting the pricing right (for the issuer) seems like THE killer feature here... (thinking back to the concept of how Google priced their IPO )[1]. Offering a product that facilitated more innovative pricing structures at offering would be extremely compelling - and would greatly increase Republic.co's target market as well.

[0] [https://republic.co/learn/issuers/how_it_works](https://republic.co/learn/issuers/how_it_works) [1] [http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB108328345314098183](http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB108328345314098183) (potential paywall)

</comment><comment><USER16> Don't current Title III rules make it legally risky for companies to crowdfund like this? The last thing I read about this suggested that crowdfunding like this could put a startup in a position of having to effectively go public very early in their life --- which would suggest that none of the best startups would crowdfund, which would create a major adverse selection problem for Republic.

<comment><USER17> You're right -- a company with $25M in assets and 500 unaccredited shareholders is essentially forced to go public. That's why traditional security instruments are poorly suited for investment crowdfunding. We created and open-sourced a derivative of the YC Safe called the Crowd Safe to solve for this (more at [https://republic.co/crowdsafe](https://republic.co/crowdsafe)).

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Republic - Invest in the startups real investors won't invest in

<comment><USER19> That strikes me as a very cynical view, and I consider myself to be a pretty cynical guy. You could also make the same argument about other market platforms:

"Ebay - Buy things real shoppers won't"

"Uber - Get a ride somewhere real taxis won't go"

"Monster.com - Hire people real employers won't"

Is it really that different?

<comment><USER20> I'd call the appraisal justified. At least from where I sit, I'd say that the equivalent to eBay or Uber would be listing stock from startups that also have VC funding, and selling actual shares in the company.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Wow, I'm blown away by the negativity in this thread. I know Silicon Valley is conservative but this is killing it.

In Europe (of all places), this sort of stuff has been going on for a number of years now. The first startup I worked for had gathered its €150k preseed funding from over 20 people. Not even with a convertible note, they really all went to the lawyer's office together. It was pretty nuts, but it got the product out (and then tanked miserably but hey, people knew what they were getting into).

Sites like Leapfunder ([https://www.leapfunder.com/](https://www.leapfunder.com/)) have been doing what Republic does for years, but then in Europe. As far as I can see, the only reason the US is behind on this one is the "accredited investor" rule that European countries don't appear to have. I wonder how Republic works around that but I guess it's a good development. I have a hard time understanding how any "you're only allowed to X if you're rich" law can be fair (and I'd assume that especially libertarian HN would be with me on that one).

But still, HN's conclusion is that it's stupid to do this? What? Why is it stupid to invest $5k in a startup but not to invest $500k in a startup? If you ask me, that's irrational to the bone. If you really can't imagine some good reasons why a company wouldn't want to raise from a VC but would prefer to crowdfund, you didn't really try very hard.

I can't find it back but did HN react the same when Kickstarted got launched? Is there really that big a difference between "first to get a Pebble" and "first to get some Pebble shares"?

<comment><USER5> > Why is it stupid to invest $5k in a startup but not to invest $500k in a > startup?

Because if you invest $500k, you get information rights, and a significant number of votes. If you invest $5k, you get nothing, and you just have to hope the company makes good decisions. It's like buying a $5k lottery ticket -- it's an investment based entirely on trust without any information, accountability, or influence over the outcome.

I suspect that the real reason companies want to crowdfund is to raise money without giving information and voting rights to their investors.

<comment><USER22> > it's an investment based entirely on trust without any information, > accountability, or influence over the outcome

Assumes that an investor's extra-monetary 'influence' on a company is +EV.

<comment><USER23> Even if it's not, they have information about the finances and plans of a company that are highly relevant to the decision to invest.

And it also protects them against the worst case, where management acts in ways that are plainly hostile to shareholder interests.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> > Crowdfunding investing is highly speculative and every investment may result > in a loss. By investing small amounts across multiple companies, you can > reduce your risk compared to a large investment in a single company.

But there's only four companies.

> Do your own research. Read the documents provided by each company you plan > on investing in. Get independent legal, accounting, financial advice. If you > have any questions or need more information, ask the company.

Sounds expensive.

Maybe we crowdfund the advice too? Is someone going to make a robo-VC like lendingrobot?

</comment><comment><USER25> One of the tags for projects is "Women Founders". In theory that shouldn't make a difference as to how investable a project is or isn't? It seems as ridiculous as giving the founder's favourite colours or ethnicity. I just don't understand what they were thinking when they put that feature in.

</comment><comment><USER26> I can see this having all the same problems Kickstarter has with video games:

\- A bunch of people whose only experience with the industry is as consumers, with no real knowledge of how investing or the field they're investing in works

\- Companies that have little more than an idea and big promises, lacking the skill, manpower, and knowledge of how to see a product through from conception to release (plus a lack of knowledge on how to obtain those things)

\- Companies that stop updating and eventually just run off with the money

\- People who think they're entitled to a refund if what they invested in fails

Will "Angel Investor at Republic" overtake "CEO and Founder at Company That Is Literally Just A Facebook Page" as the job title of choice for wannabe tech bros?

</comment><comment><USER27> Jared Friedman, YC Partner, post from 3 days ago, on raising money online and the differences between the various crowdfunding services, Angellist syndicates and YC:

[http://www.themacro.com/articles/2016/08/raising-money- onlin...](http://www.themacro.com/articles/2016/08/raising-money-online- advice-for-startups/)

</comment><comment><USER28> How is this different than wefunder.com?

<comment><USER24> This really does seem the same. Actually, I invested in one there just so say I could.

But there's some weird things on this site:

\- there's something called investment clubs where you can recommend companies to nearly-passive investors and get 10% of something out of it. But there's no inventory on this site either so why are they being paid for no work? I'm sure I could guess every investment just from the name of their club and skip the middleman.

\- several companies are just selling you bonds ("revenue share" and "loan money"). Seems strictly worse than buying some regular bonds, and why does a startup want to return capital anyway?

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> It's not 'now' that it's suddenly possible.

CrowdCube (European startup) has been doing this for years.

</comment><comment><USER30> Why is a US bank account necessary while being a US citizen is not required?

<comment><USER31> Probably due to anti-moneylaundering requirements...

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Is this a signal to the smart money that it's time to get out?

<comment><USER20> I think it is.

(But personally -- although I can't prove that I'm smart money just yet -- I'd recommend avoiding tech stocks in the first place. Don't just think of the fate of Myspace and Netscape; think of Iomega and Sun Microsystems...)

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> What could possibly go wrong?

</comment><comment><USER34> oops, never mind :)

<comment><USER9> Wrong article.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Better investment plan: Send me your money via paypal and I'll call you an idiot.

<comment><USER24> Those are called findoms, but you'll have to try advertising somewhere else.</comment></comment>


About Gigafollowers on Twitter - <AUTHOR> http://barredo.wordpress.com/2008/07/10/about-gigafollowers-on-twitter/

<comment><USER2> "number of people allowed to follow = people following me * N"

Makes it tough to get started on Twitter. If I sign up, I want to find my 10 closest friends and follow them right away.

It'd be good to introduce a formula, but that one isn't quite the right one. Maybe a velocity based solution?

<comment><AUTHOR> with an "more than" clause, or with exponentials you can solve that.</comment></comment>


(UK) CMA tackles undisclosed advertising online - <AUTHOR> https://www.gov.uk/government/news/cma-tackles-undisclosed-advertising-online <comment><AUTHOR> HN has talked about ad-blocking, and about how that might increase the use of paid-for-content.

This article is a reminder that the paid for content needs to be clearly marked as an ad in the UK.

This article is from the Competition and Markets Authority (a non-ministerial department of UK government). But there has been enforcement action from other regulators too.

Here's what the Advertising Standards Authority (an industry group) say about vlogging and sponsored content: [https://www.asa.org.uk/News-resources/Media- Centre/2015/New-...](https://www.asa.org.uk/News-resources/Media- Centre/2015/New-vlogging-advertising-guidance.aspx#.VwJKipwrK01)

[https://www.cap.org.uk/Advice-Training-on-the- rules/Advice-O...](https://www.cap.org.uk/Advice-Training-on-the-rules/Advice- Online-Database/Video-blogs-Scenarios.aspx#.VwJKjJwrK01)

Notice that the vlogging guidance says the marking-as-an-ad needs to happen _before_ the user clicks anything - a message at the beginning of the video is not sufficient.</comment>


Ask HN: As an "IT Professional" do you/should you get to claim overtime? - <AUTHOR>

I'm curious to learn about how other jurisdictions from my own (the province of Ontario, in Canada) stack up in regards to IT professionals' ability to claim overtime. Is it common or uncommon where you work/live? Moreover, do you think that IT professionals should qualify for overtime?
For a little background, in Ontario, an "IT professional" is defined as "professionals who use specialized knowledge and professional judgement to work with information systems based on computers and related technologies." (http://www.labour.gov.on.ca/english/es/guide/guide_22.html#information)
This definition is so broad that it covers everything from tech support staff to software engineers. According to the Ontario Employment Standards act, an IT professional is exempt from sections VII and VIII of the act, which cover Hours of Work, Daily Rest Periods, Weekly/Bi-Weekly Rest Periods, Eating Periods, and Overtime. This means that there are no regulations for IT professionals in these areas. Naturally, it seems you'd be hard-pressed to find an ITP that can claim overtime in Ontario, and, I suppose, technically, employers here do not even have to provide you with time to eat or sleep. <comment><USER2> Be careful what you wish for.

We don't have the exception clause here in BC; every employee is entitled to overtime.

If you aren't unionised, it's important however to keep overtime and other such laws in context as they apply to your entire job. In other words, if you want your employer to be a stickler with regards to paying you for that 41st hour, they're probably going to be a stickler with other things too, like ensuring you take 15 minute breaks, a half hour lunch maximum. Or even better, making sure you never work a minute of overtime again; sticking you with the worst possible tasks and projects.

It's give and take.

Are there employers that basically break the law. Of course. But there are a myriad of other trade offs that need to be considered from wages to promotions to perks. If everything after all that is still a raw deal, leave.

If you do work for a union though, my condolences.

</comment><comment><USER3> I certainly think you should be able to claim overtime. I never work overtime myself, but if I did, I'm sure I could claim it. Then again, the company I work for basically rocks, so... your mileage may vary.

</comment><comment><USER4> I live in California, and we have a similar law here:

<http://www.philtres.com/vlb/CA_515_5.html>

</comment><comment><USER5> So long as I can claim under time and go home when I'm done with my work for the day I don't care much either way.</comment>


IFTTT Pro - <AUTHOR> http://ifttt.com/pro <comment><USER2> Love IFTTT. Very useful features in Pro:

\- Multi-step Applets

\- Queries and conditional logic

\- Multiple actions

\- Faster Applet execution

The name your own price (>$1.99/m) for first year is a very smart pricing strategy to move into freemium model.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> How would the Pro version compare to zapier?

1.99 minimum seems too cheap vs competitors in the space

<comment><USER3> That's only for the first year though</comment></comment>


Six Figure Speeding Ticket - <AUTHOR> http://www.trafficticketsecrets.com/speeding-ticket-news-finnish.html <comment><USER2> Fines are meant to teach the offender a lesson. You can't teach a millionaire a lesson with a $50 ticket, though.

<comment><USER3> In many countries they have demerit points, which are the way the lesson gets taught. Too many demerit points and you lose you license etc.

Fines should be punitive in nature but not excessively. Rich, poor, male, female, straight, gay, all should be treated the same.

<comment><USER4> Problem is: a $50 ticket means nothing for the rich but leaves the poor without bread. So the ticket treats them the same but the result doesn't.

<comment><USER3> But fines are imposed for an offense. If someone who gets a fine for $50 and cannot buy bread, probably in this example should not speed.

<comment><USER2> This is an interesting notion. Does this mean that wealthy people are allowed to put everyone including themselves and their families in danger because they can afford to laugh about the fines? I know from personal experience that while I'm shrugging off speeding tickets when I get them, they really cut deep into the budget of some people I know. Do you think that's right?

<comment><USER3> I disagree with your line of thinking.

If poor people are deterred from speeding because of the cost of the fine, then why are we talking about poor people getting fined at all, after all they wouldn't be speeding.

Just because someone has money it does not mean they will flaunt the law because they can afford the fine.

In both cases correlation does not imply causation.

Where demerit point systems are in place both poor and rich lose their licenses after too many infringements.

<comment><USER2> > Just because someone has money it does not mean > they will flaunt the law > because they can afford > the fine.

Apparently, it does:

"It is generally the case that people getting less absolutely risk averse as they get wealthier."

[http://marcfbellemare.com/wordpress/2012/02/speeding- fines-t...](http://marcfbellemare.com/wordpress/2012/02/speeding-fines-that- vary-with-income-absolute-vs-relative-risk-aversion-and-public-policy/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> From 2002</comment>


GitHub Glossary - <AUTHOR> https://help.github.com/articles/github-glossary

<comment><USER2> Related: Fox News' version of the Github Dictionary - [http://i.imgur.com/MKjkKJ9.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/MKjkKJ9.jpg)

<comment><USER3> if you have the original clip/video for context I'd be thankful

<comment><USER4> [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2vJNNAQZlg#t=130](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2vJNNAQZlg#t=130)

<comment><USER3> Apperantly repo means resiprosity

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Would probably help prevent this from happening again: [https://twitter.com/atmos/status/378259676141338624](https://twitter.com/atmos/status/378259676141338624)

</comment><comment><USER6> My compulsive need for things to be alphabetical is going haywire because Pull Request is after Push

<comment><USER7> Knew we should have used a bubble sort. Thanks for catching that. [https://help.github.com/articles/github-glossary#pull- reques...](https://help.github.com/articles/github-glossary#pull-request)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Whaaaaat?.. Needs "merge" and "rebase".</comment>


Alleged Bitcoin 'creator' is crowdfunding his lawsuit against Newsweek - <AUTHOR> http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/14/6973389/dorian-nakamoto-lawsuit-newsweek <comment><AUTHOR> direct link: [http://www.newsweeklied.com/](http://www.newsweeklied.com/)</comment>


Anyone else have expensive legal? - <AUTHOR> http://gist.io/3146270

<comment><AUTHOR> Also, that was my first time using gist.io, and I must say it was awesome.</comment>


Standalone web applications using OCaml + Ocsigen, benchmarked against Rails - <AUTHOR> http://eigenclass.org/R2/writings/standalone-ocaml-webapps

<comment><USER2> A look at the language shootout ([http://shootout.alioth.debian.org/u32q/benchmark.php?test=al...](http://shootout.alioth.debian.org/u32q/benchmark.php?test=all&lang=all)) shouldn't make this so surprising. OCaml is faster than Ruby (about 24x faster which, incidentally, is pretty close to the 22x greater requests served).

But as someone who has done a lot of web applications and as many of you I'm sure feel: it doesn't matter how fast your web application runs. What matters is whether your database layer and the schema you're using scales.

I guess the only arena that I really care about performance in is the database/datastore arena. Plus, Ruby is getting better optimized. Ruby 1.9 should be a huge leap forward and while it won't beat OCaml, it will be much, much better. So, I guess I can't get too worried about a performance problem that's easily taken care of - unlike database performance problems which are a complete PITA!

<comment><AUTHOR> Personally I think ruby is fast enough in most cases. I'd vote for lower memory usage though.

But the point is that ocaml brings so much more interesting tings to web application development and deploy than raw speed, though that helps too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Nobody, anywhere, under any circumstances, has ever chosen Rails for the speed. So this is interesting, but not particularly useful.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> read the comment number 5 for quick explanation.

</comment><comment><USER4> this is like comparing Apache vs Rails.

OCaml + Ocsigen is just a web server with handy features to generate clean modern html. Rails on the other hand has an ORM plus the other libraires to make it a real web framework.

<comment><USER5> What is needed to make something a "real" web framework? Ocsigen/Eliom does handle sessions, routing, page parameters, forms, continuation-based sites, templating and other things you'd expect from a web framework. The main thing Rails includes but Ocsigen/Eliom doesn't is an ORM.</comment></comment>


TSA considers new system for flyers without ID - <AUTHOR> https://papersplease.org/wp/2020/08/11/tsa-considers-new-system-for-flyers-without-id/ <comment><USER2> > The main reason for the TSA to outsource the questioning of travelers and > scoring of answers is to evade the rules applicable to collection and use of > personal data by Federal agencies. … The nominal "fly/no-fly" decision will > still be made by the TSA, not the contractor. But that "decision" will be a > rubber-stamp approval or disapproval based solely on whether the app shows a > "pass" or "fail" score, or whether the would-be traveler doesn't have a > suitable smartphone or is otherwise unable or unwilling to complete the app- > based process.

You hear the drug trade is really lucrative but you're not allowed to sell drugs, so you send your money to a contractor that sells drugs, they give you more money back, and you technically haven't "sold drugs."

Somehow, thinking breaks down at the boundary between systems, because inexplicably the constraints or guarantees of the consuming system do not propagate to the providing system.

TSA could and should be (made) identity-agnostic, with its mandate to protect vehicles and occupants. Immigration is what should care about the individual that's being allowed into the country.

<comment><USER3> You just had your servers hacked into and all your database are belong to them. The black hats demand X number of BitCoins as ransom, but you cannot pay because it violates certain laws. So you hire an intermediary who pays for you, thereby avoiding the legal problem.

[https://www.theverge.com/2020/8/4/21353842/garmin- ransomware...](https://www.theverge.com/2020/8/4/21353842/garmin-ransomware- attack-wearables-wastedlocker-evil-corp)

<comment><USER4> This also seems like it pretty unambiguously still breaks the law. Has it been tested in court yet?

I wonder if it's kind of a "it's small fry, and these businesses are getting their data back, we'll turn our backs to it unless it's actual violent terrorists receiving ransom money" sort of thing.

<comment><USER5> Haven't touched it at all, but I strongly suspect that the hired corporation is treated like a blackbox.

Middleman: OK, hand us the encrypted data and 125% of whatever the ransomeware is asking.

Middleman: Outcome A: Here's your data back. Outcome B: We were unable to get your data back, here's your full refund.

<comment><USER6> Isn't that willful ignorance, and therefore on shaky ground legally.

<comment><USER7> You do have to prove intent of willful ignorance beyond a reasonable doubt though, which is easier said than done.

It takes legwork to establish intent, which is why justice is never carried out very quickly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> "A traveler who shows up at a TSA checkpoint would, it appears, be told they have to install the mobile app, pay a fee through the app (which presumably would require a credit or debit card or bank account), complete the in-app questioning, and show a "pass" result from the app to the TSA staff or contractors in order to "complete screening" and proceed through the checkpoint."

Install an app that does god only know on your cell. Hard pass. I keep debating just downgrading to dumb phone, but something always stops me ( right now it is playing with Pinephone ).

This, naturally, does not change the actual outcome ( can't fly without complying with TSA demands ), but I thankfully do not fly a lot these days.

<comment><USER9> Do you simply show your phone screen to them? Seems like a bit of a security flaw, given that I can just mock up a "pass" screen and show it to the TSA agent, no?

<comment><USER10> [https://beta.sam.gov/api/prod/opps/v3/opportunities/resource...](https://beta.sam.gov/api/prod/opps/v3/opportunities/resources/files/902095c2eb274282b84047c261898e45/download?api_key=null&token=)

        The system shall be able to generate both a human-readable and machine-readable result.
         i. The objective is to display to a Transportation Security Officer (TSO) that a
         passenger has a "pass" or a "fail" status
         ii. A machine-readable form factor should include the capability to be read by TSA's
        Credential Authentication Technology (CAT) machine, e.g., a PDF 417 barcode or a
        Checksum format
         1. Data in the machine readable zone would include Name, DOB, and Gender
         to facilitate real-time Secure Flight screening

So I guess the machine-readable output could include some verification that it was not just a "PASS" JPG.

It actually is a decent enough RFI.

I've had to fly (accidentally) without an ID a few times and it is kind of annoying. I'd be happy if I could have used something like this instead.

<comment><USER11> I literally don't have enough space on my iPhone se and always forget my App Store password because I so rarely use it. And I make decent money so I could afford a new phone.

But people who can't afford a new phone, I've met many, will be unable to fly in the same circumstances that people with money can without a problem.

It's a class system.

Not to mention older people who are sometimes technologically challenged.

If the app is purely optional and has no influence on the decision other than efficiency, then it's acceptable.

<comment><USER9> Well, it does sound like it's only for when you don't have any kind of ID, so yeah seems optional.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Right, the people who still don't allow you to board with an excess ounce of water or makeup suddenly care about making air travel a pleasant experience.

<comment><USER13> It is somewhat depressing to watch _American Graffiti_ , or for that matter soviet movies, and see people just going out to the boarding stairs and getting on the plane like they would a bus.

<comment><USER14> In some places it still happens. Around 2004 I boarded a plane with stairs in Cancun.

My wife's Aunt and Uncle have been serial travelers for decades. One time her uncle forget his briefcase in the 80s. She convinced the counter person to get someone to take his briefcase to the taxing plane. The pilot opened the window and a maintenance guy threw him the briefcase. When the pilot handed him his briefcase he said I don't know who you are or how you pulled this off but it's impressive it worked. The uncle had no idea he left it until that point.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> So according to the request for information[1], it looks like the TSA wants a system that can validate an identity exists (given name, date of birth, address, phone number) and that the identity belongs to the person using the app. The first part looks pretty trivial, given the enormous corpus of databases out there (credit reports, public records, etc.), but what about the second part? Presumably you'd need some sort of database linking identities to photos, and validate that photo against the user's selfie or something. The question is, where would that photo database come from? State DMVs? If your photo is in the DMV database, wouldn't that also mean you have a drivers license, and therefore could use that rather than the app? What's preventing someone from impersonating someone else by scraping the internet for "similar" faces to their own, finding the associated id, and claiming that they're that person?

[1] [https://beta.sam.gov/api/prod/opps/v3/opportunities/resource...](https://beta.sam.gov/api/prod/opps/v3/opportunities/resources/files/902095c2eb274282b84047c261898e45/download?api_key=null&token=)

<comment><USER16> > If your photo is in the DMV database, wouldn't that also mean you have a > drivers license, and therefore could use that rather than the app

Perhaps today, but if the REAL ID rules ever actually kick in, just having a driver's license won't necessarily be enough. It got pushed back from an Oct start date to some unspecified future date.

There's been some press about this, but when these rules do go into effect, I suspect there will be stories about people that have trouble taking their flight.

<comment><USER17> I believe in California, that unspecified future date is Oct 01, 2021 (for boarding planes).

[https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/driver-licenses- identification...](https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/driver-licenses- identification-cards/real-id/what-is-real-id/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I'd add one more:

* The WiFi in the airport is hostile? No Fly.

I once tried to rely on a mobile boarding pass to get through security. The process required Internet access, and I wasn't able to pull it up.

It wasn't until I was on the other side of security (via a paper pass) that I realized the airport WiFi was falsifying DNS results, and that was preventing me from pulling up the pass on the mobile device. But handling "DNS server is reachable but being actively man-in-the-middled" wasn't a code path the developer had thought of (I know _I_ wouldn't have…). I needed to open a browser and agree to some inane ToS or watch an ad, or something, before I could get unadulterated Internet access.

<comment><USER19> I really like that I can add boarding passes to Apple Wallet and they're available totally offline. There's not a lot Wallet is good for (adoption is too low) but it's great at Boarding Passes.

<comment><USER20> I absolutely never do this. Maybe because I'm paranoid, and especially if I'm flying internationally, I never, ever, feel comfortable handing my mobile device to security or Immigration. I still get a paper one every time.

<comment><USER21> You can access boarding pass while your phone is locked.

<comment><USER20> Sure, but that doesn't solve my (perhaps somewhat irrational) issue with physically handing my phone to people I don't really trust, especially when out of my home country.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Non-US folks who are wondering what Real ID is, and why this site seems to hate it so much, the United States is best considered in the context of the European Union but with US internal politics regarding data sharing between the federation and its member states.

There are fifty member states with full privileges and around ten member states with reduced privileges.

The federation issues government IDs in two ways.

First, the federation government issues federation IDs in the form of passports. These are accepted as proof of identity only, and grant no additional privileges beyond proof of residency within the federation.

Second, each member state issues their own photo IDs following their own independent processes. These are neither proof of citizenship to the federation's border control, nor to other countries, and data sharing agreements historically did not exist between the states and the federation.

The member states of the EU issue passports as the state ID card, and requires each member state to accept those passports as approximately equal to their own for most intents and purposes. The US federation also requires its member states to accept both any member state IDs and also federation passports.

"RealID" is an effort by the federation to be able to determine from your state ID card whether you are a federation member. It defines a minimum burden of proof of citizenship that states must require and verify, and presumably share with the federation, in order to issue an ID card with a federation membership indicator. For political reasons, many member states and many citizens do not believe it is appropriate for the federation to make this demand of the member states. I believe this is in contrast to the EU, where data sharing between authorities of member states regarding federation passports is required by the foundation, but I'm not 100% certain.

I hope this helps. Please treat this as a teaching example and do not make immigration, travel, taxation, or citizenship decisions based on it. I am not your lawyer.

<comment><USER23> Just a minor nitpick: A US Passport is more than proof of residency. It's proof of citizenship. When you get a job in the US, your employer needs to check your citizenship. A passport alone does the trick. Otherwise, you need both an ID and some other proof of your right to work, like a birth certificate (birthright citizenship), naturalization card, or a work permit of some kind from the US government (green card and such).

<comment><USER22> For teaching purposes, I didn't address social security numbers and other such tangents, as it isn't strictly necessary to help non-US folks understand how the US federation compares to the EU's for the purposes of RealID.

Social security numbers are a _second_ federation ID (but not a photo ID) that anyone who pays you money is required to ask you for. You're only required to present the 9-digit ID number, not the actual ID card, oddly enough. Temporary worker visa holders are exempt for whatever reason.

Untangling the intricate web between proof of birth, proof of residency of state, proof of residency of federation, and proof of taxability in federation is beyond the scope of my time available here. Disclaimer, I am not your lawyer, please seek professional guidance when making decisions.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> This will be a disaster as is usually the case with government outsourcing duties to the less qualified private sector. Surely there must be a "law" named after this by now.

Realid itself is a clusterfuck. I tried to get a driver's license with it. Presented all the paperwork. Was told my signed lease was not acceptable proof of residence and that it would be impossible. I'd have to get a regular driver's license or come back at a later time, pay again and more this time for a second license. Fuck that. What a clusterfuck of stupidity. I'll try again when it renews, assuming the pandemic in the US is completely done. Or not. It's just a fact of life that to fly from state to state, one needs to carry a passport now. In a "free" country. How ridiculous.

<comment><USER8> What annoys me about realid is the time it takes to make it. It takes weeks ( as opposed to being able to get one the very same day at dmv ). So average user is told tuff noodles, while average person who uses fake, working id has criminals working 24/7 to ensure easy access ( [https://www.fox5ny.com/news/shipments-of- nearly-20000-fake-d...](https://www.fox5ny.com/news/shipments-of- nearly-20000-fake-drivers-licenses-seized-at-chicago-airport) ).

And when you point it out people say something along the lines "Well, that's why you need realid!". It gets depressing fast.

<comment><USER25> God... "CBP said most of the fake IDs were for college-age students. Many had the same photo but different names. But one alarming discovery was that the barcode on the fake Michigan licenses actually worked, CBP said. "

Yes I've been telling everyone who'll here this. The PDF417 bar code at the back is just plain text without any kind of digital signature. Anyone could generate a new one. There are apps that do it for you. Since there's no digital signature, there's no way of verifying that it is authentic. There's nothing ALARMING about this. The bar code is an open standard and anyone can generate a new one. It would be alarming if they faked the digital signature.

<comment><USER26> I think the alarming thing is that it doesn't have a digital signature, meaning that scanning the barcode isn't a useful check if an ID is fake.

<comment><USER25> Yup to us techies it seems obvious that you should have a digital signature.

But for whatever reason, this wasn't done.

<comment><USER27> You can't have digital signatures without all of the attendant PKI baggage. And if you're going to implement all of the PKI baggage, might as well go all the way and start issuing people smart cards.

<comment><USER28> It doesn't need to be full PKI. Just link to some internal website ran by the State that spits out DB info about how "Joe's license, numberd 01010101 is valid". Georgia already does this for temporary license plates (Pardon the TLS 1.1): [https://www.gada.com/index.php?module=FileShare&func=downloa...](https://www.gada.com/index.php?module=FileShare&func=download&file_id=1116)

<comment><USER26> I think the issue is you'll only achieve restricting things to cloned licenses instead of arbitrary fakes (which might still be an improvement).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> The reason you can fly without any ID (even today - try it) is that feds cannot stop citizens from freely moving in the country (see multiple filings from TSA in various cases, incl, for example, Gilmore v. Gonzales). They do not like acknowledging this but you can do it. The procedure is secret and they refuse to explain it (even to the court), but you can do it. i've done it just to see how it would go a few times. It works. You do need to press them on it a bit.

This fee approach will not work for the same reason: it is an impediment to free movement (fee).

You can read more here: [https://papersplease.org/wp/2015/04/09/why-did-the- tsa-preve...](https://papersplease.org/wp/2015/04/09/why-did-the-tsa-prevent- these-people-from-flying/)

<comment><USER30> "The procedure is secret and they refuse to explain it (even to the court), but you can do it."

I think you're overblowing this ... as it is neither secret nor unexplainable. Any ticket agent at any airport knows exactly how to process a frantic ( mom + 2 kids ) who forgot her ID at home and the flight leaves in 75 mins.

The ticket agents, the security personnel and the gate personnel all know how to deal with (forgot ID at home).

<comment><USER31> So... Please explain it then. Or link to a document from the TSA that explains it.

Just because it's known by a lot of people doesn't mean it's not a secret. The ticket agent might not even know the full system, just what they have to do to get that frantic mom and 2 kids off their back.

<comment><USER30> "So... Please explain it then."

Enter airport. Walk to departures agent of your airline and explain that you forgot your ID and there is no way that someone can bring it to you, or that you can retrieve it, in time to make the flight.

You get extra screening and a specially marked boarding pass and you get on the plane with everyone else.

My wife did this as recently as 12 months ago. SFO->MSP.

YMMV. IANAL.

<comment><USER31> You know very well that that's not what "explain it" means. If you think the process isn't a secret, then find a document detailing the entire process, with specifics, end to end.

What happens in the extra screening? Is it the same throughout the country? What might vary in the process (YMMV, after all), etc.

You have a purely anecdotal account of what can happen at an airport that isn't even staffed by the TSA ([https://www.flysfo.com/about-sfo/safety- security](https://www.flysfo.com/about-sfo/safety-security)). What everyone else is looking for is a specific, detailed, transparent description of the entire process.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> If anyone's curious, the current system is laughable. I flew after getting my wallet stolen in a smash and grab.

Questions: Name DOB Family members names Home address Nearby landmarks

All public info.

If there's nothing going on behind the scenes it's just more security theater.

<comment> Mary-Jane I got home from a business trip a couple years ago, unpacked my bags, and found the switchblade I'd lost a few months prior. I went through security twice with those bags...

<comment><USER33> Similar thing happened to me, I had 1/8 ounce weed in my hand bag I unknowingly packed, flew in from Los Angeles -> China -> India. I went through rigorous security checks with police dogs and fully body scanners at both LA and China. I panicked when I opened my bag when I reached home.

<comment> blaser-waffle Holy shit dog, that could have fucked you hard; your panic is justified.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Better idea of course - abolish the TSA. I mean harshly enough the pandemic proves they don't really care about tens of thousands of lives so their justification for existence is even more moot - on top of their ineffectualness.

<comment><USER35> 9/11 will never happen again because the idea of a plane hijacking for ransom no longer exists in passengers' minds. If someone hijacks a plane now, the passengers assume the hijackers have suicidal intent and will curb stomp the hijackers to death or die trying. So in that regard I think TSA confiscating scissors and pen knives is just silly. A simple metal detector is sufficient for finding large weapons like guns.

On the other hand, terrorists' only option now is to just destroy the plane and kill all the passengers onboard. Cabin doors are locked, so this involves blowing up a bomb concealed somewhere (checked luggage, shoes, liquid explosives, etc). How do you propose we detect whether someone is trying to smuggle a bomb on a plane without something like the TSA? Just keep an eye out for nervous passengers and report them?

In other words, if we abolish the TSA tomorrow and replace it with metal detectors, what's to stop someone from bringing a few gallons of chemical explosives in their backpack, mixing them in the lavatory, and blowing up the plane? TSA has always caught when I accidentally left a full water bottle in my backpack.

<comment><USER36> >In other words, if we abolish the TSA tomorrow and replace it with metal detectors, what's to stop someone from bringing a few gallons of chemical explosives in their backpack, mixing them in the lavatory, and blowing up the plane?

The reality is that it's already feasible to sneak conventional weapons and explosives past TSA. Here are two fairly recent investigations on the TSA's efficacy, one from 2015 [1] and one from 2017 [2]. Both of these undercover investigations were performed by the Department of Homeland Security. The first one found that in 67 out of 70 tests, agents were able to get weapons past TSA, including a fake IED strapped to an agent's back. The second found that this failure rate dropped from 2015's staggering 95% to "in the ballpark" of 80%.

Yes, the TSA always stops you when you bring a full water bottle. Eight times out of ten, they won't confiscate your gun or bomb. Even if they did, what's to stop someone from mixing chemicals to cause an explosion on a bus? Or in a crowded hotel? Or an elementary school? Or a mall? Or...

In my opinion, there simply aren't that many people with both the desire and means to do these things.

[1] [https://abcnews.go.com/US/exclusive-undercover-dhs-tests- fin...](https://abcnews.go.com/US/exclusive-undercover-dhs-tests-find- widespread-security-failures/story?id=31434881)

[2] [https://abcnews.go.com/US/tsa-fails-tests-latest- undercover-...](https://abcnews.go.com/US/tsa-fails-tests-latest-undercover- operation-us-airports/story?id=51022188)

<comment><USER37> And let's not ignore the fact that someone could just kidnap the pilots families and blackmail them into "hijacking" their own plane. An organisation with the money and motivation doesn't care about the TSA and their security theater.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> the thought TSAcaptcha for air travel came to mind about halfway through reading.

<comment><USER15> [ ] I'm not a terrorist

<comment><USER39> Bush era South Carolina passed a law, and thus created a related form, that required terrorists to register themselves as such at the DMV.

I used to have it on file somewhere, now it's buried in an old hard drive. Would love to have one again. Would love even more to do a FOIA request to see if they ever actually got any filled out.

<comment><USER40> It reminds me of the paper forms I'd have to fill out when entering the US on a UK passport. The forms would ask questions like whether or not I was a nazi that participated in the holocaust.

<comment><USER41> They still ask that. They will ask those questions whenever you need a visa issued or renewed. I wondered if anyone has ever said yes to the genocide questions.

<comment><USER42> Their purpose isn't to get accurate information, they're there to give immigration authorities an easy legal way to kick someone out for something that would otherwise require a higher standard of evidence. I.e. anyone answering yes to that question is obviously a red flag but a former SS officer who writes in no can be kicked out by proving he knowingly lied on the forms due to his past as an SS agent without proving he was involved in or knew about the atrocities, which could be a lot harder.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> They claim that requiring a REAL-ID to fly is illegal, and link to this PDF ([https://papersplease.org/wp/wp- content/uploads/2020/05/IDP-f...](https://papersplease.org/wp/wp- content/uploads/2020/05/IDP-form-415-19MAY2020.pdf)) which appears to be a sort of letter from The Identity Project attempting to explain that what the TSA is doing is illegal. So, I don't know if I buy that it matters. If I show up on Oct 2, 2021, without a REAL-ID (i.e., a pre-realID california driver's license, which is what I have because DMV lines are fucked and appointments are fucked too), I think I won't be able to fly, no matter how much I wave a PDF in the face of TSA officials.

<comment><USER43> Get a passport. In CA it's the only means of getting a second ID, aka a backup ID. I once almost didn't get a job, because DMV was late sending me my driver's license renewal, and for one week I had no valid ID, and that was the week I needed to start work.

<comment><USER44> CA DMV will issue you an 'identification card' in addition to a drivers' license which very handy to have as a backup.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> I bet that those responsible for 9/11 couldn't have hoped in their wettest dreams that Americans will be subject to random strip searches and patdowns in their own country for decades to come. Terrorists and US gov response made that happen.

Time for the citizens to ask - whether that response was right.

"Those willing to give up a little bit of freedom to gain a little bit of security deserve neither and will soon lose both"

<comment><USER25> To me this isn't a question of liberty or not. I find that silly. You don't have any constitutional "right" to fly. You probably have a constitutional right to free movement within the US (whether it's walking, driving, etc).

The bigger issue with these pat downs, scans, fluid limits, etc is whether they're effective.

Bruce Schneier has written at great length (and very smartly) about this stuff. And I agree with him that the single most effective deterrent to the next 9/11 is secure cockpit doors, and a close second is passengers not willing to "allow" a plane to get hijacked anymore (whereas hijackings in the past had a sliver of hope that you'd get out safely, after 9/11 I think passengers know there might be certain death, so why not fight?)

<comment><USER46> You do have the right to travel. The constitution does not specify a mode. Ergo, all modes are protected equally, and no-fly lists are unconstitutional. It's not like you get a background check to buy a printing press.

The ACLU mounted an attack on the no-fly list that was credible enough government changed procedure.

This would imply drivers licenses and car registration are also unconstitutional. You can tax them and have traffic laws, but not do those things.

<comment><USER47> > You do have the right to travel. The constitution does not specify a mode

The constitution does not specify the first bit either; it's all been inferred by court rulings [0]

[0][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_movement_under_Unit...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_movement_under_United_States_law)

<comment><USER46> I'm aware, my view is the court's current views are incomplete. Courts can be wrong.

What draws the most interest is the right to enter states freely. Combine that with the need to travel and participate in commerce and you quickly arrive at the conclusion the right to travel in general must also be protected, and indeed we can see the hardships brought upon people when they are unable to drive, etc.

<comment><USER48> Good luck arguing your opinion though - go watch a few videos of "sovereign citizens" trying to argue they don't need a driver's license to "travel" when pulled over driving.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> I was curious what the process was ~4 years ago for this so I "misplaced" my ID flying from SF to LA and the first agent at the beginning of the line looked me up on LinkedIn then they did a bag inspection and they let me through (I had a pass on my phone).

It was very ... lenient.

</comment><comment><USER50> Its funny that this is worse than China's social credit score, there at least you know you are on the shitlist.

Much these days boils down to

"Like China, but worse technical execution and privatized to some contractor (who is probably a family member)"

</comment><comment><USER51> This is an encouraging step in the right direction, though I wonder what data this external service might capture.

I have never heard an explanation of why the name of the ticket holder should matter. The stupid thermometer tests always make me think of this so-called requirement.

</comment><comment><USER52> Is this website really arguing that you should be able to fly without identifying yourself?

I'm a big proponent of privacy and not identifying yourself to government official unless needed, but it seems like proving identify to fly is a pretty reasonable rule.

<comment><USER53> The 9/11 hijackers had ID. Turns out terrorists don't care if you know who they are.

<comment><USER52> Plenty of people pass the background check and commit crimes. Should we eliminate gun background checks entirely?

<comment><USER54> Freedom of movement and use of weapons are considered differently, thankfully.

<comment><USER52> Both are constitutionally protected, so why are they considered different?

The courts have stated that reasonably limitations on freedoms are allowed.

<comment><USER54> They are for obvious reasons, and limits are not applied to movement in public.

<comment> kube-system I don't necessarily agree with the above analogy, but there are definitely limits applied to movement in public.

Crowd control, occupancy laws, trespassing laws, curfews, checkpoints, etc.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


MapSCII: World map renderer for your console - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/rastapasta/mapscii <comment><USER2> Shameless plug for: `ssh brow.sh -t [https://maps.google.com`](https://maps.google.com`)

<comment><USER3> It's too bad that text labels don't show up correctly (because they're rendered to pixels like the map), but otherwise, wow that's impressive. It works like a charm on XTerm on Mac. (It doesn't work with Terminal.app, but that's because Terminal doesn't support 24-bit colour commands IIRC, so I am not surprised).

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Awesome! I recently spent a while making an animated ASCII globe in Python, rendering a map with Cartopy and Matplotlib and then converting the pixel array to ASCII characters. It was not elegant. Perhaps I'll switch to this.

[https://gist.github.com/rgov/97f57e58fcfc999a26501f91392606b...](https://gist.github.com/rgov/97f57e58fcfc999a26501f91392606bc)

<comment><USER5> Have a screenshot?

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Asciinema has a hilarious full-screen mode, at least in FF: it's a fully black screen with a small video in the center.

\----

Also, I wonder if terminal lovers should maybe lobby for a set of Unicode symbols with more 'pixels' than the Braille 2×8.

<comment><USER7> Considering that terminals can display images just fine you'll have a hard time convincing Unicode that you need arbitrary pixel sets because somehow images are plain text (emoji had prior usage in plain text and they have a lot more semantic meaning per character than just some pixels).

<comment><USER6> Support for images is spotty and inconsistent, whereas 'display unicode characters in a given font' is the central thing that terminals do these days.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I made something like this in the past for viewing QGIS projects in the console. Mainly just as a bit of fun on the train: [https://github.com/NathanW2/ascii_qgis](https://github.com/NathanW2/ascii_qgis)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Aw83c6q7dE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Aw83c6q7dE)

Never really had a good use case for it but was good fun.

</comment><comment><USER9> Previous HN discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14254165](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14254165)

</comment><comment><USER10> Cool project. Kudos for offering an example via telnet!

</comment><comment><USER11> Now make a readable version where the braille symbols are converted into their latin alphabet equivalents.

<comment><USER3> The Braille symbols are used as subpixels, not for their meaning. It's a convenient way to basically have 8 pixels (2x4) per display character.

<comment><USER12> I did something similar with ROSshow: [https://github.com/dheera/rosshow](https://github.com/dheera/rosshow)

I created a Python library for the Braille graphics part: [https://github.com/dheera/python- termgraphics](https://github.com/dheera/python-termgraphics)

<comment><USER13> Thank you for this. We used rosshow in our robotics lab at university.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


John H. Conway – Is the Collatz conjecture unprovable? - <AUTHOR> http://vimeo.com/album/3082332/video/109142566

<comment><AUTHOR> This is a talk given at this year's OEIS conference.

Part 2 is here: [http://vimeo.com/109142264](http://vimeo.com/109142264)

The paper in the talk is available here:

[http://bulkmail.unt.edu/bulkdocs/1413399522_ConwayJohnH_2013...](http://bulkmail.unt.edu/bulkdocs/1413399522_ConwayJohnH_2013a.pdf)

More of the conference talks are available at:

[http://vimeo.com/album/3082332/page:1/sort:preset/format:det...](http://vimeo.com/album/3082332/page:1/sort:preset/format:detail)</comment>


Odd lorem ipsum in Twitter Bootstrap - <AUTHOR>

http://postimg.org/image/p4krsoqvb/ http://postimg.org/image/c6pyonxs1/
Twitter bootstrap example page located at http://twitter.github.com/bootstrap/examples/marketing-narrow.html has the following lorem ipsum:
"Cras justo odio, dapibus ac facilisis in, egestas eget quam. Fusce dapibus, tellus ac cursus commodo, tortor mauris condimentum nibh, ut fermentum massa justo sit amet risus."
Translation from Google translator:
"Tomorrow is just hating, protein and more on the need Payments. More protein, regional and industrial advantages, More More More More, just as the main mass of the Community."
Very odd, to say the least. <comment><USER2> It is almost certainly just randomly created text from a tool like <http://www.lipsum.com/>

I just used that site to make this: [http://translate.google.co.uk/#auto/en/Nunc%20velit%20erat%2...](http://translate.google.co.uk/#auto/en/Nunc%20velit%20erat%2C%20lacinia%20vel%20tincidunt%20ac%2C%20egestas%20sed%20odio.%20Curabitur%20sollicitudin%20ultrices%20turpis%20eget%20porta.%20Maecenas%20odio%20leo%2C%20facilisis%20sed%20ultrices%20quis%2C%20aliquam%20ut%20nisi.%20Nunc%20eu%20tortor%20massa.%20Vivamus%20in%20ipsum%20arcu%2C%20sit%20amet%20ultrices%20turpis.%20Duis%20porta%20pellentesque%20ultricies).

</comment><comment><USER3> I use Hipster Ipsum. Its hilarious! Heres an example of what it outputs. "Stumptown viral four loko mlkshk pop-up, next level leggings mcsweeney's echo park retro bicycle" <http://hipsteripsum.me/></comment>


The Infinitely Profitable Program (2008) - <AUTHOR> http://peetm.com/blog/?p=55

<comment><USER2> Previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5920732](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5920732)

Other submissions:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5831515](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5831515)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4245639](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4245639)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1025294](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1025294) (a few comments)

</comment><comment><USER3> Bwa ha ha ha! tl;dr: Zero byte program sold for 5 pounds; when executed would instantly rerun last program run, making life easier for the user. 5 pounds divided by zero bytes is infinite profit.

Well, if you ignore the unit mismatch.

Well worth a quick skim.</comment>


Explore course: Write Pythonic Code Like a Seasoned Developer - <AUTHOR> https://training.talkpython.fm/courses/explore_pythonic_code/write-pythonic-code-like-a-seasoned-developer <comment><USER2> Mr Kennedy -- this is an interesting course synopsis, it looks like you've put a lot of good work into it. The course itself is not public access, but the materials are.

> The few features that are Python 3 specific will be highlighted as such > (e.g. new dictionary merging syntax).

The print statement=>function is a pretty big one too. IMO it's not too much of a wart to import it from the future in order to straddle 2.x/3.x.

Anyone else who came hoping to read actual content on how to write more Pythonic code should consult this popular reference from Pycon '07 [1].

[1] [http://python.net/~goodger/projects/pycon/2007/idiomatic/han...](http://python.net/~goodger/projects/pycon/2007/idiomatic/handout.html)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks so much. I do agree with you on the print statement to function, although other than choosing python 3 vs 2 you don't have much control over that.

As for the materials, good link. I'll be releasing 10 of the 50 topics as a free video series outside the course over the next few weeks.

<comment><USER2> > other than choosing python 3 vs 2 you don't have much control over that.

But you do! Add "from __future__ import print_function" to your code and now it can execute identically or near identically among python 2, 3. [1]

[1] [https://docs.python.org/2/library/__future__.html](https://docs.python.org/2/library/__future__.html)

<comment><AUTHOR> OK, true. :) But given the course is Python 3 it's moot in that scenario.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> In the "Dictionary as a Switch Statement" example, how come the @staticmethod decorator is on a different indent level than the method it wraps?

<comment><USER4> The class attributes are at the same indentation level. Seems like code that wouldn't parse, which doesn't seem very Pythonic.

<comment><AUTHOR> Whoops! I updated the graphic. But "programming" in PowerPoint is super tough with the indentation. It always removes the extra spaces to be helpful. Thanks for pointing it out.

<comment><USER5> Should:

        'n', Moves.Nort

Actually be:

        'n', Moves.North

    ?

<comment><AUTHOR> That's not how your spell Nort? ;) Yes, thanks, updated.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Love the podcast. Will most definitely be using this to reinforce Python chops when I need them this Fall.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks so much. Glad you're enjoying Talk Python To Me!

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Would be good to add some of these typical code samples on that page. Good vs bad.</comment>


As Google Fiber hits Atlanta, Comcast says, "don't fall for the hype" - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/business/2016/02/as-google-fiber-hits-atlanta-comcast-says-dont-fall-for-the-hype/ <comment><USER2> I'm from the Atlanta suburbs, and Comcast has been terrible here. 300GB data cap (as mentioned in the article), and they've been steadily jacking up the price (now $70 a month) for unimpressive (30 MBPS) speeds. For people who don't live in the area served by Google Fiber, the only real option to avoid the price hikes is to switch between Comcast and AT&T once per year to get the introductory rates.

<comment><USER3> Do you plan on signing up for Google Fiber when its available?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Comcast has a 300GB data cap... Google Fiber offers 2Gbps service. If Comcast had Google Fiber's speed you could hit your data cap in 20 minutes.

<comment><USER3> Comcast isn't enforcing the cap in some markets yet, but I dread when they do. I've only got a 250GB cap in the Chicago suburbs.

[https://i.imgur.com/oK6e1Xa.png](https://i.imgur.com/oK6e1Xa.png)</comment></comment>