The Register puts Soylent to the test - <AUTHOR> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/06/14/soylent_experiment/ <comment><USER2> Wait.

Wait wait wait.

Is there a chance, however fleeting, that a chunk of the Register's staff could come down with food poisoning, or be hospitalized for malnutrition?

Maybe 2013 isn't so bad after all.

</comment><comment><USER3> Regardless of what anyone can think about the actual product, I find it remarkable how the author managed to get such resonance in the media.

It might be the name, it might be that the subject matter generates strong opinions in people, but in terms of generating buzz and getting attention it has been quite a success.

<comment><USER4> Personally, I'm slightly surprised that it's proving to be so popular. Making and eating awesome food is a great joy in life; why would you try to work around that? Interesting concept, nevertheless.

<comment><USER5> Not every meal is a gourmet experience that you savour with friends. Sometimes, you just need to refuel your body. Soylent could be perfect for that.

<comment><USER6> What if every meal _is_ an experience to savour with friends and/or family? (well ok, every evening meal)

I like to live that way.

But then I also couldn't eat the same thing for lunch every day. Stuff that has actual flavour and texture gets boring fast. This would be boring before I'd finished the glass.

<comment><USER7> Then this is not a product for you. But I'd say you're the exception, at least from my anecdotal experience.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I think Michael Pollan described it well when he said food in America was undergoing a process of 'nutrification', i.e., breaking it down into its nutrients, and trying to create supplements with those nutrients. The studies in the book, though, say that we haven't yet cracked the code. I.e., taking the equivalent of one apple's nutrients isn't the same as eating an apple. The reasons weren't quite known yet. I read the book a long while back, so my recollection may be spotty.

<comment><USER9> I read that in the case of C vitamin, for instance, the body simply doesn't recognise it as C vitamin when it doesn't come directly from fruit. Just ignores it and passes it onto urine.

A nootropicist friend I have suggested that C vitamin only works in combination with Magnesium supplements ... etc. It gets pretty complicated. I'd rather just eat a stupid piece of fruit. It's tasty, efficient, and awesome. Why complicate things with dystopian future pills?

<comment><USER10> > I read that in the case of C vitamin, for instance, the body simply doesn't > recognise it as C vitamin when it doesn't come directly from fruit. Just > ignores it and passes it onto urine.

If it's getting absorbed but excreted, it sounds like you're taking more than enough. Usually absorption is limited by cofactors. Allusions to fruit being better than isolated Vitamin C should be backed up by evidence.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I can't find anywhere what it's actually made of (not on the campaign page either). And none of the people listed in the company has any training regarding food or medicine. #slightlyworried

Other than that, could be awesome. You could just have a cup with you all day and drink some whenever you feel hungry.

Question then remains, why isn't it green?

<comment><USER12> They do list the ingredients, but not the sources of those ingredients.

There are existing alternatives if you want to try liquid feeds but want rigorously tested QAd product from existing reputable manufacturers.

Or Soylent, but be aware that it's fun self-experimentation.

Here's one of my (grumpy) posts listing alternatives ([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5876219](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5876219))

<comment><USER7> It's hard to say which products of listed companies are supposed to be nutritionally complete (i.e. meal replacement, not supplement). Do you know of any?

Browsing through the pages: Complan - explicitly states you should have normal meals in addition to the product ("Avoid missing meals completely − you may not feel hungry but your body still needs nourishment") Medifast - want you to eat at least 1 cooked meal daily Optifast - not available for retail (or at least the webpage claims so)

I'm looking for a replacement for the main meal, not breakfasty/lunchy things, which none of these seem to provide. Though perhaps I misunderstand their ads?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Start the soylent diet. Then take some pill to suppress your libido. Know that now you lost all joy in life, not only half of it.

<comment><USER14> If eating is half the joy in your life you live a miserable life I wouldn't wish on my worst enemies.

<comment><USER15> Hogwash. If you have the good grace to eat food that makes up half the joy in your life, then you have a good life indeed.

In my experience, good food is everything that joy intends: gardening, growing food from nothing, spending time outdoors, connectedness with the land, creativity, quality process, science, creation, enjoyment, collaboration with others, socialization (especially when combined with good booze of many varieties), nutrition, survival, health, and certainly joy.

In fact you could say that eating and everything that goes into it makes up the a good chunk of life, and a good life at that. Certainly a hundred years ago, if you could do everything required simply to eat and eat well, then you had a life better than most. And in fact, you could certainly say the same today. Eating is a luxury, and the choice of what to eat an even greater luxury. You are lucky for it, and you should be damn joyful.

<comment><USER16> Doing that when you want to, and to the extent that you want to, is enjoyable. But subsistence farming is not. There's a middle ground, you know? It's nice not to be forced to think about your next meal several times every single day. You can relax and focus on a few meals a week that you actually care about instead of being stressed about food all the time.

<comment><USER15> True, that's a luxury too. There is balance in all pursuits.

All I know is that my favorite memories and the most joyful times in my life were camping in Yosemite, where the only concern of the day is where we were hiking to, and what we'd eat when we got there, and when we'd hike back, and what we'd eat for dinner.

That's about half of the concern dedicated to the food of the day. And it was joyous.

I find that lack of concern for food is generally caused by a lack of joy, or a lack of freedom; and in cyclic turn also results in it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'm interested in shelf life.

What's the shelf life of the beta product? And what's the expected shelf life of the released final product, in the correct packaging?

Are they going to sell it as a monthly subscription, delivering each week as individually bagged days? Or do they deliver a huge box of the stuff?

The World Food Program has a Specialized Nutritious Foods Factsheet, and that lists shelf life as 12 or 24 months. (One product, Wawa Mum, is listed at 6 months.)

([http://documents.wfp.org/stellent/groups/public/documents/co...](http://documents.wfp.org/stellent/groups/public/documents/communications/wfp255508.pdf))

I'm still strongly against the way it's being sold at the moment. Other people on HN have said that they enjoyed the idea of Soylent when it was self- experimentation.

As Kurtz79 say, they've done a remarkable job of generating media buzz about something that is not new or disruptive or innovative. I'd be interested to see what they could do with a real product.

</comment><comment><USER17> I still don't buy into this being a real product. Everything about it is far too generic and uniformed. "It comes in a large unmarked baggy". Really? No. This can't be true.

<comment><USER12> They have branded stainless steel mixing / drinking cups on their pages, and they're working on branding.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Is anyone else suspicious about the amount of money that they raised in their first day (around $130k)? The company's crowdfunding site doesn't let you see who contributed to its campaign and that's a lot of money to raise in one day.

</comment><comment><USER19> How is this different / better than any other shake-based diet powder?

Edt: As my wife just put it, "It sounds like guys are too insecure to drink Slim-Fast, so the idea is being re-branded to be more manly. Like the Axe of diet shakes."

<comment><USER20> It's not a cheap diet-oriented meal replacement (little more than protein, sugar, and vitamin mix) intended to provide satiating filler with minimal meaningful content but still requiring "a sensible meal". It's a serious attempt at providing EVERYTHING a body needs, including hard-to-manage micronutrients.

<comment><USER19> In that case, how is it different from the stuff hospitals feed old people with no teeth? For example:

[http://ensure.com/products/ensure-complete- shakes](http://ensure.com/products/ensure-complete-shakes)

or

[http://www.amazon.com/Nutrament-Energy-Fitness-Drink- Banana/...](http://www.amazon.com/Nutrament-Energy-Fitness-Drink- Banana/dp/B000KK2KU8)

<comment><USER20> Ensure Complete describes itself as "Provides balanced amounts of macronutrients and essential vitamins and minerals." Lacks the micronutrients needed. Strikes me as intended for "we really don't have any other options at this point" and consequential symptoms will be treated as illness.

Nutrament describes itself as "This nutritional drink is ideal as a snack, an occasional meal replacement, or a perfect post-workout drink." Note the "occasional"; it's filler augmenting an otherwise sensible natural diet.

Soylent is intended as "you can live on this stuff full time", which its creator does. He's suffered some pretty painful & weird symptoms of not getting everything right (like inadequate micronutrient supply causing bizarre cravings), and felt profoundly satiated when he did get it right.

Anecdote: I once worked on a portable IV pump intended to "feed" people lacking most of their GI tract, injecting nutritionally complete "meals" directly into the bloodstream. Each "meal" cost about $300.

<comment><USER7> There are solutions that claim to be nutritionally complete (Sustagen Hospital Formula) and anecdotally are sustainable for months: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5399994](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5399994)

<comment><USER20> I'd first wonder about cost (hence my anecdote about $300 nutritionally complete goo-in-a-bag meals), then about completeness (side effects may be preferable to alternatives). Other products may exist which are what Soylent aspires to.

Seems a big part is that the Soylent guy just decided to DIY for fun, it went viral, and he went entrepreneur. If you've got would-be customers banging down your door, you don't respond with "somebody else makes something like it", you monetize the opportunity.

<comment><USER19> I don't think anyone's blaming him for starting the company. The reason I raised this line of questioning isn't to criticize him, but rather to figure out if this is a new idea, in a space that hasn't been explored before, and thus worthy of our interest and excitement... or just an age-old idea with a bit of new marketing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Soylet has done a great job with getting media attention. Thumbs up for that!

</comment><comment><USER22> As an environmentalist I want to know, how green is it? O.o

</comment><comment> Kilo-byte Soylent, the man food :)

<comment><USER23> I completely forgot about the original blog post about this and was thinking "they couldn't possibly mean".. I must need to catch up on sleep.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> The article fails to mention how much product is in the bag you get (weight) and it's kcal/day ratio. The bag looks really small in the picture... Also, think about how much you will hate the flavor after a while. Anyone who ever bought cherry flavored protein powder by mistake will know what I'm talking about. Have fun forcing the stuff down your throat the 10th or 20th time. I going to eat my steak an laugh at you.

That said I would be really interested to use the product on expeditions IF it provides a significant advantage. So - how is this superior to a load of sugar(s), whey protein and a micronutrients supplement?

</comment><comment><USER25> Wow. The marketers have done a good job to get such an insipid product so much attention in diverse media outlets. Meanwhile, there are probably dozens of more substantial products failing because their creators don't know how to sling bullshit. #FailuresOfCapitalism.</comment>


Errbit: Instant-Setup, Open Error-catching for your apps on Cloudfuji - <AUTHOR> http://cloudfuji.com/blog/2012/05/21/launch_airbrake_compatible_error_catcher_on_cloudfuji.html

<comment><AUTHOR> We use Errbit heavily internally at Cloudfuji in a way that's not really possible with most open source setups. We're able to track all the errors when apps are run on our platform, so we can funnel that back into app development - and any open-source developer putting their app on our store can do the same.

One of the major challenges of Errbit currently is the Javascript error reporting, which we have some internal work going on to help make it much better (for everyone, Airbrake users included).

Major thanks to the Errbit project for such a well-made, solid product. And of course to the Airbrake (/hoptoad/exceptional) teams for making this a standard in modern development.</comment>


List of Unusual Deaths - <AUTHOR> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unusual_deaths

<comment><USER2> My favourite variation:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_inventors_killed_by_the...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_inventors_killed_by_their_own_inventions)

> James Douglas, 4th Earl of Morton (1581) was executed in Edinburgh on the > Scottish Maiden which he had introduced to Scotland as Regent.[25]

I feel bad for thinking that this is funny.

<comment><USER3> Well, he got what he deserved.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> let's hope that these will one day be the leading causes of death.

<comment><USER5> Just so long as they are few in number!</comment></comment>


Google employees: We no longer believe the company places values over profits - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/27/read-google-employees-open-letter-protesting-project-dragonfly.html <comment><USER2> Most comments moved to [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18542830](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18542830).

</comment><comment><USER3> It is interesting to see the standard to which these big internet companies are being held lately. The mere fact that Google debated and waited many years before jumping into China with a censored search engine puts into the top of the most ethical for-profit corporations to ever exist, in my book.

All this bad-will seems to come from their advertising business models, which I find is loudly criticized with rather thin arguments, given that these companies are often the only ones defending the users from the dirty tactics of advertisers (who get none of the blame). I've neve seen criticism of coca- cola for using Google's targeting abilities to its advantage and shove ads down our throats for money without a moral concern.

And rightly so.

</comment><comment><USER4> It never did. Otherwise it would have incorporated as a non-profit or a PBC. Since its inception, Google has always been a for-profit entity, which is legally required to put shareholders profits as a higher priority than everything else.

<comment><USER5> > _...which is legally required to put shareholders profits as a higher > priority than everything else._

Please retire this egregiously broken misconstrual of fiduciary duty. I promise you, this is _not_ the law, and you sound a fool for repeating it.

<comment><USER6> Then what is?

<comment><USER7> The law obliges management of a publicly traded company to report fairly to its shareholders its assets, liabilities, revenues, costs, and certain other items such as the compensation of the five most highly compensated officers.

If a shareholder believes that management is not maximizing profits, the shareholder is at liberty to take his or her money and go elsewhere, by selling his or her shares.

<comment><USER5> If that shareholder elects instead to sue, they will almost certainly lose, absent specific evidence of bad faith or of breaches of the duties of care or loyalty, for example.

The "business judgement rule" [0] compels courts to defer to the judgement of the executives of a business, on the basis that they have a _bona fide_ interest in that business and its activities, and understand them better than either the court or J. Random Shareholder ever could.

"The business judgment rule is very difficult to overcome and courts will not interfere with directors unless it is clear that they are guilty of fraud or misappropriation of the corporate funds, etc." [1]

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

[1] ibid.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Test of HN to See If This Displays Unicode 1F801 (UpArrow) - <AUTHOR> This is supposed to be "Upwards Arrow with small triangle arrowhead: 🠁 It enters ok, lets see if it HN allows this Unicode character. <comment><USER2> On iOS, it's a square with a question mark inside.

</comment><comment><USER3> Android, Firefox: Nope. It's a grey rectangle, long side horizontal.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Yes, it displays correctly in HN. Now I can submit some content that best uses UpArrow for synthesized attribute in AG. Thank you HN for supporting Unicode!

<comment><USER4> You need to test on more browsers... try [https://www.browserstack.com/](https://www.browserstack.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> It looks messed up to me on my android tablet.

<comment><USER6> It also doesn't work on my Windows 7 machine.

Firefox displays a little rectangle with "01F801" in it, and Chrome displays just an empty little rectangle. So it looks like the character doesn't appear in all Unicode fonts. (My browsers display other Unicode characters in HN comments OK, such as Chinese text.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Chrome on Linux here, it looks fine.

<comment><USER7> Firefox on Linux now, looks fine here also.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Not on Android 9 Chrome 75</comment>


Show HN: Auction tasks so you get what you want - <AUTHOR> http://gethushmoney.com/view-public?id=j1R3qeOtCIS7Jd

<comment><USER2> I was pretty confused as to the goal of the site. I was convinced by the single example that this was some sort of talent search board with a weird name.

I'd suggest that you post a link to the home page [1] or the "How it Works" [2] page instead.

[1] <http://gethushmoney.com/> [2] <http://gethushmoney.com/how-it-works>

</comment><comment><USER3> Why is there not a place to post the auctions? It seems like you just give them a link and say "good luck."</comment>


Ransomware Forces Two Chemical Companies to Order 'Hundreds of New Computers' - <AUTHOR> https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/8xyj7g/ransomware-forces-two-chemical-companies-to-order-hundreds-of-new-computers <comment><USER2> This is an honest question: The vast majority of malware targets Windows, so how is it acceptable security practice to run Windows as your company's main operating system?

There is a second question as to whether Windows is still inherently more susceptible to these kinds of attacks (I would guess the answer is yes), but that's kind of irrelevant. The threat exists, why wouldn't you just use Macs or Chromebooks or whatever else? Basically _anything_ other than Windows? Even in the case where you have Windows-only business critical software, just run it in a VM on something else.

<comment><USER3> I'd say desktop Linux is more insecure than Windows, and the only reason we don't see malware is that nobody uses it. So if high profile targets, like energy companies, started using Linux on the desktop, it may end up being worse than Windows.

<comment><USER4> > I'd say desktop Linux is more insecure than Windows, and the only reason we > don't see malware is that nobody uses it. So if high profile targets, like > energy companies, started using Linux on the desktop, it may end up being > worse than Windows.

What's the basis for your assertion?

At the level of systems we're discussing, a Windows installation would be operated by experienced Windows administrator. Thus the appropriate comparison group for Linux would be something like a university-run supercomputing cluster. We don't often hear of these being taken over for ransom.

<comment><USER3> I said desktop, not server.

I don't have any basis, just what I expect. Windows has been fuzzed and reverse engineered to the moon and back. Desktop Linux? I doubt it.

<comment><USER5> You do know that "desktop linux" and "server linux" are the same thing, just with different default programs and configuration styles?

I'd agree that yes, distros meant for desktop usage have less secure defaults, but that's not necessarily to say they're "less secure" if you understand how you're using them.

<comment><USER3> No, they are not the same thing in their USE, which is exactly the point I'm making.

I trust nginx, sshd, postgres, postfix, etc. much more than I trust the gnome file manager, evince, dbus, pulse.

For every exploit that nginx currently has, there probably are a thousand lurking in gnome's file roller.

<comment><USER6> But Gnome runs as the currently logged in user, right? So the worst damage it can do would be to files that that user has write permissions on (ie, not system files).

Unless your entirely hypothetical scenario involves privilege escalation vulnerabilities, which I'll admit aren't unheard of in Linux but are fairly rare and usually patched within hours when they are discovered.

<comment><USER7> This is the case with the vast majority of Windows malware as well. System files aren't important; sure, you need them to run the system, but it's not like you can't reinstall. The issue is damage to user-owned files, no matter which OS you're talking about.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Our teams use Macs, windows, and Linux as a natural result of what they're doing: selling, moneying, managing, designing, c#ing, ROSing, etc.

Makes me think that heterogeneity is a natural mitigator to issues like this and maybe should be embraced where possible.

<comment><USER9> Anecdote: In the 90s California, there was a chemical science research company, perhaps formed in the late 70s. Many scientists there had PhDs or quality Master in Chemistry, and they set out to write software to support the drug discovery, pesticide and industrial chemicals industry. The company was well-managed, and it grew. Into the 90s, the Macintosh computer got a lot of attention for graphics, while Windows was stuck at 3.x, and many of the scientists had DEC associations.

So the company had a plural, cross-platform code base in C for some of its core IP. Scientists may not write the best code, but they can write a lot of it, so the core libraries grew and grew.

In the 1997 or so time, Internet grows, VAX declines, Windows improves and pushes hard. The senior management are being tempted by the huge (at the time) money for valuation. Someone decides to take the Microsoft point of view.

There was a "global rollout" effort conceived and implemented, to switch _every working piece of code to Windows_ , backed by fanfare and the sort of content-less cheerleading you find at an ordinary school.. matching t-shirts and good looking people there to "help" you with the transition (!) to port the code ! There was tons of it, there were build chains, there was network code. But it was the MONEY at the top, and the relentless pressure from Microsoft and affiliates, directly, at golf courses and at hotels and at the airport and in the money meetings, that greased the wheels to _decide_ for everyone, that Windows was the standard, end of story.

Many working, carefully built products, were retired, and the team management was required to change over or else be retired also. The change happened. Within a few years (before 2000) the entire company was sold to Elsivier for three-digit millions.

postscript - a small few senior scientists did find Java when it was released, and led an effort to port certain things to Java. The web was a cacophony, and Java might have over-represented itself as far as a web-GUI and also backend. No news about the fate of that, but it was a minority effort, amongst a few who had discretionary budgets to allocate for that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> > CEO Jack Boss

Talk about your nominative determinism.

</comment><comment><USER11> > Among the measures taken, Boss wrote that the Momentive is giving some > employees new email accounts because their old ones are still inaccessible. > The company notes that it is using a new domain—momentiveco.com for new > email addresses rather than momentive.com.

That seems excessive.

<comment><USER12> Guessing they're not competent enough to purge their email systems of the original malware attachments nor have procedures sufficient to keep new computers from being re-encrypted.

New email domain means old emails aren't accessible.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Um huh? How could ransomware break computers? Perhaps their data is gone but formatting and reinstalling Windows isn't feasible?

<comment><USER13> Depends on the level of trust you place into the compromised systems and your threat model.

Basically they are going down the "nuke it from orbit" route, lets say they miss a system that reinfects the rest somehow.

As for formatting windows, sadly these days that is no longer enough to be sure with a "well crafted" malware. Lets take the industry favourite laptop tracking platform CompuTrace (now named Lo-Jack iirc).

The BIOS/UEFI Module that is its heart is a small EXE that gets executed by windows on every boot (Just like the Superfish incident, though that did use a diff way to get executed on windows launch, lo-jack gets executed by windows, superfish replaced a file that would get executed).

In Lo-Jack case its a small dropper exe that then fetches the real tracking payload once the laptop connects to the internet but it can be (iirc) tricked into downloading and running any exe it likes with system priv's. A BIOS flash of a fixed BIOS is the only "fix".

But in my past I've had fun injecting stuff into and modifying BIOS's (Mainly just to unlock extra options or remove whitelists for wifi cards) and most BIOS/UEFI's these days can be flashed from within Windows. Sure to save bricking the machine you would need to get the correct BIOS for that machine but if a company puts in a purchase order for 100 office machines they are not going to differ too much.

If you have a payload running on a machine you could call home with its motherboard make, model and revision. Download the bios from the vendor, inject a payload into it, send it back to the machine, have the machine flash it in the background and using the same methods Superfish / Jo-Jack use have malware that persists though a format or even a replacement of the drive.

I'm sure we have already seen malware using these techniques already in the wild. Signed BIOS updates will protect to some degree but their have been a fair few cases of being able to bypass the sig check (which is often only done during the the read of the bios before the flash takes place).

Is it overkill? is it paranoia? Probably. It might just be simply the case that the machines were due to be replaced at some point in the near future anyway so 2 birds, one stone.

EDIT: It might of not been Lenovo's use of superfish that was installed via bios on reinstall of Windows, but their own bloatware. It replaced Microsoft's copy of autochk.exe with its own that installs other pieces of Lenovo software. After the shit hit the fan in that case, Lenovo quickly issued BIOS Updates to remove the "feature". But it goes to show how abusing the Windows Platform Binary Table can be used to inject unwanted software into a system.

<comment><USER14> Is flashing the BIOS and reformatting the machine sufficient to remove any virus that we know of currently? Or are there other hidden components that need to be cleared?

<comment><USER15> Not sure. Who knows what hides inside Intel ME.

<comment><USER16> If you're worried about what's in the Intel ME, then you wouldn't buy another Intel or AMD

<comment><USER13> (at least on intel, I've no looked into it on AMD's side) Intel ME can be neutered. On newer gen's doing so can be as simple as setting of a single flag. On older systems you can rip so much of it out that all it can do is bring up the CPU.

I would say you can still be concerned by IntelME (as it has been shown to be exploitable) but still purchase Intel/AMD. I mean who else you going to purchase from if you want an affordable x86 system?

ARM is getting more mainstream (in the laptop/desktop/server world.) and we now have fairly decently powerfully desktop/laptop arm powered machines we could actually dev on but the ARM world is still filled with binary blobs needed to get the cpu started.

Power9 has a ton of open source but the CPU's are not. RISC-V is promising but still pricey as hell atm.

Just saying, you can be worried about ME but in a place where you are stuck with it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> What do they do with the infected laptops?

Sell them on ebay after an insufficient wipe?

Rise and repeat.

</comment><comment><USER18> Maybe it was time to replace all those Windows XP machines anyway?

</comment><comment><USER19> I'd go one step further. I'd fire the employees who brought it into the company.</comment>


10 Million Repositories - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/blog/1724-10-million-repositories

<comment><USER2> It looks like just under half of the repos are public: a search for all repos gives 4,822,978 repos right now (or 8,640,176 counting forks). [https://github.com/search?q=stars%3A%3E%3D0](https://github.com/search?q=stars%3A%3E%3D0)

</comment><comment><USER3> Meh. I like BitBucket's unlimited private repo model much better.

<comment><USER4> Me too, but you lose performance. Github is much faster compared to Bitbucket.</comment></comment>


Armour: side-effects-free JavaScript - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/techfort/armour

<comment><USER2> All this does is do a deep copy, which is a costly operation.

I suggest using persistent DS libs like immutable.js. You just let that object loose in the code and not worry about side effects happening on the object you are referencing at some point in the code.

Sure, they may have the same overhead, but the idea is that your code doesn't do unnecessary defensive cloning all over the place. Plus, defensive cloning is an eyesore in code. It isn't UI logic, it isn't business logic. It's just technical debt waiting to happen.</comment>


What happened to Apple design? - <AUTHOR> http://www.theverge.com/2015/12/8/9872746/apple-bad-hardware-design-iphone-case-pencil-magic-mouse <comment><USER2> Apple isn't immune to not-so-great design choices: Hockey puck mouse (personally never had a problem but most did), the iPod Speaker system, iPhone antenna issues, the yellowing cases in old MacBooks, the ever breaking Apple Pro Mouse, allowing the Motorola iTunes phone to be a thing, the G4 Cube, previous mediocre iPhone cases, mobile me, the egregious skuemophism that gave skuemoprhism a bad name, a few ugly iMac patterns all under the banner of Jobs.

The case is ugly but functional, the magic mouse however is just plain out poor design. This is jumping the gun. It's like declaring "Whatever happened to Google design?" After the Pixel C.</comment>


Linode doubles RAM for free - <AUTHOR> https://www.linode.com/pricing <comment><USER2> I remember when Linode was all the rage. And then they got hacked + AWS reduced their prices a couple of times.

Reading the last reviews of Linode, they seem to be one of the better platforms to be using. Pricing is very competitive too.</comment>


Retrospective: An Axiomatic Basis for Computer Programming - <AUTHOR> http://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2009/10/42360-retrospective-an-axiomatic-basis-for-computer-programming/fulltext <comment><USER2> A very interesting article by the creator of quicksort on his contribution of axiomantic semantics to programming languages (the infamous Hoare triple {P}Q{S} [ _1_ ]). What strikes me as most interesting is his idea in chosing software verification in the first place (albeit funny!), and the surprises he had in hindsight. (Which almost always makes for an interesting read, cf. Niklaus Wirth: "Good ideas through the looking glass".)

[ _1_ ]: Interested readers might want to check out the excellent "The Science of Programming" by David Gries.</comment>


Toxic dust storms in the southwestern USA are killing people via infections - <AUTHOR> http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2014/01/20/140120fa_fact_goodyear

<comment><USER3> While it is actually A Thing, it's far less scary than the article makes it out to be. How about some actual numbers?

Last year in Arizona, Valley Fever was attributed a mortality rate (primary + secondary causes of death) of ~0.6/100,000 [1]. In the vast majority of cases, the victim makes a full recovery rapidly with no lingering effects. Most fatalities from it are due to the development of chronic pneumonia - <USER2> comparison, pneumonia in general has a mortality rate of ~15/100,000 [2].

While it's true that there was a tenfold increase in reported cases between '98 and '11, the disease was only required to be reported starting in '97, and in '09, the lab reporting methods were changed, resulting in more cases being reported. [1]

> _Laboratory reporting of valley fever was mandated in 1997. Since then, > reports of valley fever have increased dramatically. In 2009, a major > commercial laboratory (Lab A) altered its reporting practices for valley > fever, greatly increasing the total number of reported cases. In 2012, a > change in testing methods at Lab A took place leading to a decline in the > number of cases reported in late 2012._

It's also worth noting that reports _outside_ of this unnamed major laboratory are basically flat (Table 2, Figure 3)

All in all, while it's something to be aware of, it's hardly the terrifying epidemic that the New Yorker would make it out to be.

[1] [http://www.azdhs.gov/phs/oids/epi/disease/valley- fever/docum...](http://www.azdhs.gov/phs/oids/epi/disease/valley- fever/documents/reports/valley-fever-2012.pdf)

[2] [http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr61/nvsr61_04.pdf](http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr61/nvsr61_04.pdf)</comment>


The WFH Times: A daily newsletter about working from home during coronavirus - <AUTHOR> https://wfhtimes.substack.com/ <comment><USER2> Page cuts off on mobile, if there's a button to submit my email address I can't see it.

Edit: or is the "let me read it first" link the submit button?

<comment><AUTHOR> Substack is a bit weird, but yes, I think "let me read it first" is the way to browse without getting update emails for new posts.

Then yes, there should also be a "Subscribe" button in the top right.</comment></comment>


AstroNavigation – A free course - <AUTHOR> https://my.vanderbilt.edu/astronav/ <comment><USER2> For anyone interested in natural navigation in general, you might check out The Lost Art Of Finding Our Way: [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16241535-the-lost-art- of...](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16241535-the-lost-art-of-finding- our-way)

<comment><USER3> I also highly recommend "Finding your way without map or compass"

[https://www.amazon.com/Finding-Your-Way-Without- Compass/dp/0...](https://www.amazon.com/Finding-Your-Way-Without- Compass/dp/048640613X)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Anybody know where to buy a good sextant? (I hope the course discusses this; I haven't had time to read it yet.) I started trying to learn this stuff a few months ago and it seems that most available sextants fall into two categories: Cheap plastic ones with poor thermal characteristics that make them inaccurate, and expensive brass ones that are more thermally stable but designed for display and not calibrated for serious navigation. I'd like to buy one in between: A quality navigational instrument that doesn't have to be "pretty".

<comment><USER5> Good suggestions from others and I know this is not your use case but I'd add to anyone new to navigation or with just a casual interest: get a plastic 'emergency sextant' and try using it along with a digital watch (Casio cheap one). Davis and EBBCO do both do plastic sextants.

<comment><USER6> There is even a book on how to use them called "How to Use Plastic Sextants" by David Burch who seems to be a fairly prolific author on celestial navigation [http://a.co/0iVNVrW](http://a.co/0iVNVrW)

<comment><USER5> Linked to that book page on Amazon is the Davies 'quick reference card' (laminated) that I imagine one would have in the life boat...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I always wanted to learn something like this! Embarrassingly... I never knew what it was called until today so I never found any books or videos on it. Learning what it is called and about an free course online course is awesome!

<comment><USER8> Your local chapter of the United States Power Squadrons (now re-branding to America's Boating Club) teaches this.

<comment><USER7> Is it a one time fee or is there a club I have to join first?

<comment><USER8> Good question. It used to require a membership (I think it's like $70/year); then there is a fee for the course on top. I believe now they have opened the courses up to the public.

There are two courses, actually. The first one focuses on sun sights- I've had that one. The second uses other stars. It's really for marine folks- so it includes a lot of navigation stuff.

[https://americasboatingclub.org/education-matters/in- person-...](https://americasboatingclub.org/education-matters/in-person- boating-education/)

<comment><USER7> Awesome, thanks!!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I found this course somewhat lacking in intuition building.

It's also sad that we're still using trig tables (that's essentially what the nautical Alamanac is. It also has to be updated every year). I thought the aeronautical paper flight computer was complex ...

Also, I find it hard to believe that a set of 6 books is more disaster proof (and quicker to use) than a hardened calculator for when the shit hits the fan ...

FWIW, here is a nice free resource for printing your own almanac:

[http://sv-inua.net/the-nautical-almanac](http://sv-inua.net/the-nautical- almanac)

<comment><USER10> Why is looking things up in a table sad?

For the purpose of astro nav: NP303 is calculated for an epoch of 5 years (and it's only 3 books). Until its end of life, it has to be "updated" in the sense that corrections need to be applied as they are released.

I don't think the point of the books has ever been disaster proofing. For the most part, books were good enough for the job before computers and still are. They're cheap, come from trusted sources (and it's easy to verify that they're legitimate), and they're easy to correct should they have errata.

Windows PCs and excel spreadsheets are used in navigation all the time. Nobody's forcing navigators to use books. If they do, though, they probably have a good reason for it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I failed this course 13 times so I've remained a Second Technician in the Space Corps.

<comment><USER12> At least you have your Bronze Swimming Certificate.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Cool, I was thinking of learning this recently. I also wanted to find a book on amateur astronomy but still have no idea what exactly to look for.

<comment><USER14> One of my favourite books is Turn Left at Orion by Guy Consolmagno. It describes the different astronomical objects that you can expect to see and how to find them in the sky. I think it also does a good job of setting expectations because you just won't see Hubble class images from your backyard. The is also a companion website [http://www.cambridge.org/features/turnleft/](http://www.cambridge.org/features/turnleft/)

<comment><USER15> I can second this recommendation, if you are into backyard astronomy.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Boy scouts orienteering merit badge stuff.

<comment><USER16> For you downvoters, I was in the Boy Scouts and earned the Orienteering merit badge.

<comment><USER17> Eagle Scout here. So was I, but your experience seems atypical. You probably just had a Merit Badge counselor that went above and beyond. That's awesome!

Anyone who wants to give back and help the shape the next generation, you can be a Merit Badge counselor. Just talk to your local council. There's over a 100 Merit Badges, and more than half of them are STEM-related. If you have a career or hobby that's related to one of them, you can share your knowledge, skills, and advice to others.

[https://beascout.scouting.org/Volunteer.aspx](https://beascout.scouting.org/Volunteer.aspx)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I watched the first couple videos but stopped when they started a practical example (3rd video, I think). Turns out you need some basic tools I don't have (dividers, parallel rulers) and charting paper. They don't mention this upfront. I need to perform the steps they demonstrate in order to have it sink in so I stopped watching. The tutorial is interesting enough that I'll see if I can get the necessary things and pick it up again.

</comment><comment><USER19> link not working?</comment>


'Sully' Sullenberger struggled with Boeing 737 MAX during flight simulation - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/19/politics/chesley-sullenberger-boeing-737-max-scenario/index.html <comment><USER2> For those unfamiliar, Sully never flew again after the ditching because of "sleep disturbances." His co-pilot did continue flying airlines.

Some pilots were able to successfully do a 180 in a commercial sim and land the plane at the airport.

But the fact that nobody died was celebrated at the time, since a lot of people thought the USA had lost its ability to do anything right after the 2008 recession.

Sully is an important spokesman since he's not affiliated or beholden to any company now.

<comment><USER3> > Some pilots were able to successfully do a 180 in a commercial sim and land > the plane at the airport.

comparisons like this seem entirely wrong.

Just because "some" pilots were able to do a 180 back to LGA doesn't mean that it was the best option at the time given all variables.

There's so many variables you can't account for in a simulator.

At this point I can't imagine there's any ATPL-certified pilot who isn't familiar with US1549. Some pilots have some small knowledge. Some pilots have extensively studied that flight. Most are somewhere in-between. All are going to be prone to choose more risky scenarios because there is no actual jeopardy to their life in the flight simulator.

In addition to all that, we've had over a decade to study and dissect US1549. Sully had seconds, perhaps a minute, to decide on a course of action.

> For those unfamiliar, Sully never flew again after the ditching because of > "sleep disturbances." His co-pilot did continue flying airlines.

That's surprising, and very sad, considering how well things turned out.

<comment><USER4> Wasn't the 180-and-return only possible if the pilot began the turn within something stupid like 10 seconds, and even then only if there was still partial thrust being produced?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Regardless of any controversy, or hindsight badgering, one really can't look at Sullenberger and accuse him of not being a demonstrated exemplar of a sufficiently skilled pilot.

For those in the wings holding out hope that Boeing may be able to offload their central role in these tragedies under the guise of "properly trained pilots can recover this", this represents a significant blow to any attempt to play that card.

Glad to see him weigh in on it. That's for sure.</comment>


We can't let the dark web give online anonymity a bad name - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.co.uk/article/dark-web-drugs-porn-internet-freedom <comment><USER2> The dark web doesn't give online anonymity a bad name.

Charlatans use the dark web to advance their goal of branding anonymity as bad.

Clickbait hot take bloggers, "journalists" who should know better, and other useful idiots are all more than willing to assassinate character and tear down something they don't care about if it confers a benefit to themselves (attention, status, ad impressions, etc...).

Those are the bigger problem. Not the "dark web."

It's nice that this author is making the principled case for anonymity. But that should be secondary to showing people the bigger picture, and how to "smell out" when they're being mislead for someone's myopic goals.

<comment><USER3> I don't see how pointing this out helps advance the goal of web anonymity. Unless you are suggesting we somehow find a way to change human nature.

<comment><USER4> It helps us see through the deceptive arguments against anonymity. You don't think that's helpful?

<comment><USER3> Not really, no. While logically inconsistent the form of rhetoric used appeals to humans which are behaviorally dominated by group association. Pointing out its logical inconsistency appeals to a very small subset of the population who probably already agree with you.

<comment><USER4> What a cynical, defeatist attitude. The Internet is full of people, and you don't know who reads what. Everyone has to learn somewhere, to start from something.

Your logic essentially is, "No one can learn anything; their opinions are fixed," but that's obviously false, as we have all learned or else we would be unable to read and write and do everything else we do.

In fact, your posting your own comment contradicts your logic, as according to it, there's no point to saying what you said, since it can't change anyone's mind.

<comment><USER3> It is not defeatist to suggest energies would be better spent elsewhere. Defeatism would be if I said we could never convince people of the need for privacy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I dislike how they immediately lump "hackers, drugs and porn" together as bad things.

Hackers and others within that category are great. Thanks to hackers you can get full access to devices that would otherwise be locked down. Thanks to hackers you can take full control of your media content, playing it without constraints and on any device.

Drugs are a huge market, let's tax it. Most people buying drugs are likely harmless members of society. We're wasting time and money chasing down buyers, sellers, and service managers. There's an absurd amount of people in jail for engaging in fully benign activities.

Porn is a huge industry which pretty much everyone likes. A few rotten apples don't mean you have a rotten tree. Oh, we also waste a lot of money chasing down prostitutes and the like. I'm sure many sex workers would love to continue what they're doing without having to worry about the risk of cops showing up.

<comment><USER6> The porn that's a bad thing is child porn, rape porn, and violence porn.

<comment><USER7> Really none of these should be called porn+. They are various forms of abuse imagery and are both crimes and evidence of crimes.

\+ (Assuming the rape and violence are real not just actors)

<comment><USER8> > They are various forms of abuse imagery and are both crimes and evidence of > crimes.

They can be that and still be porn to some people.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Anonymity is a good thing if you have a tech savvy abusive ex as a good friend of mine does. He has tracked her time and time again until she found a mentor to help her hide on the web. It certainly opened my eyes to legitimate uses of the dark web. It is not just a place for shady characters anymore.

<comment><USER10> I'm not sure what you're suggesting. Just because something can be abused for nefarious purposes doesn't mean we should ban it or abandon it. People use cars to kill people -- perhaps we should ban those? People use binoculars to violate privacy -- maybe we should ban those, too?

<comment><USER9> I am not suggesting we ban anything. What I was saying is that while being able to conduct ourselves on the web (and be tracked and all that goes with that) is fine for many, actually most, people; for some it is not. I am not suggesting banning the dark web either as it is a better way for some to have access to places they otherwise would not because they are being tracked by someone intent on harming them. Or more simply put, people should be able to access the Internet or the dark web if that is the choice they make....no need to presume they are doing something wrong if they choose the anonymous one.

<comment><USER10> Ah ok I guess I misunderstood your comment. Though, to be honest, I still don't quite understand what you were getting at. :$

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Right now it's the "dark web." Tomorrow it'll be the "decentralized web."

The world's always been full of dirty things, but holding everyone's freedom random for "protection" was usually not the way we operated.

<comment><USER12> You've undersold the problem.

The way we operated was to issue warrants.

But now these dirty things operate in more and more virtual and less and less physical ways. So the old tools aren't working like they used to, and people are looking for ways that do work.

</comment></comment><comment> k-mcgrady >> The dark web showcases the worst parts of the internet

Are there any useful websites on the 'dark web'? I'm thinking of the kind of things we hundreds of millions use every day that are legal (social networks, email, youtube, etc.). If so why aren't more people using them? And if not that seems like the easiest way to change the image of the 'dark web' and bring more regular people on to it.

<comment><USER13> Basically... no. I read a post recently where someone tried to calculate what percentage of TOR sites were legal/legit. I thought it was from Bruce Schneier but I can't find it so I may be wrong.

The person found a handful of thins like Facebook were available and some big journalistic organizations can be contacted that way. There were a number of indexes of known .onion URLs.

Most of the rest was hacker services for sale, scam sites, child porn, etc.

Outside of passing info to journalists (not much traffic) or talking where state censors couldn't find you in a repressed regeime... what would make 'the dark web' useful enough to normal people that it would get used in any sort of scale? There's an obvious advantage for criminals to use it but I don't see something to compel non-criminals. Thus it seems to have sort of naturally segregated into a mostly criminal thing.

<comment><USER14> In most 1st world countries, there isn't much censorship, so obviously most people wouldn't have much of a reason to use a service like tor, where the 1 and only important feature is censorship resistence.

If governments or powerful corporations start to engage in more censorship in the future, then more people will have a motivation to protect themselves against censorship.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Start by not calling it "the dark web".

<comment><USER16> Maybe throw up two instances of it, with one dedicated to drugs, hitmen, and child pornography and the other for political discussions or whatever.

<comment><USER17> You can't legally dedicate a network to illegal activity, and even if you could, criminals would probably never go near it.

<comment> yjftsjthsd-h I assume that was sarcasm

<comment><USER16> Yep

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Here's a solution to the "bad name" problem.

Let's call it the Debian "Words of Encouragement" messaging app. Its purpose is to allow Debian members to send short, pithy words of encouragement to each other to spread goodwill through the universe.

Here's how to build it:

1\. Fork Bitmessage.

2\. Have the client fetch the Debian strong set at startup. Only those keyholders may send and receive messages.

3\. Limit it to one fixed-size message per day, to be sent at a pre-determined time.

4\. If no message is in the queue, either send an acknowledgment of receipt for the last message or a randomly generated message.

5\. Repeat forever.

Now you've got a private information retrieval system that has no scaling problems, no Sybil attacks, and essentially no bad actors. (Or if a bad actor happen to materialize, well, they just signed their bad act with a key that someone in the Debian ecosystem should be able to tie to a human identity if it came to that.)

And you don't have to worry about giving it an approachable UX because Debian devs don't care about that shit.

Boom-- state-of-the-art decentralized messaging service that whose anonymity and metadata-mining resistance scales with Debian's own interest in granting its developerbase anonymity.

<comment><USER19>
       a key that someone should in the Debian ecosystem should be able to tie to a human identity

       anonymous

Not sure I follow

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> These media spin terms get tiring. Saying you need a special way to log into a website is too boring, so they call it "The Dark Web". People saying lewd things in chatrooms is uninteresting, so it becomes "Virtual Rape".

I just end up having to explain to my older relatives that it's nonsense when they ask me about it.

<comment><USER17> I don't believe the mainstream media invented the term "dark web." Blame computer scientists and tech culture for that.

<comment><USER21> I blame the governments. They admittedly don't like people talking privatly.

<comment><USER22> You know Tor is a US Navy project that still gets a large portion of its funding from the US Government, right? If you're going to talk about something a broad as the system of government, there needs to be some nuance and specificity in your statements.

<comment><USER21> No, I didn't know that. Thanks to the US Navy.

I just expressed my personal perception. I see politicians talking about, that the government should be able to decipher whatsapp etc.

They probably don't like tor either.

<comment><USER22> I wouldn't worry about it too much. I've yet to see any US politician make a serious case for making non-backdoored encryption illegal, or banning Tor. A couple people have mentioned the idea, but no one's proposed legislation or anything like that.

<comment><USER23> Back during the whole Apple v. FBI thing last year:

A New York lawmaker proposed mandating backdoors or face a $2,500 fine per device.[0 §1(C)]

Senators Burr (R-NC) and Feinstein (D-CA) tried to introduce the "Compliance with Court Orders Act of 2016".[1 §3]

Thankfully, neither made it anywhere, but the fact that many politicians are so clueless about modern technology is scary.

[0]: [https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/bills/2015/a8093](https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/bills/2015/a8093)

[1]: [https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/2797124/Burr- Fein...](https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/2797124/Burr-Feinstein- Encryption-Bill-Discussion-Draft.pdf)

<comment><USER22> A few people have made proposals, though nothing has been taken seriously. The first one was a NY state proposal that never got out of committee. The second is weird. It seems to be a draft of a bill, I don't know if they actually proposed this in committee. And it's odd. It requires that companies must provide data to law enforcement with a valid court order. Which is redundant: of course if law enforcement has a court order for a company to provide data they have to provide it, unless they can contest the court order. The uses the phrase "make data intelligible" which reading further seems to mean you have to decrypt the data. So it looks like it's meant to require companies to be able to decrypt any of their secure systems with a valid court order, hence requiring a backdoor. But Section 3.(b) says "Nothing in this Act may be construed to authorize any government officer to require or prohibit any specific design or operating system to be adopted by any covered entity." That seems to clearly state this Act can't require a company to put a backdoor in their system. It's really an odd little document.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> A good start is calling it something other than the "dark web"...</comment>


Cyclists should buy a camera to capture accident evidence - <AUTHOR> http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2017/11/cyclists_should_invest_in_a_camera_to_capture_accident_evidence_when_no.html <comment><USER2> I've cycling since 2 years old, and when I was 10 I built my own bicycle from scratch with my older brother. He's stil running his bikeshop.

The world needs a bicycle for the current age. I see many new ideas on kickstarter and news outlets presenting new bikes with all sorts of features. Most take one idea and built a bike around it. Some take more ideas but none actually solve my day-today problems with bikes:

\- They get stolen

\- They need regular maintenance on the drive train

\- Lighting breaks easily

\- Not robust enough

\- Traffic lights cost a lot of energy

\- Charging is a hassle

On top of that, I'd like some tech bolted on top of my bike:

\- Camera's

\- Safe & usable mapping system

\- Citylight & countrylight

\- Electronic lock

\- Electronic tracker (when stolen)

Lastly, it should use mostly standard parts.

<comment><USER3> To me, the ideal bike would be a fixed-frame hybrid or cx bike with an internal drive shaft (not a belt) and disc breaks to minimize maintenance, fenders. Basically like a bikeshare bike but without the bikeshare weight and the upright angle.

Chains and belts, caliper brakes, shocks, are all maintenance pain. Cam shafts are cheap to maintain but require a bike that is built around a shaft drive - they're not compatible with a standard frame setup.

Put all the electronics in a detachable pod on the handlebars. Light, horn, camera - all there. You can easily pop it off and take it with you.

Edit: if I were crazy enough for a hardware Kickstarter, an all-singing electronics pod would be it. A long-necked bike light with yellow leds down the side for side visibility and a pair of buttons for horns - a quiet pedestrian chime and an earsplitting horn guaranteed to cause hearing damage if used carelessly.

<comment><USER2> Low-maintenance and maintenance-free drive shafts are a solved problem, but expensive currently. Locks are a necessity where I live, I don't want to put a €500+ bike without 3 ore more locks. I want a lock to fasten the bike to a fixed item (e.g. pole) and both wheels locked to the frame. Then I want an electronic lock.

The electronics are dispersed over the whole bike. frontlight, backlight, camera's (I'm thinking 3 or 4), integrated mapping,, electronic lock, possible electric steering make it impossible to put all tech into a detachable unit. It's simply out of the question for a well-designed bicycle. I can see it adding some value for current bicycles though.

For the frame I probably want aluminium, because it's cheap and light enough. Shocks are not needed as my country has excellent biking paths. For most other countries shocks don't add too much value, especially not when using the bike in an urban environment. Then they are just maintenance-prone weight-gainers.

<comment> semi-extrinsic Electric steering? But why?

Lights: I bought a $15 set of lights off eBay ~3 years ago. The alkaline AAA batteries need replacing a few times a year, nobody can be bothered stealing them because they don't look expensive.

Why all the cameras?

Why an electronic lock?

As for locking both wheels, in my experience changing from QR dropouts to something that requires a simple tool for taking wheels off solves that problem. The tools on my bikes are small enough that I Gorilla tape them to the underside of the seat on each bike.

As for shocks being maintenance-prone: my daily commute is on a bike with Suntour shocks from 2002. They've never had maintenance. Basically everything else on the bike has been replaced except for shocks and frame.

<comment><USER4> To be honest, a cheap light is a cheap light.. but I have had my rear light stolen before now and had to cycle home in the dark without one (in truth, it was like 1 am and I went via the back roads but I still felt very exposed and pulled off when a car approached). I currently have a rear pannier frame which has a built in reflector and have thought it would be useful for that to be a light, though I can't charge batteries on the bike so they need to be removeable easily. I'm nervous about leaving anything on the bike that is easily removable though.. so a small light is enough. The LED ones these days easily fit in my pocket and are way bright enough for city riding where all you need is visibility.

I'm intrigued about that chain drive though..

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> It's actually fascinating to see various constituency behavior in relative terms. Drivers are often overly aggressive and downright dangerous vs cyclists on the streets. Then you go to a college campus and cyclists behave as if they have the right of way over pedestrians (ex: stanford).

Perhaps it is simply a symptom of human psychology and entitlement/power.

<comment><USER6> > ex: stanford

Stanford seems to be particularly bad about this and I really don't understand why. The only bicycle "bump" incidents I have ever had were at Stanford.

One dude had the misfortune to bump me near my wallet. My city-bred reflex reaction (which even surprised me with how fast it was) knocked him right off the bicycle. Of course, he was pissed at me for clocking him. Umm, yo, douchebag, people will leave you alone if you don't bump into them.

<comment><USER7> _Of course, he was pissed at me for clocking him._

So you lashed out at someone because they accidentally bumped into you and they are the douchebag?

<comment><USER8> _So you lashed out at someone because they accidentally bumped into you and they are the douchebag?_

Yes, definitely the cyclist is the douchebag.

A cyclist is often traveling much faster than a pedestrian and can easily injure someone. The burden of proper behavior, especially in a mixed cyclist/pedestrian environment, must fall mainly to the cyclist.

Usually a "clocking" is because a cyclist is behaving recklessly. People often want to dismiss something as "an accident" when instead it was easily foreseen "negligence".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> Z-Widwil I have two cameras on me when I ride. One is the Fly6 rear cam shown in this article. The other is a helmet mounted GoPro. I would not ride without them for a lot of the reason brought up in the article. Not only were they helpful after the two accidents that I've had, but they also help out for everyday riding. As folks drive much better when they see a camera strapped to your head.

<comment><USER7> I doubt if many people notice the camera, although perhaps society as a whole will get used to the idea with enough incidents.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Many do. But this is still fundamentally victim-blaming; growing ridership and sensible infrastructure design have been shown again and again to be the drivers of safety, not shame-driven rider-specific pieces of tech.

</comment><comment><USER10> First day I got my bike cam, I was riding near park slope and coasted straight through a green light. Almost to the crosswalk on the other side of an intersection, a kid maybe 5-6 years old just books it right in front of my bike. I swerved into the center of the street to not hit him(luckily I had just looked over my shoulder 10 seconds earlier and knew no cars were behind me). Day in the life of a NYC biker, but the father(who was talking to someone else when his kid ran away from him) started yelling obscenities at me for almost running over his kid, and started chasing me down the street. I got away easily and nothing ever came of it, but I am so glad to have the dash cam because I would have no way of showing that the kid ran out in front of traffic, and not that I ran a red light and almost killed a kid.

<comment><USER11> I have trouble picturing it - it sounds like the kid went out into a crosswalk, over an intersection, with a green light. I agree the dad should keep a closer look at the kid, but that doesn't sound like he was the one at fault.

<comment><USER10> I was going straight through an intersection with the green light - the kid ran across the street perpendicular to my motion across the crosswalk which had the orange hand.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> This is extremely unsubtle payola. It reads like an infomercial. I figured slate was better than that.

<comment><USER12> Yup. "You should buy a camera. Specifically this o- [tab closes]"

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> A couple months ago I mounted an inexpensive (~$140) 360 view camera to my helmet for my bike work commute. Here's some recent footage: [https://youtu.be/aTTEEWxJImk](https://youtu.be/aTTEEWxJImk)

It works well and might one day capture an accident. I just need to remember to charge it. I wear it even when it is not charged because it seems cars are more cautious around me when they see the camera poking off the top of my helmet.

<comment><USER14> What camera do you use?

<comment><USER13> This is the one I bought: [https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B071NPLVZH/](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B071NPLVZH/)

It looks like it might be discontinued, but there are other similar models available: [https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_nr_p_36_2?rnid=386442011&key...](https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_nr_p_36_2?rnid=386442011&keywords=360+camera&rh=n%3A172282%2Cn%3A502394%2Ck%3A360+camera%2Cp_36%3A7000-15000&qid=1510550839&low- price=70&high-price=200)

If you try this a good helmet mount is important. This one works well for my hardshell helmet: [https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008BNEXH4](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008BNEXH4)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> This is a technical solution to a social problem.

Taking video to the police of centimetre close passes (1m is legislated) in Australia just yields "your camera is not calibrated to measure distance so we cannot accept this", and stonewalling.

<comment><USER16> exactly. the solution is more people on bikes getting fresh air and exercise instead of road-rage in their cars

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I follow the BikeCammers subreddit. Based on what I've read, it seems that in a lot of jurisdictions, police have to actually witness the offense in order to issue a citation.

But if the cyclist has video footage of the vehicle involved in the offense, and footage of the diver of the vehicle, then I don't see a reason a citation couldn't be issued if the cyclist was willing to testify as a witness/victim during the trial.

<comment><USER18> As in for an infraction? Surely reckless or negligent driving rises to a misdemeanor, and video is used for those all the time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I am riding a bicycle on a daily basis in Amsterdam. No one is using dash cams here, but I do(YI action cam) and it helped me a lot when a had the accident : [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUY7psClcbQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUY7psClcbQ)

<comment><USER20> The irony of the driver's vision blocked by a bunch of bicycles parked on the corner.

What was the outcome of this? I think you assumed right of way a bit too much in this instance and went flying through without slowing down. Car was moving very slowly and you still hit it!!

This is exactly where a lot of tension between cyclists and cars comes from. Cyclists have much better visibility and should avoid accidents like this.

<comment><USER19> the outcome - I broke a bone in my palm and spent 6 weeks with the cast around my hand, the car driver fixed my bicycle, his insurance company paid all my expenses : public transport costs, medical costs("own risk") and the compensation for "pain and suffering".

<comment><USER20> That's surprising. To me it looks like you sped through an intersection without slowing down or looking out for cars.

You hit the car, the car didn't hit you.

Also, bicycles at that speed can stop very short if brakes in good order. You didn't brake! Sorry... I don't mean to be rude. But I ride in the city, and there's no way I'd speed across an intersection without making sure it was clear.

Lucky you're living in Amsterdam because in Australia you would be paying for damage to the car!

<comment><USER21> Legally, not sure I agree with you. It looks like an uncontrolled intersection (I don't see any signage requiring the bike lane to yield in any way, although I'm not familiar with Amsterdam's signage). Looks more like an alley to me than a road, too.

Cars turning right are obligated to yield to others going straight in this instance. The van turned into what looks pretty clearly to be a bike lane.

Practically speaking, I totally agree with you though. Bikers need to be way more defensive.

<comment><USER19> From my experience cars ALWAYS let bicycles go on those intersections here in Amsterdam. In my situation the driver's view was blocked or he didn't check it as it was 8am and I was moving very fast, shit happens.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I've looked into helmet cams since I had an accident that cost me a tooth (sideswiped by another cyclist). It seems that most of them only have about 2 or so hours of record time on a charge. That doesn't seem sufficient. Don't need the additional lights, though.

<comment><USER23> Since you're on a bicycle, you should be able mount a reasonably sized battery on the bike to keep it charged? Any common usb phone battery bank should work fine

<comment><USER22> I have a dynamo hub that could recharge it on the fly, with a USB adapter. It would mean wiring it to the handlebar, but I suppose I could live with that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I would have loved to have cameras like that when someone chucked a rock at me in Milwaukee back in 2005.

Another thing that would be handy would be the ability to quickly transfer video to my phone via Wi-Fi.

<comment><USER25> Transferring files locally is still an unsolved problem. Bluetooth is cumbersome and slow, WiFi would be better, but something like AirDrop for non Apple devices would be great.

For SD-cards, many Android smartphones can be used to read it. Unfortunately iPhone has no SD slot.

<comment><USER26> So don't buy an apple phone.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Frankly I think this also applies to car drivers. Get a dashcam in case you get into an accident.

<comment><USER8> You would think that by now car manufacturers would make this easy to do. Why doesn't every car have a convenient way to both mount and power a dashcam? This whole necessity of snaking a power cable around the edge of a dashboard to connect to an unused fuse location is complete bullshit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I would love a camera with a button that when pressed automatically saves the previous 15 seconds and the preceding 15 seconds into a clip and send it directly to the police. Every single time I go out I have to deal with dangerous and inconsiderate drivers clearly braking the law, driving as if the world only exists in front of the car.

<comment><USER29> A common bike cam feature is to detect crashes and save the previous footage. Otherwise, they typically overwrite the oldest footage first.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> I agree, dashcams,have become very cheap, the main thing is people dont get around to it</comment>


The Entire Economy Is MoviePass Now. Enjoy It While You Can - <AUTHOR> https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/05/16/technology/moviepass-economy-startups.html <comment><USER2> Previous discussion from a few days ago: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17085538](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17085538)</comment>


MeetingShed - easy meeting scheduling with Google Calendar - <AUTHOR> http://www.meetingshed.com

<comment><AUTHOR> This is a web app in beta, the developers are looking for feedback</comment>


The Startup Curve - <AUTHOR> http://adam.blog.heroku.com/past/2008/4/23/the_startup_curve/ <comment><USER2> I didn't add those labels, though. Those were added by Trevor as a joke.

<comment><USER3> I would have thought there'd be a few more wiggles of false hope just before the trough of sorrow. You know, to make the trough of sorrow that much deeper and painful!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The first 3 comments on that post are hilarious

</comment><comment><USER5> The first comment says "Techcrunch only shows startups in the US or startups from the insiders - people who know Mike Arrington personally."

I know this is not the case. My company is not in the US and I don't know Mike Arrington. I just contacted them through their standard form, they liked one of our products and reviewed it favorably:

<http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/04/23/twitter-trends-twist/>

<comment><USER6> Note that comment's author.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> This is _exactly_ what justin.tv's traffic curve looks like. I joined just around the first Wiggles Of False Hope.

</comment><comment><USER8> N.B. This is from the whiteboard at the Y Combinator Mountain View office. Seeing it gives me an eerie _Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate_ feeling. The hockey stick at the end gives me a _little_ hope, but that trough looks awfully long...

</comment><comment><USER9> We apply a similar framework that tracks all the Stages of a business journey; I like the additional depth and experience this adds (through both the graph and the labels, however humourous) to the initial Start-Up Stage.

</comment><comment><USER10> Looks like the seeds of a meta-essay.</comment>


C will not save us. The Future of Software Development - <AUTHOR> http://a16z.com/2014/10/17/the-future-of-software-development-eves-chris-granger-plots-a-course/

<comment><USER2> Not C, C++. Those are two vastly different languages.

<comment><USER3> I think the point is lower level languages won't save us, as in 'python is too slow let's try C++, C++ is too slow let's try C, C is too slow let's try...' He also does mention C towards the end of the talk.

<comment><USER2> It's more like he mistakes C++ for C towards the end of the talk. But indeed, the talk is more about using languages closer to machine than about using C or C++ specifically, so this hardly affects the merit.

Good talk, by the way.</comment></comment></comment>


The State of Cloud Computing in 2011 (Infographic) - <AUTHOR> http://www.readwriteweb.com/cloud/2011/06/the-state-of-cloud-computing.php <comment><USER2> This infographic doesn't give me any info at all! The numbers don't make any sense.

"Most popular guest OS in the cloud : 66% Windows, 83% Linux." How am I supposed to interpret that? This equals to 152% of most popular guest OS

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Some people are going to use both Windows AND Linux so that's how that's possible.</comment>


The vandals destroying libraries should have the book thrown at them - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/13/vandals-destroying-libraries-should-have-book-thrown-at-them <comment><USER2> I live in the UK, have done my entire life, and have also been an intermitted user of libraries throughout my life - often at points when I couldn't afford the books I wanted to buy (particularly when I was a student).

I love books. I always have done, and most of my Christmas presents this year have been books (only 3, but you get the point). They are so incredibly important for opening up the vistas of thought and imagination that are available to you, that I don't think it can be overstated. And the UK government has been on a course of destroying libraries and a wide range of other cultural and societal infrastructure that it can't be overstated how scary this is.

Gove was responsible for stripping out a great deal of the syllabus in the UK - support for 'meaningless' subjects such as music, and music technology which I used to teach until the funding was removed from schools and it fell by the wayside for most schools as it was too expensive to keep going once equipment needed to be replaced. He is a man who feels he is an expert in every area, despite being anything but. Others in the government seem to be much the same, not seeing the point in anything they can't personally profit from.

Many of the subjects that are now struggling aren't public interest, and I wasn't too surprised. But this will destroy any chance that a generation will have to have access to the many-faceted wonders that a library can provide. The UK is sleep-walking into a desolate, dystopian future where knowledge is derided in favour of three-word soundbites and self-interest. The BBC will fall foul of the government once Brexit is out of the way, with all that brings.

I'm 48, and I can't remember any other time where I've actually despaired about the future for my (step) kids, and where I've felt that the government really is out of control. The way that the last election went was a damning indictment of the (pathetic) opposition in this country, and Johnson and his cronies (such as Gove) now have carte blanche to do as they please. By the time they are finished, so much structural damage will have been done to this country's institutions I think it will be next to impossible to repair what's been done, even if there is the political will to do anything about it.

<comment><USER3> >> I'm 48, and I can't remember any other time where I've actually despaired about the future for my (step) kids, and where I've felt that the government really is out of control.

That is said by every generation. Every generation going back hundreds of years. In the 1950s, the glory time for today's elderly, comic books we the craze. A hundred years before that doctors would regularly tell people not to read as it could cause illness, especially in women. Some thought chess angered the blood. But they all drank and took opium with abandon. Today doctors tell kids to reduce screen time, while loading them up with ADHD meds. Nothing changes.

The definition of "old" is when you start lecturing on how young people were so much better in your generation. It's just nostalgia. Old people forget the evils of the past and see new evils everywhere in the present.

<comment><USER4> Everything changes, yet nothing is new under the sun.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> i found this article to be very poor. instead of trying to formulate an argument for why libraries should be kept open, it lashes out in some petty political scoring.

my opinion is that the age of the library has ended. the library model is from a bygone age. it's role has been taken over by the internet. and any other features (such as events etc) have been nullified by changes in society. this is backed up by extremely reduced numbers of borrowers (and falling) and the incredible growth rate of the internet, and especially mobile as a whole. the digital disenfranchised have the same issue as the people who couldn't read and write back when libraries were one of the main the sources of knowledge. the difference today is that the price to access the internet has never been lower, will continue getting lower, and the benefits of the internet massively outweigh any nostalgic dreams about libraries.

there will still be libraries, but i don't foresee anything other than a continued decline until a more sustainable model is found. even then, i don't think another age of the libraries would be back anytime soon.

<comment><USER6> You are wrong, libraries are extremely important and provide access to both books and the internet for many many folks. They are a cultural, social and intellectual nexus. The thinking that libraries are outmoded because we have the web is short sighted.

This is article is outlining the destruction of the libraries in the UK by the conservative government, an educated and engaged population is a cure for the right. This is the same reason we have a war on education in the US, to make more right wing voters.

> Because nobody has worked as doggedly to this end, as unsentimentally, and > with a greater commitment to the suppression of literacy, than our own > Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport.

<comment><USER7> I think he was referring specifically to their traditional function as a repository of information. I think in that regard, libraries are outmoded.

Of course they have been and can be transformed to perform other important community functions.

<comment><USER8> They are not outmoded for this function, which is the function of a repository of information free to all citizens. They are critical for it, and they are giving up on it, by and large, thanks to the current generation of professional librarians.

What is described in the article is also happening in the US, and over the last 15 years the public library has largely ceased to be a repository for information or even a kiosk to access information, which would be it's primary modern function. It has become a place to deliver entertainment, and even more importantly to warehouse children of working parents and in some areas, homeless people. These are perhaps useful and important functions, but not a primary rationale for a library. But in order to perform these functions, the libraries have eliminated ... the books.

And I don't just mean the physical books, and most of the suburban libraries around here have eliminated by my estimate at least half of their physical collections, both in books and media, largely to open floor space for lounge areas. These books in many cases are now just _gone_. They aren't available to read digitally either - because libraries are largely outsourcing the whole 'content' thing to for-profit companies that essentially lease books for access by libraries at ridiculous prices. And you'll get what they consider profitable, which is largely content that is ... entertainment.

One of the great functions of the "old" library was access to out-of-print material. This is now largely gone, and because it is out of print, you won't find it in digital distribution, either. And obscure or unpopular material that formerly could be found in a library you now must buy, at a high price because of low individual interest.

I believe that the public library was one of the great democratic institutions in the US, not just because it afforded access to information, but as a place where everyone, rich and poor, would go and have the same right to borrow a book. The only sliver of hope I see here is that most libraries still seem to have large children's sections and it warms my heart to see parents still taking little ones to the library. It's one of the small rituals that help to produce a civil society and one that I fear will eventually be privatized as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> "Vandals", being the politicians cutting back funding, not actual library vandals.

<comment><USER10> I'm fairly certain the calibre of reader here is able to make that distinction without it being pointed out. Or they could read the article to find out.

<comment><USER11> Sure, but it's a misleading/clickbait title.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> "Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport". Just the name makes you cringe. Digital, Media, and Sport is what a library is about avoiding. Its about deep thinking and healing through reading, not the mindless pleasure of the screen. How did these technocrats get in charge of such a precious institution?

<comment><USER4> The upside I see is illegal online "libraries", which are free public printing presses.

It's a revolution that went quite unseen, thanks to the copyright lobby's persistent noise about copied videotapes and bootlegging.

May good health find their operaters, and may the next Library of Alexandria make it to the heat death of the universe.</comment></comment>


The birth of a new gender-neutral pronoun. - <AUTHOR> http://grammar.quickanddirtytips.com/grammar-yo-pronoun.aspx

<comment><USER2> In a paper I once wrote as an English major, I once proposed using "em" in the same manner as these kids use "yo". The advantage is that the pronunciation would mostly mirror "them" in speech ("When the patient comes in, have em fill out a form"). Of course the drawback was that there would be confusion with "him" and "them" (did he say "have 'im", "have em", or "have 'em"). I also proposed adapting "le" from Spanish/French for singular gender-neutral subjects ("whoever le is, le is the fastest driver I've seen").</comment>


Cyber crime: Preventing young people from getting involved - <AUTHOR> http://www.nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk/crime-threats/cyber-crime/cyber-crime-preventing-young-people-from-getting-involved <comment><AUTHOR> \- Is your child spending all of their time online?

\- Are they interested in coding? Do they have independent learning material on computing?

\- Do they have irregular sleeping patterns?

\- Do they get an income from their online activities, do you know why and how?

\- Are they resistant when asked what they do online?

\- Do they use the full data allowance on the home broadband?

\- Have they become more socially isolated?</comment>


Which mathematical definitions should be formalised in Lean? - <AUTHOR> https://mathoverflow.net/questions/311071/which-mathematical-definitions-should-be-formalised-in-lean <comment><AUTHOR> I thought this mathoverflow post might be of interest to those who mentioned automated theorem proving in discussions on the recent post on the ABC conjecture ([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18034714](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18034714)).</comment>