Craigslist has cost U.S. newspapers $5 billion since 2000, researchers say - <AUTHOR> http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/08/14/craigslist-has-cost-u-s-newspapers-5-billion/ <comment><USER2> That's like saying that cars have cost horse carriage manufacturers $X billion. What a silly statement.

<comment><USER3> Its entirely reasonable to claim CL has transformed a billion dollar business into a million dollar business of which it (as a company) is the sole beneficiary. For quite some time, Newspapers and the like have not sold news- they sell used cars and real estate. Quantifying the actual numbers if valuable.

<comment><USER2> It's reasonable to say that they have transformed the market, but saying they have "cost" them anything is an ill choice of words.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Alternatively, Craigslist has saved people $5 billion (minus fees for a few categories) since 2000.

<comment><USER5> I feel the same way. The headline should say:

Technical progress and competition have cost U.S. newspapers $5 billion since 2000, researchers say

<comment><USER4> _" Failure to innovate damages industry Dinosaurs"_

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> What a horrible headline. That makes it sound like US newspapers were somehow entitled to that $5 billion. In actual fact, the newspapers had the same opportunity as Craiglist to earn (or try to earn) that revenue, and they dropped the ball. Boo hoo, cry me a river.

It should, instead, read "failure to adapt to new technology and a changing environment results in $5 billion loss to US newspaper industry". Or something roughly like that.

</comment><comment><USER7> Newspapers forfeit $5 billion badly needed dollars to Craigslist by totally failing to notice how bad they were at their jobs, and how technology has changed information delivery. Continue to insist upon sending patrons pounds of waste paper every month.

</comment><comment><USER8> Nothing stopping media tycoons from making their own classifieds site. Village Voice did with Backpages

</comment><comment><USER9> Cost per inch, classifieds were always a big rip-off. Worse? Obituaries. Now many papers charge a fee for print, plus a web fee. Adding insult to injury. Who's going to disrupt the obits?

<comment><USER10> Only old people care about obituaries on a regular basis. When they start reading other media (actually, when people who read other media get old), newspaper obituaries will be disrupted.

<comment><USER9> Only old people read obituaries? What about real estate agents? Auctioneers? I'm sure people said no money existed in free classifieds. Except for Craig.

<comment><USER4> Sure, but I think few people buy obituaries to help out real estate agents. If those people want obituaries, then perhaps they can pay newspapers to run them for others for free.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> First, the article is talking about data for 2000-2007 (so the title is a bit misleading). The prime collapse in the newspaper industry began after 2007.

Second, if you ran it to 2013 it would clearly be at least several times $5b based on the spectacular collapse of the classified industry.

Third, losing the lucrative classifieds business chopped the legs out from under newspapers, the net cost to them was much wider than just the raw classified business itself.

As others have noted, Craigslist has saved people and businesses at least as much as they've cost newspapers. The efficiency gain alone of Craigslist is likely to have produced a significant net gain for the US economy.

</comment><comment><USER12> I wouldn't mind if newspapers went out of business. Hopefully most of the industry's jobs could move online. And it sure would save a lot of paper.

<comment><USER13> This is a very short-sighted view. Where do you think all those syndicated stories that fill every online news site actually come from?

<comment><USER7> Journalists?

<comment><USER13> That are paid by...?

<comment><USER7> Sometimes they aren't[1]. Some are paid through agents. Those syndicates are missing their opportunity to organize and solve the journalists' coordination problems. Someone will.

[1] - [https://natethayer.wordpress.com/2013/03/04/a-day-in-the- lif...](https://natethayer.wordpress.com/2013/03/04/a-day-in-the-life-of-a- freelance-journalist-2013/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Let's all sit around and cry about how new technology replaces old business models.</comment>


The Price of Amazon - <AUTHOR> http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/05/the-price-of-amazon/?ref=technology <comment><USER2> It's hard to see this piece as more than a disrupted industry, frankly, whining over their diminished power in the new reality. I'm to believe that it's bad for anyone but publishers that books are cheap? Because people might buy books for the wrong reasons? Oh, humanity. ("it sends a confusing message that good books are worth less, and because it encourages buying based on something other than the quality of the book")

This bit is particularly disingenuous: "The hippie, black and women's movements of the 1960s would not have been so successful in challenging authority without the bookstores, which made their ideas widely available and sympathetic in a way that television, for instance, did not."

Seriously? I mean, really, seriously, you just wrote that on a _technology_ (wait for it) BLOG? The analogous movements of today has unprecedented access to spreading their ideas through blogs and websites and social media and petition sites and collaboration services and who knows what else - most of it available instantly and almost or entirely free. I don't think that if the occupy/tea party/anonymous/truther/conspiracy/pick-your-revolution-of-week movements have struggled for five minutes to make their ideas available, it was because of the _lack of bookstores_.

<comment><USER3> >> This bit is particularly disingenuous...

Yes and no.

His statement is correct in a historical perspective that Walter Cronkite and the local newspaper had little interest in covering these movements (or at least not in a sympathetic or fair light).

His statement is humorous, as you point out, when used as a leg of his argument that bookstores are still needed for these social reasons.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I feel like this entire argument is less against Amazon and more against modern economics. The author attacks two trademarks of the Amazonian publishing spectrum: algorithmic pricing and a diminished sense of competition.

The first, I think, is difficult to make because you're saying "hey, this pricing scheme is arbitrary and capricious" when the current model of publishers setting prices for goods seems equally arbitrary. Books are art with little intrinsic value -- if you were to ask me to value a book in my collection, the answer would range from less than a dollar to thousands of dollars, with little in between. I'm not saying demand is a perfect proxy for value, but I think its better than the other options. (I feel the same way about clothes. Any pricing scheme where there's a systematic understanding that everyone is going to discount the hell out of the base price is, I think, a flawed scheme.)

The second, I think is much more valid overall but the same points could be made about Barnes & Noble or Borders, back in the day. (Remember _You 've Got Mail_?)

A much bigger and interesting topic of discussion, I think, is what happens ten years from now when eBooks become the du jour method of literary consumption. Personally, I'm looking forward to the Bandcamp of poetry.

<comment><USER5> There is already an absurd amount of literary content freely created online by millions of people. And most of the sites offer some ranking system to filter the crap out. I think I bought my last book ever in college, considering I have an infinite supply of 15 - 25 year old Tolkein's works available that they put out for free because they just want people to enjoy their writings if I look hard enough.

<comment><USER6> I've acquired about five self-published books at a very low cost (including free) and they've all been shit. I have a hard time buying something these days that I don't think had an editor work through it, but I am concerned that editors will play a smaller and smaller role in the book business going forward.

<comment><USER7> Perhaps a site where editors can freelance and be rated by writers and readers alike?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> _"So do you raise the price, knowing they're going to lower it, so that the price will then appear closer to what you need it to be? "_

So, Amazon is paying the publisher the wholesale price regardless. Amazon's discounts cut into Amazon's profits, not the publishers -- or even result in Amazon taking a loss.

I think this publisher quoted has to tell us why he "needs" the price on Amazon to be a certain amount, when it does not effect how much he gets paid per copy -- the initial naive interpretation would be that if Amazon wants to cut their profits, so presumably more copies sell, while the publisher is still making the same amount per copy -- this would be good for the publisher, no?

It _is_ a weird market (with Amazon appearing to routinely sell books at a loss), and is dominated by Amazon, which indeed isn't great for a healthy diverse bookselling market.

But publishers are saying some weird stuff, without explaining themselves.

<comment><USER9> It's been a couple of years, but I used to work at a place that published a number of books.

Usualy wholesale price was %40 off retail. Amazon demanded 55% at the time or they wouldn't sell the books. I can imagine some publishers would raise their prices accordingly so that they would still reach the minimum wholesale price they wanted/needed.

<comment><USER10> Why do books carry a printed retail price anyway? Is there a reason why they can't be like CDs and other goods?

<comment><USER9> Apparently to (try to) guarantee the survival of books shops: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixed_book_price_agreement](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixed_book_price_agreement)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> If you're interested about the kind of harm Amazon can potentially do to the publishing ecosystem (or good, depending on your position), than definitely check out the Melville House Publisher's blog. They've famously fought Amazon numerous times over their terms and write frequently about Amazon issues.

[http://www.mhpbooks.com/archive/](http://www.mhpbooks.com/archive/)

</comment><comment><USER12> I'm really interested to see how the Google Shopping Express [1] thing will play out. I really like the idea of challenging Amazon's control by enabling local stores rather than just trying to create another behemoth.

It seems like it's right up Google's alley, given their experience with long- tail markets in the advertising business. I hope it's a success.

[1] [https://www.google.com/shopping/express/about/](https://www.google.com/shopping/express/about/)

<comment><USER13> I've been using Google Shopping Express (beta invite from a former coworker) for the past month now, and I love it. I ordered a toothbrush going into work yesterday, and the courier was at my desk by noon. I especially like that it includes a variety of local stores (including budget places like Walgreens and Target) so I almost always get the best price. A couple of potential flaws I see with the service are:

* The price point. Right now the beta gives me free delivery on everything. So I can order from numerous stores with tiny orders, which is great. But normally it looks like it will cost $4.99 for a one-store delivery, which may not be worth it for me unless I really need something urgent. Amazon Prime will almost always be worth it for me in that case, unless it's something I can't go two days without. Now, maybe if Google came out with a Prime-like one time annual fee for unlimited deliveries...

* The type of products available. Right now, you can't get a lot of the things you would normally go to the store for: perishable food items, alcohol, etc. That takes away a lot of the value of Same Day delivery. Amazon Fresh really has a big edge here, but I guess that's only available in Seattle.

<comment><USER14> I'm in the beta as well and the account section explicitly mentions an annual membership and the date that the trial ends and the membership starts. It would make absolutely no sense for them not to offer this as a subscription.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Publishers probably weren't complaining when Amazon would buy their book at wholesale and take a loss with massive retail discounting.

What publishers want is for Amazon to sell at low margin so they get volume and the publishers get each at a decent wholesale price.

As a seller on Amazon I have noticed that often people will pay more than the cheapest available, either they don't bother looking elsewhere or Amazon as a brand has grown to the point where people just find it easiest to use them all the time. If this effect holds for books then they no longer have the be the cheapest to drive decent volume.

<comment><USER6> | Publishers probably weren't complaining when Amazon would buy their book at wholesale and take a loss with massive retail discounting.

Ha, I bet a few were more than concerned.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> In Germany we have a law that prohibits rebates on books. The prices are usually printed on the back. Selling books discounted is prohibited and may lead to huge penalties. (Of course there are loopholes, damaged books can be sold for any price and books can be damaged by stamping "DAMAGED" on them.) This eliminates pricing competition and will probably give the local booksellers a few more years to live. However: Amazons margin on books is probably the largest ever realized countrywide. Book wholesalers have the contractual right to get the largest discount granted to any customer. This is why basically no-one gets more than 50%. Except Amazon. They'll buy from wholesale, but the book will need 1-2 additional days to ship. To get 24h shipping, the publishers have to sell directly to Amazon at 50% rebate plus around 15% for handling and advertising. This way they realize lower sourcing costs than anyone else. It's ridiculous, but many agree to it.

<comment><USER17> There is also one main difference between US and German book market.

Ordering a book in US took two weeks or even month, to ship the book to Boston, before Amazon disrupted the broken US book market. While ordering a book in Germany takes a maximum of two days to any bookstore.

One thing the article does not mention is the real price of ordering a book at amazon: Privacy. There had been lots of cases where CIA or FBI visited people because of the books the bought.

<comment><USER18> Unless you're paying cash for books and not using any sort of membership/discount card when you do, your privacy is just as gone at a physical bookstore as it is at Amazon.

<comment> UVB-76 Not necessarily; in most cases I would imagine only the book store themselves retain data about your purchase (details of the SKU(s) you purchased, images of you making the purchase on CCTV, etc.)

If you use an electronic payment method, only 'metadata' — to use an expression in vogue — about the transaction will be transmitted to third parties, not the details of the particular item(s) you purchased.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> This confirms my theory that NYT would write anything as long as Apple pays them enough.

The picture painted here ignores the point of view of the customer completely. Whatever Amazon does is okay with me as long as they successfully exposes Apple + Big Four cartel.

</comment><comment><USER20> Most books sold by Amazon are sold by 3rd party sellers, which are small businesses generally. They use SaaS apps to do repricing. Pricing is not, for the most part, done by a special Amazon algorithm.

<comment><USER21> > Most books sold by Amazon are sold by 3rd party sellers

Are there any solid figures on that?

<comment><USER20> No, in fact it looks like I was wrong. I based it off my buying of books which are mostly long tail. 3rd party sales appear to be 50% of Amazon sales right now, according to Google (on phone right now, hard to link) buy most of that is not media, so Amazon must be doing 50%+ of sales.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Destroy the looms, they're stealing our jobs!

</comment><comment><USER23>
        Steve [Jobs] is in the I win/you win school.
        Jeff Bezos is in the I win/you lose school.

[http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/04/26/100426fa_fact_...](http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/04/26/100426fa_fact_auletta).

<comment><USER24> I am more to believe that those two quotes should have been reversed. I am all for the idea of publisher's being pushed out in favor of authors getting direct to customers, the same idea that would be so nice in music.

There really is no difference in the end, both can easily be delivered electronically and both have adherents to the old means of enjoying them; physical copies.

<comment><USER25> It's unfair to say the reverse when Amazon were only making a loss to monopolize the market. However, Apple didn't care that book industry were gouging the consumer - no printing costs, no shipping costs, no packaging costs .. why should eBooks be the same price? Greed! I don't buy eBooks on principle. If the price was reduced accordingly, so that the book industry maintained its profits - that would have been fair and equitable. From my perspective, neither Apple nor Amazon had this goal in mind.</comment></comment></comment>


Denis Dutton: A Darwinian Theory Of Beauty - <AUTHOR> http://blog.sokanu.com/denis-dutton-a-darwinian-theory-of-beauty

<comment><USER2> I think that appreciation of beauty, in art, music etc. is just a glitch in the brain's compression algorithm. It tends to reward novel patterns which are also familiar, i.e., compressible in regards to learned information. For example, music is boring when it's totally compressible repetitive pattern, or when it's too novel or random and thus not compressible.

</comment><comment><USER3> The correct summary is that "we find beauty in something done skillfully". He's talking about art and such.

I also think it should be clear that people who are more handsome or beautiful or have straighter teeth than others are better evolutionarily than other less beautiful people.

They are less flawed.

<comment><USER4> To be clear, it's not because they're less flawed per se, but less symmetrical. Physical asymmetries indicate poorer genetic fitness, and we interpret this potential genetic detriment as flaw.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Doesn't seem so crazy. I mean, just look at how popular musicians are with women!

It doesn't entirely make sense to me from the female point of view, but from the male point of view being artistic (in this case musical) makes a lot of sense in Darwinian terms!

<comment><USER6> indeed, the entire talk struck me as being overly male-centric, beginning with the example of the peacock's tail. he needs to at least argue that sexual selection works both ways to explain the many talented female writers/musicians.

thing is, I don't even buy that musicians' popularity with the opposite sex is a universal thing. For most of history in China (where I live) - if you want to have a random sample of humanity and culture, can't quite ignore China can you - being a musician is quite a lowly occupation. it's only in the last 50 years when they began to make big money that they became desirable as sexual partners.

evolutionary biology no doubt determines what we look for in a mate. but it's not as fixated on some notion of beauty as pure reproductive advantage.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: What are the skills you use to navigate the world? - <AUTHOR> There are a few skills i can think of that cannot be described using just one word:
* avoiding responding in verbal bursts - this allows you to switch to the analytical brain and not provid transactional information as it comes to your mind * listen to understand not to reply - this seems very click baity, but in my experience it's seems undervalued
* once you understand(see above) you can use this to adapt behavior/answer and not anchor to the previous conclusion while ignoring new knowledge that was created
* Occam's razor is something that is also underrated when searching for motivations/incentives of individual actions(that are not yours). It seems that most of the time, the simplest explanation is also the true one, but that does not stop us from adding unverified assumptions and exit with very personal but complex conclusions.
* when interacting with people always look for the signal, because from the words alone in the message can be very misrepresented. Use the message to transform the signal into something simple as in: i don't know, maybe, yes, no, i don't like that etc - obviously this should not apply when you get specific data on topics where details are important
* context - in my opinion this is also underrated because most of the time the conclusions are not enough or can be easily dismissed. I always like to give as an example "flat earthers". We usually know their conclusion and dismiss it arrogantly, but the deeper context(if you actually were interested in the topic of this movement) is that the people that form that "society" have a deeper reason for their common conclusion: it's belonging. As the rest of us, that movement made them belong and form a deep connection although the premise is not valid. Looking for context in this case and understanding it takes a whole new response from my side when interacting with the above mentioned individuals. * don't forget that people speak most of the time just to express themselves(think of instagram) not to give information or request new information
I like to force myself in using these tools to understand conversations/ideas or general communication.  Also, a [resource](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtIzMaLkCaM&feature=share) i found about people expressing themselves in writing (mind -> text -> reader -> idea you wanted to get across from your mind) is this lecture. It can come off as not relevant but it can be applied also in verbal communication.
If you think of success as getting what you want, having a better understanding of how individuals communicate and being better at communicating with them, can give you a boost in navigating towards what you want. <comment><USER2> I think that a basic understanding of some concepts of (micro)economics is very helpful, e.g. knowing about excpected value; marginal utility and the fact that it is often decreasing; and pareto efficiency.

Also, two insights from computer science that are applicable to many areas of life: ducktyping ("If it walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, then it must be a duck") and the fact that context switching takes a lot of ressources.

</comment><comment><USER3> Being outward focused when possible to try to see things from other's point of view.

Slowing down a bit and not jumping to conclusions.

Trying to keep my ego in check. It's okay to be wrong or for a better idea to come from someone else.

Making a conscious effort to listen carefully and not interrupt. I can be impatient so I have to actively work on being present and tapping the brakes.

Avoiding caricaturing a point of view based on the loudest or most extreme versions of a point of view. Related: make sure you understand and address the strongest version of an argument (i.e., avoid the straw man version).

Avoiding Subscribing to ANY ideologies. All ideologies are bullshit and an easy substitute for thinking for yourself.

</comment><comment><USER4> The ability to talk to people, especially while traveling. While that skill is on pause for now, I have had many experiences where someone introduced me to their world, and they all started from striking up a conversation.

</comment><comment><USER5> Deliberation. Try to argue with yourself. Convince yourself you are right or wrong. This pause gives you time to cool your head and respond intelligently, or consider the consequences.

</comment><comment><USER6> "Don't listen to what people say, watch what they do". Though it can readily be applied to politicians, applies to nearly everyone you meet.

<comment><USER2> Similarly, watch out for the quiet ones.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> cartography</comment>


Ask HN: where to send a friend's son for Programming 101? - <AUTHOR>

I was with an old high-school friend this weekend and his son's interest was piqued by the notion of learning programming, after I showed him a bit of code. The kid is 14 yo and suitably geeky, but has never coded.
I am happy to help teach (remotely) but I think that a) there are good resources out there and b) programming is largely solitary and c) I know more about programming than I do about education.
What is your most-recommended resource for learning programming, tabula rasa? <comment><USER2> Does he play video games? Games are a great gateway drug to programming.

If he's interested in Minecraft, I'd buy him a Java book (I've heard good things about Head First Java) and help him work through that. Once he gets the gist of Java introduce him to the Minecraft modding community. He'll have a lot of fun making mods for both himself and his friends.

This strategy worked for a few people I know who are in his age group.

</comment><comment><USER3> Most of the MOOC sites seem to have a CS101 course which is generally programming fundamentals. Udacity have a great one, which is basically building a search engine in Python. It doesn't hurt that one of its lecturers is a Googler.

</comment><comment><USER4> The best way: 1)Control click 2)Inspect Element

Also, [http://cs75.tv/](http://cs75.tv/)

</comment><comment><USER5> The best way to start learning programming? Linux.

</comment><comment><USER6> arduino</comment>


Show HN: Trying to disrupt the phone and phone number industry with our startup - <AUTHOR> http://www.reflap.com

<comment><USER2> Wasn't this recently posted a day or two ago? I recall seeing this

<comment><AUTHOR> Ummm, I don't think so? Well let's say I didn't post it on Hacker news.</comment></comment>


Twice the Effort All the Time - <AUTHOR> http://ronjeffries.com/articles/017-02ff/scrum-thoughts/ <comment><USER2> I'm not sure, but I think I was recently in a dark scrum/kanban environment. Agile was imposed from above; the attempted sale to the workers was the "burning platform" metaphor. Passive-aggressive adherence to roles, where people would be aware of problems but wouldn't say anything because it wasn't their role. This was at a BigCo.

I say I'm "not sure" because this was my only exposure to Agile. I suppose that's unfortunate.</comment>


The trading volume of Alibaba reached nealy 6 billon dollors yesterday - <AUTHOR> http://weibo.com/1768198384/AiigJrzYT The trading volume of Alibaba reached 35 billon yuan(nearly 6 billon dollors) yesterday. <comment><AUTHOR> More details from The Wall Street Journal. [http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB1000142405270230464410...](http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304644104579191590951567808) "Chinese E-Commerce Marketplace Records $5.78 Billion in Sales, Breaking Last Year's Mark in Half a Day"</comment>


My Google Glass Application - <AUTHOR> http://www.pickmegoogle.com

<comment><USER2> the link with the "www" doesn't work. <http://pickmegoogle.com/> is accessible.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for pointing that out! NearlyFreeSpeech and their canonical links...</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Which news sources do you consider the most and least reliable? - <AUTHOR> <comment><AUTHOR> here, reliable means balanced and trustworthy.

if possible, also break down analysis by tech, business, and general news.</comment>


Israeli hackers counter attack: posting private photos of anti-Israel hackers - <AUTHOR> http://geektime.com/2014/04/10/israeli-hackers-launch-counter-offensive-breaking-into-computers-and-photographing-a-group-of-anti-israel-hackers/

<comment><USER2> I wonder how they found these OpIsrael participants in the first place. I assume they just went into an IRC channel dedicated to OpIsrael and struck up conversations with gullible people to try and get their personal information. I doubt these are the people responsible for the credit card and email leaks from several days ago.

[http://time.com/51616/anonymous-israel- attack/](http://time.com/51616/anonymous-israel-attack/)

</comment><comment><USER3> > Israeli hackers broke into the computers of Anonymous members that attacked > Israel

"attacked Israel"? I wasn't aware that Israel was a computer. Anyone know where this article's sources are?

</comment><comment><USER4> Politics aside (fucking retards).

Looks like the attack was performed by getting the ips of users in the #opisrael chat room and trawling for vulnerable targets. Which means most of the outed users probably has nothing to do with the defacing of Israeli web sites. It's a much much easier attack than trying to go after them who was active in the initial attack who likely have slightly better security than random irc users.

</comment><comment><USER5> "As of 2013, Israel had been condemned in 45 resolutions by United Nations Human Rights Council since its creation in 2006—the Council had resolved almost more resolutions condemning Israel than on the rest of the world combined."

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_UN_resolutions_conc...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_UN_resolutions_concerning_Israel_and_Palestine)

Yeah.... "praise Israel".

<comment><USER6> Yes, the U.N is definitely known for its objectivity regarding Israel.

[http://imgur.com/4FQNZBu](http://imgur.com/4FQNZBu)

<comment><USER5> Oh, so how would you describe Israel in a more objective way then?

We are talking about a brief history (60+ years) of massacres and a growing illegal occupation of land here, would you like to phrase that in a more nicer way no to offend "God's chosen people" or what's the problem?

<comment><USER7> I recommend you pursue your line of inquiry elsewhere.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Jeff Bussgang: A Lost Generation of Entrepreneurs? - <AUTHOR> http://www.pehub.com/61944/a-lost-generation-of-entrepreneurs/

<comment><USER2> What is the mark of success? VC funding and IPOs? What about the thousands of under 30s who have made good products, are living a good life from the earnings, and aren't seeking to be bought out? I know more than a few under 30s entrepreneurs who don't live in the Valley, have reputable positive cashflow sites, and spend much of their free time traveling the world and meeting new people. How is that not success if that is exactly what they wanted to do? Yet you won't hear about them in lists like these, though they have had garnered lots of media coverage about their projects.

Success varies person to person. Four billion in the bank and a fully-booked schedule may be success to one while $240k in savings with absolutely no obligations may be success to another. This doesn't mean they are not entrepreneurs. It just means they don't fit the author's/society's definition of success.

<comment><USER3> Good points. I think including Jack Dorsey in the meaningful success category suggests the OP was a bit wooly-headed. Unless I missed the news of Twitter's exit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Following yesterday's discussion on the software architecs thread.

Doesn't the lack of experience, toughness and soft skills make it really hard to 20 somethings to have success as founders?

Maybe it's my environment but from what I have seen, I live in a latin country(one of the least of the latin ones, Portugal), your skills of comunication are fundamental. And every business initiative needs backstage moves.

People here will just dismiss you for your age or step on you on the first flaw.

</comment><comment><USER5> I have to disagree with the age fetishization in this article. You hear the same thing about math and the creative arts, especially in popular depictions: that a mathematician or artist is "dead" by age 30.

It's not true. Creatives of all stripes (mathematicians, painters, poets, entrepreneurs) peak between 45 and 55. The ones who peak at 25 are extreme outliers.

<comment><USER6> There was a study that indicated the average age for peak scientific productivity in Nobel Prize winners was 27.

So while not dead at 30, if you haven't completed your magnum opus by then you are doomed to also-ran status, at least in the hard-intellectual fields.

<comment><USER7> Nobel winners must be alive at the time of the prize being awarded. Given the lag between profound discovery/invention and the widespread recognition of that profoundness, isn't it likely that those who did their best work at age 55 would be dead by the time their work is recognized? So, are we observing anything other than selection bias?

<comment><USER5> Those sorts of awards, in general, are designed to encourage rising greatness rather than recognize it posthumously. This was the rationale behind giving Obama the Peace Prize so early in his presidency.

I believe it's a requirement for the Fields Medal that the recipient be under 40.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


A "small-time investor" - <AUTHOR> http://diegobasch.com/im-a-small-time-investor

<comment><USER2> Well as long as nobody invents 'brovesting' I'm ok with it. :-)

I understand that many people have a connection between 'angel' and 'charity' but I've always equated the angel in angel investing with 'guardian angel' which is someone who can see more of the hazards facing the team and give them a heads up or a nudge when one of those comes close to being a 'problem.' This isn't charity, it is providing a heads up sort of service.

</comment><comment><USER3> I know Diego personally and can speak from experience that he's the sort of person that will help you more than most "angels" out there would even if they tried (most don't/can't; spray-n-pray is still in full swing out there, folks!)

Maybe we need a new label that identifies people like him. I'd like to believe that I would qualify for whatever it is that we come up with as well, but others need to decide that.

For many of the same reasons he so eloquently described I've avoided using the "angel" term like the plague, even if some people need the quick epithet to summarize where you fit in this crazy world of ours.

The so-called democratization(/crowding?) of funding is going to bring more, not less, of these types of dumb-money checkbook swinging people out into play. It will end in tears for many, but as long as we are all adults about it, and we don't place those bets with large pools of money that should be directed to a different asset class like fixed income for pension funds distributions, we'll survive yet another period of frothiness and call it a day while we wait for the next one to materialize.

There is no central bank that plays with the valuations of things (ie. price controls) in the startup ecosystem, and that's a great thing, mind you. Yet as long as IPOs like $FB today return not 1 but 3 VC funds in one large swing for the fences, we are all going to be playing this game here for a while.

Pick a side, enjoy the game and don't hate the player but the game (while you try to change it if you can!) We can all thank PG for some of the most recent changes, and blame him for the unintended consequences of his particular version of the reality distortion field.

<comment><USER4> Thanks Juanjo for the kind words. Completely agree regarding the game, and the rules are already changing. It's interesting that the same technologies that enable new kinds of startups also enable new investing models. I guess we all like change when it works in our favor, not so much when it's against us :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> The "angel" in angel investor is how you're seen by the company you're giving money to. It fits in a tight funding market, although it may not seem to fit now that the market is so liquid.

<comment><USER4> When I've raised funding I didn't see angel investors as "angels." I wasn't asking for favors. My company wasn't a charity. I wanted investors who believed in what we were doing, not some uncle with money who might think he was being magnanimous.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Great to see that there are humble people like this out there. I'm not even really in the field but the term 'angel investor' has always struck me as really self-inflating. If there is anyone who is 'angelic' it is the people doing the hard work. Why not just 'seed investor'?

</comment><comment><USER7> Maybe an "initial" investor, or an early-stage investor. "Small-time" seems derogatory.

<comment><USER4> It's intentional. I need to keep my ego in check, and remember that I'm only supporting cast. The entrepreneurs are the protagonists.

<comment><USER7> I just don't know if I could muster the cojones to refer to you as a small- time investor in your presence (I'd have the decency to check that you're not around first).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Low five figure investments ? You seem pretty angelic to me. Us mere mortals don't have that kind of ca$h bro!

<comment><USER4> Most people who work in Silicon Valley for a while can afford to make a few small investments like that if they choose. Others buy a nice car, or whatever. It can be seen as an expensive hobby. Many angel investors are regular working guys/gals.

<comment><USER8> I'm curious as to how you make such investments though. I thought the rules were that you either need to have net worth > $5MM or a household income of over $300k/year. Those are from the SEC website and I'm not 100% sure of whether they apply to everyone or just on second market. (I guess contract investments work otherwise..)

If those numbers are right then that still does sound out of reach. Though to be honest, $100k per investment also sounds out of reach to me but I haven't had any big silicon valley payouts.

<comment><USER9> The > $5M is for entities, there's also "a natural person who has individual net worth... that exceeds $1 million"

and

"a natural person with income exceeding $200,000 in each of the two most recent years"

<http://www.sec.gov/answers/accred.htm>

<comment><USER4> You can also invest in startups as an unaccredited investor, with some restrictions. I know those laws have been revised recently.

[http://www.quora.com/Investing/What-are-unaccredited- investo...](http://www.quora.com/Investing/What-are-unaccredited-investors)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Need an RSA-Key? Github delivers - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/search?p=6&q=path%3A.ssh%2Fid_rsa

<comment><AUTHOR> I know, it is not Github, making these Keys public, but Gihub might consider, protecting its users, that do this.

Just my 2 cents.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> They fixed it by killing search.</comment>


Ask HN: Contact at Google Chrome Web Store? - <AUTHOR> A Google Chrome extension I created 3 years ago has 50k users. I recently released a new version and have started to make a number of improvements to it. At the same time, my extension was "flagged" and has been in review hell for the past days.
I've received contradictory emails from the store / reviewers. One (non automated one) said that the extension would be back "in 30 minutes", and after that, I received sporadic automated emails telling me that my extension was being removed from the store.
I sent our personal emails to Googlers in my network but no response. Is there any way to reach someone from the Google Chrome Web Store?
Thank you very very much! <comment><USER2> I've had the same issue with my extension - it has 250k users and it was removed a few days ago with no warning. I recieved one reply 12 hours later saying there was "too many keywords" in the description. It has been in the Chrome Web Store for at least 5 years with the same description - very odd and it is still not restored.

<comment><AUTHOR> Jeez... best of luck. That sounds awful and completely unfair. "Live by the Store, Die by the Store"........

<comment><USER2> Yes I feel sorry for people who's entire livelihood rely on these apps - there's no phone number or name to contact just a black hole to email.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Sorry man, I wish I could help you but I only know a few people on the google app side. I'll poke around but no guarantees.

What is the app though?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you!

It's an extension to dictate emails in Gmail. It's used by a wide range of people -- from power email users to people with disabilities.

I have received a number of praise emails over the years -- it's pretty terrible to see all of that vanish with no explanation!

Thanks again

<comment><USER4> Link to the app?

<comment><AUTHOR> It's been removed from the store so it doesn't have a page anymore...! There's a number of YouTube videos about it, here's one: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGiIUI- Bdrs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGiIUI-Bdrs)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> email@example.com

I've gotten personal replies from emails sent to this address.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks — unfortunately that's not my case.

I've received automated replies, contradictory explanations (the extension will be live — the extension will be removed), etc. from that email.

Did you get someone's name or email from those conversations?

<comment><USER5> here it is verbatim:

"Dear Developer, We have reviewed your item, "gif.com.ai," with ID: dfdojjbjcmnilhaenpijacjdgmilecpg and it does not comply with our program policies. Please review this section of our policy:

Developers must not obfuscate code or conceal functionality of their extension. This also applies to any external code or resource fetched by the extension package. One such instance was found in inspector.js

Your item was found to have one or more files that does not comply with this policy."

\---

This reply is clearly template based but unlike some of the other replies it wasn't automated. There was clearly a human behind the email addressing my concern.

The total thread is 9 emails back and forth.

<comment><USER5> By the way. The extension was never re-instated even after I futilely tried to get them to see the light that my code was minified and not obfuscated. :/

This happened after I changed the version number in the package. So unless you need to update your package, don't! Usually changing the description in the dashboard is fine but if you start messing with some of the options it will invite review and a possible lockout.

<comment><AUTHOR> \- Thanks for sending your reply. Mine contains the same template text but does not contain a "Please review this section" bit. It only has the "does not comply" part. i.e., it says that something's wrong, but doesn't state anything else.

\- I'm really sorry to hear that your extension was never reinstated...! By the way, my extension is also minified... I didn't know about this rule at all! It was never mentioned in any of the communications, but I am seeing at least one article [0] about this. Is that what this is all about?? I just un- minified and submitted it again (after getting an email prompting me to resubmit)

\- Finally, when you say "If you start messing with some of the options", what do you mean? Which options? I'm particularly interested in adding more i18n languages to the extension (amongst other changes). Do you mean to not make any changes to the manifest.json & description in the store, but that code changes are (generally) fine?

Thanks a ton!

[0] [https://www.zdnet.com/article/google-to-no-longer-allow- chro...](https://www.zdnet.com/article/google-to-no-longer-allow-chrome- extensions-that-use-obfuscated-code/)

<comment><USER5> If you already submitted and its published, I would be careful about updating the package and changing options such as language in the dashboard. I was particularly thinking language as an option that would invite review. But if you need to change and re-publish make sure to also do your code updates externally and xhr from the extension so your able to minimize changes to the package.

<comment><AUTHOR> I specifically read in the article that I linked above that the reviewers supposedly have a disfavorable view on 'hot loading' code externally, so that developers would not swap in different code than the code already reviewed...

Hmmm. Do you know if "major" extensions such as Boomerang, etc. typically update their extensions on the store, or do they do exactly as you say -- leave the store extension alone as much as possible, and update remote code?

Thanks for your input!

<comment><USER5> I don't know. I'm my case I think the reviewers had a hard time following how my extension operated. And instead of following their written rules around minification, they closed it down. I didn't feel comfortable sending over all my open unminified code.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Internet 'kill switch' proposed for US - <AUTHOR> http://www.zdnet.com.au/internet-kill-switch-proposed-for-us-339303838.htm

<comment><USER2> Let's imagine there's really a national security risk that actually requires the President to order the internet turned off. I don't know what it would be, but let's say it's dire. In that case, the president (for all practical purposes) has the power to send the national guard into all the relevant physical locations and cut the power to the internet backbones. It's illegal and wrong, in the same sense that Abraham Lincoln's multiple violations of the Constitution were illegal and wrong. Which is to say, it's one of those edge cases that the law, by design _has_ to leave out, a situation where you have to violate the Constitution in order to save it, but there is no way in hell you're going to give any freedom within the law itself to do anything of the kind. This is a very difficult idea for a lot of people to wrap their heads around.

<comment><USER3> I was just talking about Lincoln with a friend. If you're bored sometime, look at one of Lincoln's speeches and replace "union" with "empire" - it still works! "Our most sacred American empire must not be divided... these rebels may not be allowed to break the spirit of the empire..."

And for the record, I like Lincoln - but he's easily, easily the most imperial-minded president in U.S. history. It's a shame we don't call it for what it is - the Confederate secession was by-the-books legal, the south became a separate sovereign country, and the north went and conquered them. And yet, I think it was the right call.

Every American should read Lincoln's first inauguration address. Basically everything school teaches about Lincoln is wrong. Here's his own words:

<http://www.bartleby.com/124/pres31.html>

\--

"There is much controversy about the delivering up of fugitives from service or labor. The clause I now read is as plainly written in the Constitution as any other of its provisions:

No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall in consequence of any law or regulation therein be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due.

It is scarcely questioned that this provision was intended by those who made it for the reclaiming of what we call fugitive slaves; and the intention of the lawgiver is the law. All members of Congress swear their support to the whole Constitution—to this provision as much as to any other. To the proposition, then, that slaves whose cases come within the terms of this clause "shall be delivered up" their oaths are unanimous. Now, if they would make the effort in good temper, could they not with nearly equal unanimity frame and pass a law by means of which to keep good that unanimous oath?

There is some difference of opinion whether this clause should be enforced by national or by State authority, but surely that difference is not a very material one. If the slave is to be surrendered, it can be of but little consequence to him or to others by which authority it is done. And should anyone in any case be content that his oath shall go unkept on a merely unsubstantial controversy as to how it shall be kept?"

\--

Here's Lincoln's part about the union being preserved, his argument is that the American union is older than the Constitution and comes before it (a crazy argument never used before or since):

"Descending from these general principles, we find the proposition that in legal contemplation the Union is perpetual confirmed by the history of the Union itself. The Union is much older than the Constitution. It was formed, in fact, by the Articles of Association in 1774. It was matured and continued by the Declaration of Independence in 1776. It was further matured, and the faith of all the then thirteen States expressly plighted and engaged that it should be perpetual, by the Articles of Confederation in 1778. And finally, in 1787, one of the declared objects for ordaining and establishing the Constitution was "to form a more perfect Union."

But if destruction of the Union by one or by a part only of the States be lawfully possible, the Union is less perfect than before the Constitution, having lost the vital element of perpetuity." \--

And here's my swapping out of "empire" for "Union" -

"But if destruction of the _Empire_ by one or by a part only of the States be lawfully possible, the _Empire_ is less perfect than before the Constitution, having lost the vital element of perpetuity." - It still works.

And mind you, I like Lincoln. He made the right call. But saying the Civil War was about slavery is like saying World War II was about coal. I mean, it kind of sort of was in a very tortured way, but that's a very incomplete understanding. Lincoln was very pro-slavery in his first inauguration address, and threated the South with war to preserve the empire if they tried to leave. They thought he was bluffing. He wasn't. Every American should read that first inauguration address, it's Lincoln's own words. Your view of the American Civil War will never be the same afterwards.

<comment><USER2> I'd say the Civil War was about slavery the same way WWII was about fascism-- the _casus belli_ wasn't that one side held slaves or that one side was fascist, but having fascists control a couple of central European countries leads to war the same way having a pseudo-aristocratic slave-owning social structure in the same country as a free-labor capitalist society leads to inevitable divisions and attempted secession.

The South was a deeply evil society even then--plantation owners were hereditary lords in all but name, except their slaves were mere chattel rather than serfs, and everyone in the middle were exactly that.

<comment><USER3> Partially yes, but 1860 was the most divisive Presidential election in history. The Republican strategy was basically to punt on the South and run on an entirely pro-Northern/Western platform. Notably, the Republicans ran on a platform putting tariffs on foreign machinery, requiring raw materials to be processed in America before being shipped, granting free farmland in the federally owned West (instead of selling it), and support for a Northeast/Western railroad. _All_ of those were unpalatable to the South. The tariffs protected Northern industry at the expense of making it more expensive for Southerns. Not letting raw cotton be shipped overseas until it was sent to the North for processing was going to be a nightmare.

The free land would again reduce the price of inputs to Northern factories by producing more agriculture, at the expense of the South. Mind you, the South had also been a part of paying for and fighting for Western lands in the various purchases and wars, and now the land they'd bought/fought for was going to be given away, which would also lower the prices of their crops.

And so on, and so on. Lincoln carried zero southern states, zero border states. He took all of the Northeast and West Coast.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ElectoralCollege1860.svg>

I agree with you on the deeply evil society thing, 100% agreement. Just that's not why the war started. Or, it's one small component of it. Slavery was ended without a massive violent conflict in most civilized places and could have been ended that way in the USA, and besides, the Civil War was only partially about slavery. Lincoln's entire platform was anti-South, he ran his campaign similar to Bush II: That is, punt entirely on large parts of the country and try to win core demographics. The tariffs, shipping laws, giving federally owned lands for free, and railroads were all pro-Northern measures and somewhat hostile to the South. Lincoln didn't even want to end slavery, as you'll see in his inauguration speech. The way they teach the Civil War in American high school, as sort of a moral fight, is entirely wrong - it was about politics, money, and empire. But anyways, I'm on the North's side for the Civil War, glad they did it, and glad they won. But we should all understand the real root causes of it. It wasn't fought for morality's sake.

<comment><USER2> Tariffs in particular were an issue between North and South forever, most notably in the nullification crisis, where South Carolina "nullies" petitioned their states to "nullify" the 1828 "Tariff of Abominations". The legal theory at the time was that the states had the power to nullify federal law, so if you were in California and California legalized medicinal marijuana (hey!) the federal government had no legal power to enforce drug laws[1]. Andrew Jackson and the U.S. Army put a quick end to _that_ idea. (This confrontation also put to an end the service of South Carolinian Vice President John C. Calhoun, who resigned and ran for Senate, not at all helped by his wife making wild accusations about the Secretary of War and his wife.)

Lincoln's election (when he wasn't even on the ballot in half the states) was the _casus belli_ , in the sense that some Serbian bomb-throwing anarchist killing some archduke was the _casus belli_ of the First World War. But that's like dousing your neighbor's house in kerosene and lighter fluid and then saying it was burned down by a single match.

Incidentally, you're right on the morality thing. A few enlightened liberals were abolitionists, but most anti-Southerners just thought the whole slavery- backed aristocracy thing going on in the South was bad news, and that the "Slave Power" would take over the country and crush democracy. Actually, that was the more consistent argument--the North fulfilled its demand for cheap labor by importing tons of poor European immigrants who worked in factories and lived in tenements, which was in many respects a worse life than slavery. It's hard to take a moral high ground from there.

[1] The legalization laws for medicinal marijuana simply create an exemption for state laws. Since state and local cops don't usually enforce federal law, this has the practical effect of sanctioning medicinal marijuana, even though on a legal basis the DEA could go in and sweep every single dispensary and cancer patient they find. At various points in recent years, the feds actually have gone after medicinal marijuana even in legalized states, leading to significant controversy. So if you can imagine Dick Cheney as a hardcore stoner and Dick Cheney's wife spreading wild rumors about Don Rumsfeld, you have a fairly decent grasp on Jacksonian-era political intrigue.

<comment><USER3> Good comment, I think we're basically on the same page. I generally like Andrew Jackson, he was right about the banks and he balanced the budget, only U.S. President born poor, etc, but how he handled nullification was wrong in my book. Interesting that it's coming up again now with the medical marijuana thing... of course, not many people are sympathetic to the drug laws right now. I wonder what would happen if Texas declared income tax invalid in TX? Well, it'd be interesting at least...

I think we're on similar pages, probably a couple differences in interpretation but both aware that the official historybook version is lacking. Good discussion, cheers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Any kill switch capability that is built in will simply become another vector for attack—in this case an attack that overrides the core competency of the Internet which is massive redundancy in case any one section fails.

It is almost a certainty that such a capability will be exploited.

<comment><USER5> how about a guy at the border unplugging the fiber optic cable? I assume it can already be disconnected somewhere physically; all this does is authorize the government to do it.

<comment><USER6> There would be quite a few cables to unplug:

[http://personalpages.manchester.ac.uk/staff/m.dodge/cybergeo...](http://personalpages.manchester.ac.uk/staff/m.dodge/cybergeography/atlas/cables.html)

<comment><USER5> The military has a lot of people.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> _Joe Lieberman, the primary sponsor of the measure_

Is it any surprise that he's the primary sponsor? You can always count on Joe to be on the wrong side of history.

An Internet kill switch is one of the worst and most authoritarian ideas I've ever heard coming out of the US government. Here's to hoping Schmidt uses his veto power on this one.

</comment><comment><USER8> They have something similar in Iran - for all the wrong reasons. Although even there, they don't dare sever themselves from the 21st century economy entirely, and that has left enough gaps for circumvention software.

Turning the internet off is something that can't be used for good. It's a tool of repression and anyone who supports it sees themselves as likely to benefit by repression.

</comment><comment><USER9> I tried to make this same argument in another thread and was down voted for it, so here goes...

Any act of electronic warfare has an equivalent physical response. Regulation such as this is nothing more than power grabs by government and the defense industry.

<comment><USER10> I think that it's hard to make the case for open warfare when you can't prove that it was the (for example) the Chinese government that launched the attack. Or are you suggesting a covert retaliatory attack?

<comment><USER9> Open war, covert actions, or economic sanctions would work fine on a state v state level.

In the case of non state actors, current policing methods should be sufficient. In the cases where its not (and there is sufficient cause) covert policing actions should not be ruled out.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> So in the event that the main Internet goes down, for whatever reason, who wants to help buy up a bunch of wireless routers (and other applicable items) to start forming a giant mesh network? Neighborhood by neighborhood... [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/Building_...](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/Building_a_Rural_Wireless_Mesh_Network_- _A_DIY_Guide_v0.8.pdf)

<comment><USER12> me

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> What happens when somebody hacks the kill switch?

<comment><USER14> What could possibly go wrong?

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I find myself very conflicted about this. I think the wording of "kill switch" is an extremely poor choice so I will try to illustrate what I think the genuine national security reasoning is, using China as the hypothetical aggressor. The Chinese government controls all of the hubs which connect the internet in China to the rest of the world, the "great firewall" as some have called it. The chinese use this for censorship, but it also puts them in an advantageous situation during a conflict. Imagine the impact widespread denial of service attacks on financial and governmental institutions would have on a nations ability to wage war (read estonia). China could launch such attacks while effectively defending itself against similar attacks from foreigners. The chinese subset of the internet would continue to function while blocked off from the rest of the world.

With that in mind it seems like the "kill switch" should kill or limit connections to outside the United States. That said, the power this would give the domestic leadership may pose a greater threat to liberty than a foreign aggressor. I think I agree with philwelch.. I would rather see the plans to do this confidentially drawn up by the CIA than written into law.

<comment><USER16> So, we save our computers from a DDOS by... shutting it off? I don't really see how this makes any sense.

<comment><USER17> That's why you're not the Senator from Connecticut.

I hate that man.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> So you are saying you want to prevent me from talking to someone over a private communication channel I paid for?

Unless it's a war, good luck with getting that past a court review.

<comment><USER19> Sadly, since the US government has tricked its people into fighting a _concept_ it is _always_ war.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Oh the irony! We want our Internet to be robust, robust, robust! This bill just did half the work for some evil hacker.

</comment><comment><USER21> What hypothetical attack would this prevent?

<comment><USER17> Domestic insurrection.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Reposting a commend I made on this topic when it came up sourced from Infowars...

Unintended consequences aside, this is less about a kill switch or government censorship and more about forcing a industry that has not taken security seriously to get their act together.

Many providers don't actively police their customers for botnet activity or respond to security incidents that don't affect their network infrastructure or back office systems.

This appears to establish a regulatory framework where network security officially becomes more than a law enforcement issue and lets DHS order operators to secure their networks and help out if they are unable to do so.

<comment><USER23> Maybe it is, but

a. That's not the government's job.

b. Once a new power is in place, it will be used, and not just for whatever the original intent was. We separate policy from mechanism in software for a reason. It works in law too.

<comment><USER22> Amen on B.

As for A, it became the government's job when provider apathy with regard to infected clients and hosts with botnet controllers etc permitted a situation to arise where the means of a (supposed) attack for a foreign power is actually based within the US. At that point it stopped being a private security issue and became a national security issue.

I don't like it, but the problem it addresses does exist.

How would you separate policy from mechanism in this case?

<comment><USER23> Things that are critical to national security should be able to defend themselves from botnets (most likely by firewalling themselves from the public Internet). I think these threats are vastly overstated, mostly by people trying to get more power in to the hands of the government.

As for shutting down hosts involved in a bot net, a court order can do that in an emergency already. Sure, it adds a delay, but it also adds oversight and separates policy from mechanism. The executive branch controls the policy, while the courts control the mechanism.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> It is quite ironic that ARPANET was designed for survivability.

</comment><comment><USER25> In other news: "Terrorists seed internet with dangerous files, government places emergency connectivity restrictions all over the U.S."

</comment><comment><USER26> Killing the internet would seriously disrupt the flow of information, information that is integral to remedy any attack and the psychological welfare of those affected.

A Weather Service Style Notification Service would be much more beneficial, that is unless that is skynet is controlling the robots.

</comment><comment><USER27> Related: A few months ago, Bush's advisor on cybersecurity was on Fresh Air, an NPR interview show, talking about cyberattacks: [http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1260970...](http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=126097038)

</comment><comment><USER28> Awesome. Let's give The Prez the ability to leverage a massive-scale worldwide denial of service attack at his every whim before the Evil Haxors can pound their script kiddie tools through the firewall. Way to go.

</comment><comment><USER29> what useful purpose would cutting off mass communications serve a democratic government?

<comment><USER19> A democratic one... not much. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> If we are being attacked electronically, it makes sense to be able to defend ourselves.

<comment><USER10> An Internet 'kill switch' is akin to a 'slash and burn' tactic. e.g. 'They' are using our road system to attack us, so we mine our road system. In the end, nobody wins. Even if we defeat 'them' we have to pick up the pieces that we left ourselves.

<comment><USER17> Actually, this is an excellent analogy. Nobody would believe that mining the Interstate highway system in case enemies used it to invade would be a good idea. But put the word "computer" next to anything else and most people's brains just switch off.

<comment><USER10> I think that the main reason they are trying to do this is that so many government networks and even utilities are hooking up to the Internet, so they want to be able to shut out 'invaders' if there is a bad attack happening.

The problem with this is that maybe those networks/utilities _SHOULDN'T BE ON THE PUBLIC INTERNET_. If the military or other government agencies can't defend themselves appropriately, then maybe they should invest in rolling out a completely separate network just for US government purposes. Hell, they did it once (i.e APRANet).

<comment><USER17> Good point! These morons always say, "But a hacker could destroy our electrical power grid!" and I _always_ wonder _why is the power grid accessible on the Internet_? What idiot thought that was a good idea, and can't we fire him or her and take the grid back off the Internet? Like, today?</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


'Library Anxiety' and What Librarians Do to Help - <AUTHOR> http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/the-strange-affliction-of-library-anxiety-and-what-librarians-do-to-help <comment><USER2> I've read almost every book (certainly over 90%) in my local village library when I was a kid (no internet = lots of time). It was quite small library, and you could go between the shelves and choose something by yourself which I still think is great. I hate libraries where you can't just go choose sth without knowing what exactly. Half the books were old and had handmade gray paper covers over them with handwritten titles and authors. I loved it. So it's not that I'm anxious about libraries.

I used huge university library like 5 times at most, because I could spend a few hours going to library, waiting in queues, waiting for the book, etc, and then having to remember to give it back, or I could just pirate the book in 5 minutes without standing up from my chair.

Piracy is the ideal library. It's more convenient than going to library, and more convenient than buying a book or even ebook. We should just stop pretending and find a way to fund authors with that in mind. And the immorality of it is hard to justify, when it's basically "I can get this book legally for free anyway, just wasting my time and restricting access to others".

<comment><USER3> This is because, outside of the object fetishization of books, they are really just a transport/storage layer. It's the content which matters, and as with other content, making it convenient is important. Your local library as a kid was sufficiently convenient, so you used it. Your university library wasn't, so you went elsewhere.

<comment><USER4> On a slight tangent into object fetishization.

I work with ebooks a lot in my job and I'm often asked if books are dead, if they will die, or why they are not dead. Ebook growth has leveled off significantly as devices to read them became ubiquitous and cheap, so its sits more or less flat at about 35% of the market (give or take).

I often turn the question on the asker and ask them to analyze a book like its a piece of technology. It's lightweight, extremely durable (survives a five foot drop to concrete no problem) and inexpensive to replace. It's UI is really unmatched since we've been taught it since childhood, but on an objective scale it's easy to jump to exactly where you want (though difficult to search). It's resolution is fantastic and I've never tested it, but I've heard the battery life is great. It's a wonderful single use device, and single use devices certainly still have a place (after all, you can make toast under your broiler, but plenty of people still have toasters).

End of tangent.

<comment><USER5> To carry your tangent onwards...

Books are great, but are really quite feature-poor. You frequently need to install add-ons to get even the most basic capability - like bookmarking, or increasing font size. You definitely don't get search, a built-in dictionary, or the ability to trivially share excerpts.

All in all, I would definitely recommend this product to users with good eyesight and memory, but other potential users may want to go ahead and upgrade to ebooks.

<comment><USER4> Perhaps, but the add-ons are incredibly easy to use and flexible based on user needs. Need colors for your bookmarks? What about inspirational slogans or funny pictures? Want to use your font increasing plugin on a different book or even a non-book item like your food packaging or crafts? All easily done. You don't need to get your add-ons or books from a single, central repository.

Finally, though search is lacking, users have developed some clever ways to overcome that issue over time including indexing and tables of contents.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > Some students in masters programs, says Allen Foresta, Senior Librarian at > Columbia University's graduate Teachers College, "managed to get through > undergraduate without really being required to use a library, which is kind > of astonishing to me."

Thanks to Google Books, the good ol' high school research paper standby of "write from bad sources (Wikipedia, these days, or from a _single_ decent source) then find good ones for the stuff you wrote until you hit the minimum reference count" also works for (at least most) undergraduate papers. You just need search and the free samples—full book and leaving your room not required. Bonus: it's also easier to get generated citations (for the real books, not as web resources) than manually entering the data from physical books.

<comment><USER7> You don't even need to get that sketchy. With services like ACM providing their research libraries at student prices, you can have all sorts of papers easily downloaded from the comfort of your dorm/whatever.

Personally, I only really went to the library when I was doing Master's research, and there were a few specific books I needed on graph theory. Went in, got them, and that was it. Everything else I was able to easily and legally do online.

<comment><USER8> When I needed books from my Uni library, I normally had to request them from stacks, so I didn't even need to go into the library to get them. I'd just order them the night before, they get delivered at 8am, and I pick them up at the library front desk.

<comment><USER9> > When I needed books from my Uni library, I normally had to request them from > stacks, so I didn't even need to go into the library to get them.

Is that for reserved course items? A library where you had to request everything would be completely useless. In my experience you miss out on 80% of interesting books if you do not browse the shelves. Amazon, Worldcat, etc are useless for discovery, particularly for anything published before 1980. Google Books is a little better. Frequently when visiting a new city or town I will drop in on a library to browse the mathematics shelves and take note of any interesting books I should read later. Used bookstores are also interesting but most have no math books.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> >college students in particular are prone to library anxiety because they believe their research skills are inadequate

because their skills are inadequate. Either research shills aren't taught or the students don't listen because too often my college students have little idea how to research if it doesn't show up in the first few results of google.

There is also the fact that researching can take a while. If the perfect source doesn't show up right away then it might take a while to find it. Students don't know how to do this or don't want to put in the effort before they give up.

I try to teach my students how to do research but it isn't really part of my class topic so I can't spend too much time on it. It is also an uphill battle when so many of my students seem to still think that all .org web sites are still organizations and therefore more credible than .com.

>Once students make it past the lobby, it can be hard to locate a librarian.

But maybe I'm a bad example myself because although I have a phd I have never asked a librarian for help researching a topic.

</comment><comment><USER11> Oh my goodness - it never occurred to me that a library could be scary. As a book lover, I was positively thrilled the first time I entered my university's 3-million-book-library...

Although having said that, I can absolutely empathize with a library that big being confusing (especially when parts of it are spread all over town). Thankfully, our university library provides short introductory courses on how to use a research library, and there are brochures lying around everywhere that cover the fundamental stuff.

<comment><USER12> I find it very hard to believe as well. I've always seen libraries as a place to relax and spend seemingly endless unstructured time browsing and reading guided only by curiosity.

I can imagine a slight amount of anxiety back when CARD CATALOGS were commonplace and one had to understand the indexing system (the dewey decimal system), scribble down the numbers onto slips of paper, hand them to a surly librarian and then wait and wait.

<comment><USER13> This is about college students who aren't there for unstructured reading. They have specific research goals they want to accomplish, and that's why they get anxiety when confronted with giant unfamiliar collections.

<comment><USER11> That doesn't change much, IMO. Sure, finding the exact book you need in a collection of several million can seem daunting, but after you've learnt the system, it takes about three minutes (most of which is walking time). And learning the system isn't hard either, at least in my library, it's a matter of minutes.

So as far as I can see, there is no real excuse except "I'm not used to books because they're not the Internet".

<comment><USER14> >Sure, finding the exact book you need in a collection of several million can seem daunting

They don't know the exact book they need. That's where things go south. Any idiot can type the title into most library search systems now. The problem students have is when you ask something that requires them to figure out which books they should look in themselves.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> > "...You have to figure it out on your own—where are the books?" Though > Butler Library underwent extensive renovations in the early 2000s, it > remained confusing. "The architect who designed the renovation did not want > to put signage up in the lobby that said 'This is where you go for this,'" > says Mills. "He thought that would be too much like an airport."

 _headdesk_

</comment><comment><USER4> Perhaps library anxiety exists, but I also think this article misses the fact that anxiety or not, people will tend to take the path with the least friction. Right now that's Google and Wikipedia. These are both huge accomplishments in the dissemination of human knowledge and libraries should pursuing strategies that work with them or like them instead of around them.

As a librarian, my primary criticism of the profession is its need to reinvent itself. Librarians are convinced of their irrelevance and their response is offering more and varied services (3D printing, for example) rather than pushing the services they do have into new spaces.

For example, linked data initiatives like RDF would do wonders to make unique library collections more accessible, and possibly more searchable. Or work with universities and vendors to break down the silos of journal vendors to integrate them better into library catalogs, and more development of those tools to make discoverability a priority.

</comment><comment><USER16> Worldcat is your friend: [https://worldcat.org](https://worldcat.org)

Odds are good your institution (or one near you) uses it. 2 billion items indexed.

DDG bang search !worldcat

Title specifier: "ti:<terms>"

Author specifier: "au:<terms>"

E.g., !worldcat au:rowling ti:hallows

</comment><comment><USER17> I wonder if this "anxiety" is correlated to personality type. I personally find libraries extremely relaxing and I'm not particularly academic or intelligent albeit I appreciate the pursuits. I bet other INTP types are similar.

Same with museums. My wife finds them either boring or anxiety provoking as she feels it will take forever to cover all of exhibits. I on the other hand prefer to take my time and actually read the notes on the exhibits.

It sort of boils down to time. Libraries and museums make me feel I have all the time in the world to explore and learn with out judgement, pressure, and/or deadlines.

</comment><comment><USER18> When I first glanced at 'Library Anxiety', I thought they meant anxiety about adding another library dependency to your project, making it dependent on the API, maintenance and updates of yet another developer.

</comment><comment><USER19> The University of Oklahoma library is one of the few things I feel in love with while in college. I can see the library anxiety problem given the ridiculousness of the search function. And good luck actual talking to the librarian most of the time it was just a student employee. So it is good to see articles like this coming up to help people not willing to trudge through figuring about how the library works on their own.

That said the OU library is first place I will give any significant money. I love that place.

</comment><comment><USER20> What I've hated about my schools library, and why I will likely never use it, is that it's a huge pain in the ass to use their search systems.

That and the amazing existence of google's great search engine and I can not only find information but google can likely take me to the exact page (Google Books) that I need to read to get my information.

The user experience for someone is just not there to make it easy to use.

</comment><comment><USER21> I got through my undergraduate without even trying to avoid doing research. It never even came up. If wikipedia doesn't count, then I still don't have any idea how you do research.

</comment><comment><USER22> I love that life is so easy for people these days that they need to find things like the library to get anxious about.

A few hundred years ago and your worries would be related to your crop failing or you know, something even remotely troubling in any way.

People need to take a step back, take a chill pill, and be grateful for the immense privilege and resources they have rather than collapsing into balls of anxiety all the time.

<comment><USER23> Tell that to somebody who fails at the library, fails at university, and fails to find a job adequate to keep custody of their children.

What do you know about crops, anyway? Is that just some sort of rhetorical device?

edit: also, the idea that it wasn't critical for people a few hundred years ago to complete their education, whether it was in a library or in an apprenticeship, is nonsense.

<comment><USER22> I have a garden with 8 tomato plants and 8 pepper plants. The tomatoes have been struggling to produce and the peppers failed. I distinctly remember thinking to myself, ' I'm so glad I can walk to the store and feed myself despite my failed crop.'

Its just so weird to me that people worry about the library. Its a building full of information and people whose job it is to help you find that information as quickly and painlessly as possible.

This feels like a general social anxiety issue (not being able to ask for help) than an issue of libraries themselves being particularly scary.

Aside: I don't know what the deal with your first paragraph is. Its clearly an emotional appeal and doesn't make any sense. No one 'fails' at the library. The library is not going to make you fail university, whether or not you use it. As for the custody issue, I have no comment other than there are many steps between being bad afraid of the library and losing your children.</comment></comment></comment>


Chemical flavorings found in e-cigarettes linked to lung disease - <AUTHOR> http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2015/12/popcorn-lung-seen-in-e-cigarette-smokers/? <comment><USER2> In _some_ e-cigarette _flavors_. Look at the actual study [1] and you'll see the dangers are mainly limited to some buttery/fruity/nutty flavors. The fact that Diacetyl occurs at much higher concentrations in regular cigarettes goes unmentioned. 'Popcorn lung' disease occurred with workers who were exposed to enough Diacetyl vapor in a day as an e-cig 'smoker' would be in a month. Finally, I'll leave the conclusion of the UK Department of Health [2] : "E-cigarettes around 95% less harmful than tobacco estimates landmark review"

As indicated in the second link, the scaremongering of studies such as this one mislead smokers into thinking that e-cigarettes are about as dangerous as regular ones. The dangers are not equivalent, by a long shot. Every smoker that switches to e-cigs, as I did 3 years ago after a 20 year habit and three failed attempts to quit, is much better off. Haven't smoked a 'real' one since. I know at least 50 people with the same experience (anecdotal, I know, but still...).

[1] [http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/wp- content/uploads/advpub/2015/12/e...](http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/wp- content/uploads/advpub/2015/12/ehp.1510185.acco.pdf) [2] [https://www.gov.uk/government/news/e-cigarettes- around-95-le...](https://www.gov.uk/government/news/e-cigarettes- around-95-less-harmful-than-tobacco-estimates-landmark-review)

<comment><USER3> Indeed. It seems that two very different sects combine forces in the battle against e-cigs: traditional tobacco industry, who sees e-cig transition as a threat, and health authorities and activists, who see second-best (e-cigs) as the greatest threat to what they think is best (total abstinence).

This unholy alliance seems unfortunately quite strong. I'm not a smoker, but I'm all for every smoker around me converting to e-cigs, and even at the "risk" of having some non-smokers start e-cigs it's really a no contest: if some e-cig flavourings are unhealthy, investigate and regulate those, but please please do not stop the transition which is great for absolutely everybody (except traditional tobacco providers).

<comment><USER4> The transition is indeed an improvement, but there is a dangerous myth spreading: that e-cigarette smoke (as exhaled by smokers) is "completely harmless". I've heard people describe it as "just water vapor".

Well it isn't harmless, and transitioning from a traditional tobacco cigarette to an e-cigarette doesn't mean you can just start smoking everywhere.

<comment><USER5> So let's put this fair - e-cigarette smoke is basically the same stuff we've been using for ages as the stage smoke. If you aren't afraid of going to a concert, you shouldn't be afraid of passive e-cig smoking either.

<comment><USER6> I'm less concerned with the safety of second-hand vapor than the offensive odor. It has been so nice these past few years to be able to go to bars and restaurants and not come back with my entire wardrobe reeking. I don't want to give that up.

<comment><USER5> Fair enough. I sympathize with that concern, though as 'ptaipale pointed out, at this point you should start worrying about perfumes as well. But it's no longer about danger - it's just about being nice to other people.

<comment><USER3> With perfumes it's also a somewhat actual health hazard, for some people (if someone is allergic or over-sensitive).

For me it is just an inconvenience, but I do feel a bit sick in department stores because in so many of them, you have to enter via the 1st floor fragrance department. But apparently that makes commercial sense, i.e. the additional sales to impulsive perfume-buyers (profiled mostly to be women) is more important than the non-sales of anything to me.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I am sure production of Vape juice is totally unregulated. I have heard tales where budding entrepreneurs are starting their own Vape Juice factories. People who just understand a little bit of what goes in are running these production units. All they need is a minimum bulk order and they will label and package as per one's wish. So there are many brands right now that are being sold in stores but no body knows a thing about it, probably not even the guys who runs the manufacturing if those are harmful or not. Bottom line is don't trust the nicely packaged bottles of that harmful liquid. You never know what is inside.

</comment><comment><USER8> Nicotine users just can't catch a break.

Based on the real subject of the article, diacetyl, I'm surprised the chemical has not been regulated by now.

Here is the federal register snippet [0]

§184.1278 Diacetyl.

(a) Diacetyl (C4H6O2, CAS Reg. No. 431-03-8) is a clear yellow to yellowish green liquid with a strong pungent odor. It is also known as 2,3-butanedione and is chemically synthesized from methyl ethyl ketone. It is miscible in water, glycerin, alcohol, and ether, and in very dilute water solution, it has a typical buttery odor and flavor.

(b) The ingredient meets the specifications of the Food Chemicals Codex, 3d Ed. (1981), p. 368, which is incorporated by reference. Copies are available from the National Academy Press, 2101 Constitution Ave. NW., Washington, DC 20418, or available for inspection at the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). For information on the availability of this material at NARA, call 202-741-6030, or go to: [http://www.archives.gov/federal_register/code_of_federal_reg...](http://www.archives.gov/federal_register/code_of_federal_regulations/ibr_locations.html).

(c) In accordance with §184.1(b)(1), the ingredient is used in food with no limitation other than current good manufacturing practice. The affirmation of this ingredient as generally recognized as safe (GRAS) as a direct human food ingredient is based upon the following current good manufacturing practice conditions of use:

(1) The ingredient is used as a flavoring agent and adjuvant as defined in §170.3(o)(12) of this chapter.

(2) The ingredient is used in food at levels not to exceed current good manufacturing practice.

(d) Prior sanctions for this ingredient different from the uses established in this section do not exist or have been waived.

[48 FR 51907, Nov. 15, 1983]

[0] [http://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text- idx?rgn=div5&node=21:3.0.1....](http://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text- idx?rgn=div5&node=21:188.8.131.52.14#se21.3.184_11278)

<comment><USER2> I'm not clear if you are being sarcastic, but note the GRAS (generally recognized as safe), for _ingestion_ at least...

<comment><USER8> I am not being sarcastic. That entry hasn't changed in the FR since 1983. "Generally recognized as safe" is out of date and the chemical needs another regulatory review and update.

<comment><USER9> FR is a log of all regulations and you are referencing an old GRAS notification. GRAS is valid and up to date _FOR INGESTION ONLY_. Here is the most current information on GRAS _food additives_ (not pharma additives) from the FDA: [http://www.fda.gov/Food/IngredientsPackagingLabeling/GRAS/](http://www.fda.gov/Food/IngredientsPackagingLabeling/GRAS/)

Here is the inactive ingredients database for approved pharmaceutical additives which depends on route of administration: [http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cder/iig/index.Cfm](http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cder/iig/index.Cfm)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Life imitates art :)

[http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/health/put-cancer-in-e- ci...](http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/health/put-cancer-in-e-cigarettes- say-non-smokers-2014021983765)

</comment><comment><USER11> It is important to note that the levels of these chemicals in the vapor from vaporizers is 50-100x lower than found in traditional, "analog" cigarettes.

<comment><USER12> Why is that important? What might be important is whether the level of chemicals is high enough to pose a risk, not if something else is worse.

<comment><USER13> Not clear why you are being downvoted. Many people start smoking with e-cigs. These are people who otherwise wouldn't smoke.

<comment><USER14> > Many people start smoking with e-cigs

Are you saying: Nothing > ecigs > regular cigarettes?

If so, could you provide a citation for that claim?

<comment><USER15> I don't smoke - I never have. I've personally considered taking up ecigs on several occasions.

I haven't done so because the ingredients in the fluid flavorings are so oddly unregulated - You end up with weird things which really aren't safe to be heated and inhaled.

If I had confidence that there was sufficient oversight, such that they were only moderately dangerous, not "close our eyes, and hope for the best", I'd likely start using the devices.

<comment><USER13> You do know that nicotine is addictive? Why would you take them up?

My roommate did it a few times now he gets sick if he doesn't vape. The thing doesn't even vet you high! Its literally pure evil, there are much more interesting substances to use.

<comment><USER16> This reads like an 80's anti drug commercial.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Quoting directly from Reddit [1]:

>Oh boy, time to crosspost for information's sake.

>Even diactyl containing e-juice still contains 100x less diacetyl than traditional cigarettes. [Citation: [http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/tox.20153/pdf](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/tox.20153/pdf) ] And no smoker to date has ever gotten "Popcorn Lung" (Named because it occurs years after dumping pure uncut diactyl into vats and bins when making cheapo microwave popcorn in the factories.)

>And despite all that- It's still largely the other factors and chemicals and tar and actual combustion that damages your lungs when smoking is involved. Not diacetyl specifically.

>Even 100x the amount of diacetyl as e-juice is apparently not enough to cause the "Popcorn Lung" issue related to the compound specifically. So why would 100x less than the amount that does not cause it suddenly start to cause it? Not that it's 100 percent safe (As mentioned by a replier as well- So I have appended my post some for accuracy and fairness.) Just that it's not the immediate or unavoidable threat it's being presented as.

>And in the span of 7+ years even in the heaviest vape users no one has (yet, mind. For the sake of fairness and caution.) reported any major health issues tied to vaping or the compounds contained in e-juice. If the 75ml a day heavy diactyl juice user doesn't get popcorn lung then I highly doubt popcorn lung is a problem to watch for regarding it.

>Also there are many many e-juices available without diactyl. So even if it was an issue you can actively avoid it. And most manufacturers have discontinued it's use or clearely state if their juices are diacetyl free so the risk factors that are purely tied to diacetyl are avoidable and preventable.

>As far as being paranoid about what's put in it- This is purely my opinion but, I think that is razorblades in your kid's halloween candy or "Shadey people handing out drugs for free/Lacing your kid's flintstones vitamins with PCP" levels of unfounded overconcern.

>Caution is important- But so is research and fact checking.

>Edit: To append this to- I am not defending the use or previous use of the substance, merely dispelling the immediate "Popcorn Lung" panic around it. I personally don't use e-juice containing it for the sake of risk reduction in general as I like to limit as many potential factors as possible in general. And there are hundreds- if not thousands of brands and types which do not contain diacetyl to choose from which I would recommend.

>I am also not claiming vaping is 100 percent safe- Just that this instance is an avoidable factor and has been for a while.

>Personal safety and active research should always be practiced in all facets of life.

[1] [https://np.reddit.com/r/science/comments/3vxbzo/chemical_fla...](https://np.reddit.com/r/science/comments/3vxbzo/chemical_flavorings_found_in_ecigarettes_linked/cxrq6ro)

Edit: For the record, that is not my Reddit post. I found it to be very informative, so I thought I'd share it with the HN community. Please respect Reddit's no brigading policy - for both upvoting and downvoting posts.

</comment><comment><USER18> For those are interested in a source of e-juice that doesn't contain Diacetyl or 2,3-Pentanedione, Johnson Creek provides third-party lab test results for many their products. For example: [https://d1fardvzz27152.cloudfront.net/skin/frontend/jcosj/be...](https://d1fardvzz27152.cloudfront.net/skin/frontend/jcosj/beta2/pdfs/Baked%20Apples%20Cert.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER19> I would never go back to smoking cigarettes. There is no comparison to e-cigs and cigarettes, obviously this is backed by the tobacco industry and that is the reason why its not a comparison of cigarettes and e-cigs; which is the real story that wasn't written.

<comment><USER20> Do you miss the subtler aspects of smoking cigarettes -- the smoke leaving the cigarette, the real fire at the tip, etc?

<comment><USER21> I'm not the other guy, but the answer is yes, absolutely. E-cigarettes are not a full replacement for cigarettes. Like you mentioned a lot of the subtler aspects of cigarettes are completely missing from e-cigarettes.

It's a great way to stop smoking, but a lot of people act like you'll pick up an e-cigarette and never think about cigarettes again, which is absolutely untrue. It still takes a concerted effort to not fall off the wagon (I've fallen off twice so far).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Additional comments on post from 14 hours ago:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10700914](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10700914)

</comment><comment><USER23> I would appreciate if anyone could point me to some good links about e-cigs. I'm interested in switching but know nothing about. Thanks.

<comment><USER24> There's a great subreddit that can point you in the right direction: [https://www.reddit.com/r/electronic_cigarette/](https://www.reddit.com/r/electronic_cigarette/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> This is a problem when you don't really solve your problem (smoking) but trying to find ways around it. Same thing is happening with diet.

<comment><USER26> That's assuming they think it's a problem. Just because you do doesn't make it so (and I'm a non-smoker, for the record).

Edit: If e-cigarettes allow someone to get their nicotine fix without the nasty health effects, all the more power to them.</comment></comment>