The rise of fake engine noise - <AUTHOR> http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/americas-best-selling-cars-and-trucks-are-built-on-lies-the-rise-of-fake-engine-noise/2015/01/21/6db09a10-a0ba-11e4-b146-577832eafcb4_story.html <comment><USER2> This may be a transient problem as people get used to new technology. It's like using Filmlook to put scratches and grain on HD video.

The 2013 Lotus Evora, a series hybrid vehicle with an electric motor and a fixed gearbox, took this to the point of silliness. Not only did they provide fake engine sounds, they provided shift paddles and _required the driver to shift software-simulated gears_. They even provided a momentary loss of power during simulated gear shifting. ([http://www.autoblog.com/2013/01/22/lotus- pondering-fake-shif...](http://www.autoblog.com/2013/01/22/lotus-pondering- fake-shifting-for-evora-414e-plug-in-hybrid/)) The driver could select different sounds, or turn all this off and just let the electric motor do its thing, which yielded better acceleration. Here's a demo of all the sound options: ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1CzoqEyACQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1CzoqEyACQ)). Options include simulated straight-6, American V-8, and V-12 engines, plus some turbine-like sounds.

After some snickering from the automotive press, this feature was dropped from later models.

Many electric cars already have an outside noise generator, mandated by law in the EU and US. These switch off above 25 MPH or so, so they don't contribute to freeway noise.

<comment><USER3> I still want one that makes the sounds of the vehicles in The Jetsons. Why aren't loadable and customizable sounds a thing?

<comment><USER4> If the sounds are too different from existing mental models, they won't be associated with oncoming traffic?

<comment><USER5> It will probably sound enough out-of-place to get attention. But it doesn't help with the stigma of electric cars being toylike.

Go with something menacing, like the sound a TIE Fighter makes. Attention getting, futuristic, and you won't feel like you're riding around on Scooty- Puff Jr.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Recently drove a Tesla Model S P85D... best thing about it is that the torque is immediate and silent. Not only can you blow other cars away at lights, you can do it casually, with no noise or fuss. Car is here; put car over there. It's like piloting a UFO.

<comment><USER7> Don't you see any problem with the silence in terms of safety?

There is a reason bicycles need to have a bell. Because these you also cannot hear when they approach you.

Although, it would be funny seeing a Tesla with a nice little bell and the tacked on law that you have to use it to alarm others in front of you that you are approaching. That'll be a sight to behold.

<comment><USER8> Cars come equipped with horns for that exact purpose (alerting pedestrians, etc.), though they are often used as displeasure-signalling devices.

<comment><USER9> As a cyclist, it is _much_ preferred to hear engine noice rather than honking horns.

<comment><USER10> Also as a pedestrian

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I drive a Leaf and a Volt, both technically electric cars. The sprinting power of an electric is pretty good, I often take modded civics off the line (stoplight) in the Leaf; the point being that electric cars can quickly move to a spot you don't anticipate them. The Volt has a 'pedestrian warning horn' that, when engaged by the driver, gently and rapidly beeps the horn to draw attention to the Volt. Since it is engaged by the driver, however; it does little if the driver isn't paying attention.

As a cyclist, I enjoy having good situational awareness, and electric cars can definitely be surprising when they pass you. Overall, though I enjoy the super quiet ride, I think we should require some warning noise (engine noise seems like a nice option) to alert other to the oncoming car. It makes it safer for the driver because people are less likely to do something unexpected, and safer for the other people because they have better situational awareness.

Perhaps when automated car drivers are the norm, we can move to silent cars; since they will be more vigilant than a person could ever be.

<comment><USER12> >>> As a cyclist, I enjoy having good situational awareness, and electric cars can definitely be surprising when they pass you.

The car could have a bell and "on your left" speaker. ;-)

<comment><USER13> This seems like the perfect use for something like a mini LIDAR you can mount on a bike that detects a car behind you and just lights up a couple of LEDs on the handlebars.

<comment><USER11> Forget the bike, I've always wanted a kit that would detect cars around my car and display them like a mini map. Maybe with high speed delta from my own highlighted.

<comment><USER14> I mostly bike around cities, and when I drive I have taken to cracking open a window because not being able to hear cars around me feels deeply disconcerting.

<comment><USER15> Wow - I thought it was just me !

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> As a motor vehicle enthusiast, I think it's important to distinguish "real noises intentionally amplified by physical audio routing" and "electronic recordings or audio processing played through speakers."

I don't object to routing engine noises to the cabin to allow for a loud- feeling vehicle (without necessarily being loud to people outside the car). To me, this isn't fake. The driver experiences real engine noise, with efforts to circumvent sound-deadening that comes in modern cars.

Playing recorded engine noises and/or digitally transforming sound is fake to me. It's a lie. I haven't driven a car that does this, but my guess is that it's noticeably simulated.

<comment><USER17> Perhaps it's because I have no interest whatsoever in cars, but I have trouble seeing the distinction.

If the idea is that certain sounds are merely the side effect of attributes which are themselves desired for reasons other than their sound, like a powerful engine, then it seems like _any_ intentional design to produce or amplify those sounds are completely useless. What the driver wants is the actual attributes which produce the sound as a side effect, and if those attributes are achievable and verifiable without hearing those certain sounds, then the driver should still be satisfied.

If, on the other hand, certain sounds are desirable on their own, because of aesthetics or whatever, then the driver should be satisfied if those sounds are produced, regardless of how they're produced.

<comment><USER18> It's the same as hearing a recording of someone playing the violin vs. the real thing. Even with the best audio system you can still tell it's just a recording.

And I don't treat the sound the engine makes as a side effect of other attributes - it's just as important as acceleration or fuel consumption.

<comment><USER19> The real thing is also a recording, it's the memory of the music and the playing skill recorded in the violinist's mind, with the musician and his violin as the playback device rather than a speaker. You prefer the acoustic qualities of one type of playback device over the other, but that doesn't make it any more or less "real" for any commonly accepted definition of "real".

<comment><USER18> ...I honestly can't tell if you are serious. Your argument is basically that everything is real, because sound coming from the speakers is no less real than the sound coming from an actual violin. Should I have used a term "artificial" then? Just like artificial diamonds are not the same as real diamonds, artificial sounds produced by a speaker are not the same as sounds made by a real violin. Like someone else said - the difference is the same as there is between attending a concert and sitting in your room listening to a CD. You could even argue that with a sufficiently advanced audio system, the aural experience is exactly the same, so technically they are the same. And that would be true, if humans were robots - but we experience a whole set of irrational emotions,and that's why a lot of people prefer being at a concert to listening to a recording, having real diamonds instead of mass-produced ones, or using actual sugar instead of sweeteners - even if the sensory experience produced is no "more or less "real" for any commonly accepted definition of "real". And that's why I would personally prefer having an actual combustion of fuel to be producing sounds in my car, instead of the speaker system , thank you.

<comment><USER19> Hey, preferring some playback devices because of your cultural background is just as valid as preferring some of them because they have higher pitches. You like what you like. But they're all "real".

Artificial doesn't make sense here because music is manmade to begin with. I don't think it would make sense to call an artisanal handmade telephone any less artificial than your factory-stamped Cisco IP phone. Diamonds are naturally occuring, so there is actually a distinction there. As the manufacturing process matures, that distinction will remain, but 99% of people just won't care. Like with salt.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> In Amsterdam one of the bigger reasons given for the reduction of speeds on some roads is that it reduces the noise pollution. It would seem backwards to require cars to make more noise than they strictly have to. That said in mixed traffic situations it may save some lives, so essentially this proves all those guys that drove without dampers in their exhausts and bumper stickers saying 'loud pipes save lives' right after all.

I think once the background noise of IC engines has disappeared and we can all hear normally again that this will pass, it's just the intermediate period when we can't hear the electric cars over the noise of the rest of the traffic.

<comment><USER21> Most of this noise is pumped into the car (to make the consumer happy), not out of the car. The two most common systems in use today are the car stereo (either amplifying the real engine's sound or by simply synchronizing a synthesis mechanism to the engine's load conditions) or a "sound pipe" which runs from the engine's air intake into the cabin ventilation system.

This article strangely managed to conflate the two by bringing up external electronic car noisemakers, which are entirely unrelated in both purpose and execution to the noisemaking devices explained throughout the rest of the article.

<comment><USER20> If my car would make less noise I'd be happy. It totally baffles me why someone would want more useless noise in their lives rather than less if that's an option. Music is beautiful, artificial engine noise is just that: noise.

<comment><USER22> The sound of an approaching Merlin V12 at full throttle is the most thrilling sound in the world.

[http://www.amazon.com/Sigh-Merlin-Spitfire-Alex- Henshaw/dp/0...](http://www.amazon.com/Sigh-Merlin-Spitfire-Alex- Henshaw/dp/0947554831/)

"For anyone who has heard a Merlin engine on any aircraft, you will understand the title."

No stereo has ever been able to reproduce that sound.

<comment><USER23> Nostalgia can be insatiable, sure.

<comment><USER18> It would only be nostalgia if you found it attractive because of an old memory you had. If you put someone in a car with a V-12 engine there is a very good probability that they would find the sound exciting, even if they never heard it before. That has absolutely nothing to do with nostalgia.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Am I the only one that associates loud noise with a weak engine?

To me a powerful car just has an acceleration whine, and that's all.

It's like a rocket exhaust: the "wilder" it is the weaker it is. A powerful, well tuned, rocket has a very sharp, and clean (i.e. not noisy) flame.

Same with a car - if it's making a lot of noise, it's poorly tuned or designed.

<comment><USER25> It's not just you. It's also other people who don't have much experience with engine performance. Quieter mufflers restrict more airflow, something you don't want to do when you're trying to pass more fuel through a small engine.

<comment><USER26> I have plenty of experience with engine performance, and s/he was absolutely correct. An overly loud engine is is opening its valves too early or closing too late, and it can only be made quieter by restrictive mufflers. More modern and efficient engine designs, enabled by technologies such as variable valve timing, are quieter out of the valves because they convert more energy into motion instead of sound. Being quieter, they also have less pressure, and are less affected by muffler restrictiveness. Straight pipes might make a 1969 charger more powerful, but the effect on a modern V8 like the BMW N63 is negligible.

<comment><USER27> The most dramatic example is VTEC, especially before variable cam phasing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> You'd think some people would want to opt out of the fake/amplified engine noise, so they can drive in peace, listen to their stereo without interference, etc. but i guess making the amplified/fake engine noise an option would defeat the purpose.

<comment><USER29> I can see it now: Added option - reduced engine noise $500.

Charging the buyer a one time fee to "disconnect a wire".

<comment><USER30> Which will be illegal to disconnect yourself.

<comment><USER31> DMCA violation!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> This is hardly new. In college, we had a guest lecture from a mechanical engineer at $POPULAR_MOTORCYCLE_MANUFACTURER. He described how his team cooked up a new engine design that achieved some significant performance increase over the old design. Only problem? It didn't sound like a $POPULAR_MOTORCYCLE.

The new engine was delayed for a year while they cooked up a mechanical noisemaker to adjust the sound.

<comment><USER33> Harley Davidson filed for a sonic trademark on their engine sound back in 1994[0]. (I think it failed, not sure.) But it's pretty easy to reproduce the sound to remind people:

Potato, potato, potato, potato, potato, ...

[0] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_trademark](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_trademark)

<comment><USER34> If I recall correctly The sound originally came from cost cutting engineering choices. Beyond the fairly tight angle (a little over 60 degrees) which gives you a asymmetric "gap" between ignitions, they simplifies the ignition timing so that it fired every stroke instead of every other stroke. So the exhaust strokes had a little ignition going on due to unspent fuel/air, giving the quieter sounds. Not a good design for efficiency but it sure gave them a distinctive idle.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> At some point the engine noise just becomes completely arbitrary. Avertisers will buy out your engine noise sounds, as you pass by in your Telsa furniture warehouse salesmen will scream from the engine compartment.

<comment><USER36> Eerily reminds me of "sales pitch", the Philip K Dick story where advertisers hijack your thoughts while you're commuting: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sales_Pitch_(short_story)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sales_Pitch_\(short_story\))

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> This reminds me of one particular TV set I was messing with recently. Pulling the HDMI cord on an input resulted in the screen showing _static_.

Had to think about it for a second, but the static had to have been simulated by a piece of code to _pretend_ that the input had gone missing.

<comment><USER38> Apple had that feature, at least on my previous Air.

<comment><USER23> Wait, is that really deliberate for the DisplayPort-to-DVI adapter? I've always assumed that was some sort of serious hardware/software bug causing the coloured random noise.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> i read this and I want a new car so I can hack the acceleration sounds from Elite: Dangerous into my car. That games sounds design is incredible, here is a quick clip featuring some space acceleration: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqIVbT6v5j0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqIVbT6v5j0)

</comment><comment><USER40> I want the Jetsons' car sound. My bother wants a Star Wars TIE fighter and my father in law would like the sound of a B-17, please.

<comment><USER41> I've always wanted the hovercar sound from Blade Runner, but I think I've found a new favorite with the TIE fighter :)

<comment><USER42> It wouldn't sound so appealing to the driver without the Doppler effect applied.

<comment><USER41> Maybe combine with the sensors of a driverless car -- anytime some jerk is approaching from behind at a reckless speed, play the TIE fighter noise adjusted to the circumstances of his relative speed and approach vector. You'll hear the Doppler as he overtakes and then cuts you off. If you're going to pipe engine noise into the compartment, at least make it useful.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> 100 years from now cars will still make a vestigial sound that is simply taken for granted and not really considered until some wise-ass at a party starts in "Funny story..."

<comment><USER12> We will have to explain the origin of the sound coming out of our car speakers to our kids, like we have to explain the floppy disk icon for saving a file.

<comment><USER44> A friend's young daughter asked him why the phone made a "funny sound" when taking a picture. She's never encountered a film camera or heard a real shutter click before.

<comment><USER45> To be fair, someone who has a lot of experience with film cameras could legitimately ask the same question. Why the hell _would_ a completely different technology ape the noises of a previous generation?

<comment><USER46> [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skeuomorph](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skeuomorph)

I guess in this case (with sound) it would be called skeuophone.

<comment><USER47> It's also that some countries legally required digital cameras to make noises when taking photos, to make surreptitious photography impossible.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> I have no problem with manufacturers including fake engine noise as a feature as long as it can be disabled by the customer.

<comment><USER49> Perhaps it should just be used when a pedestrian is near? It's bad enough worrying about cars that are making legal maneuvers, but when an electric car doesn't follow the rules, it's that much more dangerous.

<comment><USER48> I think you might misunderstand the nature of the artificial sounds mentioned in this article. It's not talking about electric cars making noise for the benefit of pedestrians (although that does get a cursory mention), it's talking about manufacturers of pumping artificial car noises into the cabins of cars like the Ford Mustang and the BMW M5 for the enjoyment of the occupants of the vehicle.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> Electric cars do not pollute. We should force electric cars to emit some thick black smoke to ensure people do not get surprised!

I don't know in what world these regulators live in, but in my world 80% of pedestrians are walking listening to an ipod/iphone/iwhatever. We already live in a society where pedestrians do not hear cars.

But let's make sure cars remain a nuisance to anyone trying to sleep in a city!

<comment><USER51> The cars don't pollute, but odds are that the electricity they run on came from burning coal, and lithium batteries aren't exactly environmentally friendly to manufacture or recycle. The rare elements required for the electric motors and batteries aren't earth-friendly to mine or refine, either.

But the car itself doesn't obviously emit any of this, so the public image it presents is great, hence their popularity. For me, wake me up when we have a diesel electric hybrid, since that's actually a very efficient tech which doesn't necessarily require any batteries and has been around for over 100 years (popular on ships / submarines / trains).

<comment><USER50> I don't disagree but I wasn't making a statement about the eco-friendlyness of electric cars, rather about a law defeating a technological improvement. Cars are by a large margin the largest source of nuisance in a city and for two reasons: noise and pollution. Electric cars are solving both.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> My car has a "sound symposer" feature, and a 6-speed manual transmission. It has a tube coming off the engine, through a butterfly valve, then into the firewall of the car. The butterfly valve opens when the engine is under high load, so that the car is quiet normally, and loud if you get on it (inside).

I really enjoy this feature, and have actually redirected the tubes past the valve so that the sound is always on 100% of the time. This allows me to hear the engine RPMs while shifting, instead of monitoring the RPM gauge. It also reminds me to be more mindful of fuel economy because I can hear when I'm wasting gas.

I can understand a fully electronic sound being annoying - and the feature would annoy me on an electric car like a Tesla... But with the setup that mine has - I think people are just whining and that this article reeks of sensationalism. Also, it can be easily disabled in about five minutes by anybody who can watch some how-to videos on YouTube.

</comment><comment><USER53> I hate the idea of a fake engine noise, but I drive a manual transmission and I know I use my ears a lot to know when to shift.

<comment><USER54> From what I've read, that wouldn't be relevant for an electric vehicle, since there is no transmission. Or that might only be for the Tesla.

<comment><USER55> Literally the entire reason for the transmission for a combustion engine is to make the relatively high minimum speed of an internal combustion work for lower road speeds, with the pleasant side effect of increasing torque at low speed.

Electric motors have no need for one, because they have both variable speeds and generally tremendous amounts of torque to start with.

<comment><USER56> Electric motors tend to have wide useable rpm ranges, but their efficiency varies across the range, so a transmission is still useful.

Scroll 2/3 of the way down this page to see a representative brushless DC motor performance curve, for example: [http://www.johnsonelectric.com/en/resources-for- engineers/au...](http://www.johnsonelectric.com/en/resources-for- engineers/automotive-applications/motion-technology/ec-motor-brushless.html)

<comment><USER57> AC induction motors (typically what's used in electric cars) have a pretty flat efficiency curve. For example: [http://powerelectronics.com/motion- systems/motors-efficiency...](http://powerelectronics.com/motion- systems/motors-efficiency-and-adjustable-speed-drives)

There would be some minor efficiency gains from having multiple gears, but it's probably small enough that it would be hard to overcome the extra losses from having a more complex transmission.

Note that technically electric cars _do_ have a transmission. The motor wants to spin much faster than the tires, so you want a reduction gear to let them both live in the ranges where they're happy. It's a single-gear transmission, though, on every electric car I'm aware of.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER58> There is some good discussion of synthetic car noises in Norman's "Design of everyday things". Sound is a hard to use interface that could still offer great usability advances if we work out to harness it properly.

I see people asking "why not rely on the horn to alert pedestrians". The horn is the equivalent of shouting "oi" but engine sound is hugely rich source of information. We get: speed, direction, distance, acceleration, attitude (e.g. distinguish aggressive acceleration, panicked deceleration) and type of car (e.g. racer vs. town-car).

Unlike a horn, we get this information at the times a horn would not be used i.e. the driver has not seen us and about to mow us down. Synthetic car noise must alert, orient but not annoy. Norman said the current United States National Highway Traffic Safety Administration spec for synthetic car noise is 250 pages long.

</comment><comment><USER59> Weird. I would prefer the engine to be as quiet as possible. The proof of performance is in how the thing drives, not how it sounds. Tweaking the exhaust pipe on a car like the Mustang makes sense, but piping sound in through the speakers? As long as I can turn it off permanently.

<comment><USER60> Different people have different preferences, and some sounds provoke an emotional response in some people. Not that weird.

</comment></comment><comment><USER61> I don't know about other communities, but Formula 1 fans go and watch races because of sounds. The new rules in 2014 which introduced the v6 hybrid doesn't have a very loud sound and you can see the media reaction to it. Old cars used to have a v8 engine. Revs limiting is also one of the reason of low sound in 2014.

If you want an comparision between the old sound and new sound, see the below mentioned youtube video

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jS4Dh_EAfJI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jS4Dh_EAfJI)

News: [http://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2014/mar/25/bernie- ecc...](http://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2014/mar/25/bernie-ecclestone- formula-one-cars-volume)

</comment><comment><USER62> Confession: I am a Luxury Ricer.

When I bought my now 11-year-old Lexus, I was amazed by two aspects: how sporty and well controlled it was [for a luxury car], and how silent it was. It was literally more quiet than a Prius and it had an inline six.

And I hated it.

After a few months of hitting the gas and hearing _nothing_ , I opened up the hood and ripped the tiny ram-air front inlet off the air intake. I also took apart the air box and gutted the parts that didn't affect the air filter. The result was a tiny but definitely noticeable engine roar when high-revving. It finally sounded about as mean as a Toyota Corolla.

They can pry my engine noise from my cold, dead, ricer hands.

<comment><USER57> Priuses aren't really very quiet (at least on the inside) unless you're cruising at <60MPH or so, or decelerating. The engine gets pretty noisy when accelerating at any rate that isn't painfully slow, and the power output needed merely to maintain higher highway speeds gets pretty noisy.

Noise is actually one of the big reasons I'm looking forward to switching from a Prius to a pure electric.

</comment></comment><comment><USER63> Noise is just wasted energy that could be doing useful work unless, of course, you actually want the noise (like in a musical instrument). This is a really weird trend.

<comment><USER64> The power in noise is actually fairly low. Like single digit watts low, for deafening noise.

<comment><USER24> You are only looking at the energy in the noise itself. But to make that noise there is a ton of wasted energy in vibration, friction from gears, etc.

Noise is a symptom of "slop" in an engine. It might be unavoidable, but it's still a symptom of wasted energy.

<comment><USER64> Oh, definitely. Noise is often a symptom of wasted energy in a mechanical process.

And even producing noise with a speaker is rather inefficient. You need hundreds of Watt input for single digit Watt output in the interesting frequencies.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER65> >Federal safety officials expect to finalize rules later this year requiring all hybrid and electric cars to play fake engine sounds to alert passersby, a change that experts estimate could prevent thousands of pedestrian and cyclist injuries.

Yeah, because those pedestrian and cyclists should be responsible for staying out of the way of badly driven cars... Just think how safe things would be if we cranked things up so loud that drivers could hear other cars.

<comment><USER66> The worst part about that is that car noise is an actual ecological and "quality of life" threat, combated in many places by noise walls built around roads. Forcing cars to be loud is the worst possible decision that could be made.

<comment><USER67> The flip side is that modern cars can accelerate from the 5kph that they exit their driveway at to 50kph with no noticeable noise.

I have almost been run over this way. Look to the left, no cars on the road, look to the right, no cars, look back to the left JESUS CHRIST.

Hopefully automatic pedestrian detection will become standard in the next few years, but in the mean time I need to be able to hear your high speed death- ram when I'm not facing it.

Perfectly happy for it to be something other than simulated engine noise, but I need an audible cue.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER68> On the Renault Clio, you can already choose the kind of engine noise you want from a menu.

<comment><USER69> They could monetize that with microtransactions. 99c to download and install "1968 Ferrari Dino" or "Anakin's Podracer".

<comment><USER70> Sebulba for the whales, 100€

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER71> My initial thought was: I wouldn't want any 'fake' noise, potentially hiding information in the (softer) real noise.

But what if the noise is dynamically synthesized based on lots of info from the vehicle – perhaps not just its real noise/RPMs, but other qualities usually not usually sensed. Temperature and vibrations across multiple sampling-locations? Computed fuel-economy? Others?

Maybe it's a good aural channel for real info!

<comment><USER72> Great point

</comment></comment><comment><USER73> This reminds me of Kornbluth's story 'The Marching Morons' where cars are made noisy but slow so the morons will be stimulated but safe.

</comment><comment><USER74> When I first drove my 2012 VW Golf R, I was startled by how rumbly the engine sounded. Found out the sound was produced by a device called the soundaktor that was attached to the windshield frame. The device would send low-frequency vibrations to the windshield as needed to "enhance" the engine sound.

</comment><comment><USER75> While maybe it's silly to do it electronically, thousands of people switch out the exhausts on their cars/motorcycles not often for increases in performance... but to have a different sound.

Doing it electronically is new, but the concept of wanting a more 'powerful' sounding engine isn't.

<comment><USER56> That's still derided by enthusiasts when it's taken to extremes, for instance a loud exhaust on an economy car fools no-one and will draw negative attention from most people. But below trying-too-hard territory, it is an authentic- feeling unleashing of your vehicle's inner beast, which is something the sound effects system will never be.

</comment></comment><comment><USER76> Fake engine noise would be nice. We drive in historical St. Augustine Fl. That is, for those who don't know, the oldest city in the US. As such it was built with extremely narrow streets.

My hybrid silently rolls down the back alleys unnoticed by pedestrians. I've had to sit for 10 minutes because people would walk out in front of my car. Women with strollers. Old people talking.

I've watched traditional cars. They have far less problem. There is a sense that hearing an engine means that someone wants out.

</comment><comment><USER77> I don't mind channeling the REAL engine noise into the car. Like the article said, it can be preferable to the sound of bumps in the road or whining of wind. And for car enthusiasts who actually work on their own cars, sound is a key part of detecting and diagnosing issues with the car.

But they need to cut it out with the fake noise. That's just glamor and it's unnecessary. The only exception I would support is for electric cars, for the purpose of pedestrian safety.

</comment><comment><USER78> My first reaction was that it's stupid and pointless.

But my second reaction is that it's a clever culture hack that allows more efficient engines to make their way into typical "car lover" cars--so ultimately a good thing all around. Drivers get the sound they want, with better gas mileage, and the rest of us get cars that are quieter on the outside and produce less pollution. All enabled by a bit of digital audio.

</comment><comment><USER79> I think all of this is normal. Sound is also an interface, for it connects one world to another. As in software, if you change drastically any interface, the users will not like at the first. That's why great changes needs to be done in small portions. With the past of years, these fake sounds can disappear of the industry, after the users get used to electric cars.

</comment><comment><USER80> Wow, so I guess the movie "The Dilemma" was actually based on a true story. They do spend time optimizing engine noise!

</comment><comment><USER81> I have a Nissan Leaf so yes, there is no fake engine sound, only a sound in front at low speed to warn pedestrians.

Not only I would not want a fake engine sound but I would be willing to pay more to have my car sound proof, with insulation or something, it would be quieter, colder in the summer and warmer in the winter.

</comment><comment><USER82> We should really be taking this opportunity to make all cars sound like the cars on the Jetsons.

</comment><comment><USER83> "Federal safety officials expect to finalize rules later this year requiring all hybrid and electric cars to play fake engine sounds to alert passersby, a change that experts estimate could prevent thousands of pedestrian and cyclist injuries."

My guess is that the main force behind this law is Big Oil using their lobbyists to slow the adoption of electric vehicles. If they were really concerned about pedestrians being hit by cars it would be illegal to wear headphones while walking.

Instead of adding noise, which we already have too much of (I can hear cars on roads a mile away from my house) how about they require cars to send out a signal that an inexpensive device can pick up and thus locate the car. That way any pedestrian can actually see where all the cars are around them. I bet that kind of proactive action would have much better results then depending on people's inadvertent attention to background noise.

</comment><comment><USER84> Clearly a first world problem. I especially like the "outrageous" language in the article: "built an lies", as if it was a major drama, ... honestly, who cares? ... But then I again, I do not even care to own a car.

</comment><comment><USER85> The phrase "the rise of" is really being abused these days.

</comment><comment><USER86> Yet another example of skeuomorphism...

</comment><comment><USER87> Heinlein predicted this in The Cat Who Walks Through Walls

</comment><comment><USER88> Car ring-tones! yay! I want crazy frog on my tesla.</comment>


Bill before Icelandic Parliament to grant Edward Snowden citizenship - <AUTHOR> http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.althingi.is%2Faltext%2F142%2Fs%2F0078.html&act=url <comment><USER2> It's relieving that Iceland is the only country with any balls left for civil liberty, and all those that complained about the NSA spying but then refused Snowden asylum should be _ashamed_ of their actions. It's an international embarrassment. Also quite ironic this happens on the Fourth.

As I type this, I breathe an immense sigh of relief. It's odd that Snowden, a man I hardly know, influences me that much. It's the feeling I get when I think of the founding fathers and their sacrifice and how it paid off after a long and difficult struggle.

I don't know if it will pay off for the United States, but bravo to Snowden for standing up and doing something apart from signing online "petitions."

<comment><USER3> How likely is this to be passed?

I would imagine that there will be a fair amount of influence exerted in the direction of Reykjavik to make sure this doesn't pass.

Actually, it would be fascinating to see the records of the incoming calls to the leaders of the Icelandic government - I wonder who could help with that? ;-)

<comment><USER4> There's zero chance this will pass.

We currently have a right wing majority in parliament in Iceland, and they're not keen on issues of civil liberty. Head of one of the ruling parties said last week that "Snowden is going to go to the back of the citizenship line like everyone else". Sorry.

<comment><USER5> What they could do is send out a letter to all the people at the front of the citizenship line and ask if anyone is willing to trade places with him. If I were waiting at the front of the line I would gladly switch places with him. I'm sure they can find someone.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Iceland also granted citizenship to the late chess great Bobby Fischer, when he was on the verge of being deported to the US, from Japan.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Fischer#Asylum_in_Iceland](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Fischer#Asylum_in_Iceland)

<comment><USER7> Yeah, but Fischer was wanted for playing chess in Yugoslavia and generally being an ass. Accepting Snowden is whole new level of shit-storm for whatever country does it.

I've been living in Iceland for about three years, and there's no way they're taking him.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> It surely cannot be good legislative practice to make laws solely for one person, even if it seems to be the right thing at the time. In general it is thought to be good practice that a law should address a particular form of behavior rather than a specific individual or group.

Although Congress has in the past passed laws for individuals, such as when Congress passed a law in 1963 making Winston Churchill an honorary American citizen ( [http://www.winstonchurchill.org/learn/biography/redux/church...](http://www.winstonchurchill.org/learn/biography/redux/churchill- honored-with-us-citizenship) ).

This use of legislation in the UK was also in effect from 1300-1800 and called a bill of attainder.

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

<comment><USER9> In Iceland, citizenship can only be granted by passing a new law in the parliament.

Normally citizenships are granted in batches with similar bills, after the receivers pass the normal qualifying process carried out by the immigration authorities.

<comment><USER8> Thats really interesting, thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Is it Iceland or Greenland that has energy independence? That gives them some economic power.

I'd like to visit there someday, that is if the US doesn't stop allowing people to visit there like Cuba.

<comment><USER11> We still have no gasoline though and the cars/boats/planes are not electric. We have a lot of free energy in regards to heating, hot water and electricity only. Nor can we easily export that energy without large advances in the field of superconductors being so far from mainland Europe.

<comment><USER10> Don't you have hydrogen "gas" stations?

Wikipedia says they are aiming for 2050 energy independence.

That would be incredible.

<comment><USER11> Well its not like there are many vehicles that support the fuel. As far as I'm aware there are only two electric "pumps" available in the entire country. We're still very much based on the technology of gasoline. 2050 perhaps, but its still a long way off.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> When is it being voted on? Are people going to gather around Alþingi? Has anyone planed anything to push the MP on letting this through?

</comment><comment><USER13> Way to go. I wonder why none of the south american countries offered him citizenship and a passport, maybe even a diplomatic one (it won't give him immunity, but will help with travel arrangements)

</comment><comment><USER14> Surprisingly, tiny Iceland is the only country in Europe daring to question American might.

<comment><USER15> I question the "in Europe" bit.

Iceland is closer to the halfway line between mainland Europe and North America than it is to Europe. Geologically it is squarely in the middle, being built on the mid-Atlantic ridge. The nearest larger piece of land is Greenland, which is on the North America continental plate.

These facts matter. Iceland is used to being very far from everyone, and able to set its own rules. Because who is going to bother trying to invade?

<comment><USER11> Ahem. Iceland is a very strategic location in the centre of the Atlantic sea, a good place for Arctic circle expeditions and a half-way stop to Europe. During WW2 it was used as an outpost for supply deliveries to the USSR. Therefore invading Iceland would be a good call for any large force for strategic purposes.

I think you might also underestimate the influence both Europe and the US are able to place upon it. "Able to set its own rules" is probably a bit of an exaggeration that I would guess is derived from the awful journalism that has recently suggested that Iceland have done "great things" (jail bankers, bail out its own mortgage holders) when the journalism is infact mostly incorrect.

Iceland is really not _that_ different from Europe/US.

<comment><USER15> None of what you say indicates that Iceland is actually in Europe.

Yes, you're right that it is a convenient waypost between the North America and Europe. But the key point here is _between_.

You are also right that there is the ability to put pressure on Iceland from lots of places, including the USA and Europe. However compare how much independence Iceland feels with European countries of the same size. In population it is in the middle of Luxembourg, Malta, Jersey and the Isle of Man. Which of those is even remotely comparable?

<comment><USER16> Iceland was a member of the EEA and is a candidate member for the EU.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The degree of US's actions for catching Snowden ( [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5982842](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5982842) ) despite previous statements of Obama suggesting otherwise is puzzling.

I hope the law gets passed.

</comment><comment><USER18> Looking at the bill, I see that he just had his 30th birthday a couple of weeks ago. Happy Birthday Edward! 30th is sort of a big deal (or depressing to some) - I'm sure he was 20 he didn't expect to be "celebrating" his 30th this way.

</comment><comment><USER19> Just before adjourning parliament, a vote was cast to put the bill before a parliament committee to be discussed further. The vote was defeated 24 to 33, 5 didn't vote and one was absent. Seems like this door has closed.

Can't find news articles on this, except this piece [http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=is&tl=en&js=n&prev=...](http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=is&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dv.is%2Ffrettir%2F2013%2F7%2F4%2Fmeira- kjarkleysid-og-aumingjadomur%2F)

</comment><comment><USER20> Iceland seems like a pretty good place to me. Minus the freezing and harsh winters, and the lack of sun. From all that I hear about it, it seems like a good place to expatriate to. Any thoughts on this?

<comment><USER7> I'm an American living in Iceland for about three years now. I like it here -- it's nice. But if you get your "facts" from the foreign press, you'll be sorely disappointed. It's not some sort of wonderland where the people took back the country from the bankers and wrote a new constitution on Facebook.

Also, the winters aren't that cold.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I applaud the initiative but if this bill passes, what are the chances that we won't cave in and hand Snowden over as soon as the US start applying some _real_ pressure?

</comment><comment><USER22> I love iceland. You guys rock.

Even if it's only for the effort.

</comment><comment><USER23> Are icelandic parliamentary bills typically that short?

<comment><USER24> Change the URL from [http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0078.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0078.html) to [http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0076.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0076.html) , [http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0075.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0075.html), [http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0073.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0073.html), [http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0025.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0025.html) , and so on, then judge for yourself.

Most of the ones I saw were short.

However, take that last one as an example. It's a committee report, saying "The majority suggests that the bill will be passed unchanged."

Here's a longer one: [http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0015.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0015.html) . "Bill amending Act no. 74/2012 on fishing fees."

Next question - how long are they in other governments? For example, the recent US "Freedom to Fish" [in the 'waters downstream of a dam'] Act is only two pages.

<comment><USER9> All of you links but the last one are to committee comments on bills, not the bills themselves. Here are some bills discussed in the past days:

[http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0067.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0067.html)

[http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0046.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0046.html)

[http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0040.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0040.html)

[http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0020.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0020.html)

[http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0007.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0007.html)

[http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0006.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0006.html)

[http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0005.html](http://www.althingi.is/altext/142/s/0005.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> AImll</comment>


Ask HN: Idea Incubators? Or this: "I need some ideas" - <AUTHOR>

I recently came across the following links from Google and Hacker News:
http://ycombinator.com/ideas.html http://jacquesmattheij.com/My+list+of+ideas+for+when+you+are+looking+for+inspiration
I am probably dumb when it comes to ideas because everytime I think of the "next" big idea, it has already been done.
Would you recommened any other blog posts like the ones written by Jaques or Paul that can enlighten me?
I am not looking for a direct "here's an idea" though, only something that will make me think more about the latest problems. I want to go through the experience of a startup at least once and am willing to put in long hours and am open to learning. Any suggestions? <comment><USER2> A philosophical perspective - Ask yourself this:"why do you want to start a startup?" Is it to make $? fast and lots of it? If so, then just rehash old startups and make a new one with a twist (another photosharing app, file sharing app, etc) - new startups today are all a mish-mash of some sort. If $ is not your immediate answer, then it must be drive/passion - something you want to answer/see because no one else has that is disruptive. In all honesty,the "next" big thing will take time and patience and you will need your drive and passion to keep it going. Other 2 things I want to add: think outside the box - step back and look at it from another way that no one else has; don't stay complacent with the status quo. And, finally, take calculated risks. Good luck.

</comment><comment><USER3> Steve Blank's Customer Development is basically a repeatable process for discovering IPO-worthy startup ideas in the enterprise space. Sounds like reading 4 Steps to the Epiphany would be worth your time (the summaries and blog posts don't really get at idea creation in the same way the book does).

Another choice is to start with a customer segment that mid-20s guys (e.g. startup founders) tend to ignore and figure out what could be improved about their lives. Middle managers, stay-at-home moms, nurses, prisoners, old people, etc.

Also, pg posted a convenient list: <http://ycombinator.com/rfs.html>

</comment><comment><USER4> Haha ... I have the opposite problem: no lack of ideas, but a lack of my ability to execute (on my own). I think it's because I am a customer facing (marketing/bizdev/sales) person at heart though my forte is product (management). Anyway, my ideas all come from customer interaction. And I have heard it from many others: just pick something as long as it gives you an excuse to interact with real customers. This is a bit easier in the enterprise market where you can engage with real customers. Partnering with somebody who has credibility with those guys and can get you meetings also helps.

</comment><comment><USER5> 1) the most you can be is inspired by a general concept. The rest has to be your idea, otherwise you won't understand it at a deep enough level, and won't be able to execute it in the right way.

2) if you're chasing the next big thing, you won't get anything. Solve a problem to a significant degree (which means truly understanding the problem). Page didn't do Page Rank because he wanted to be rich; he did it to try to solve the search problem.</comment>


ARM: "RISC-V Architecture: Understand the Facts" - <AUTHOR> https://riscv-basics.com/ <comment><USER3> If this article is genuine (there are many comments arguing it might not be) I would consider it an excellent endorsement of RISC-V. If a company with an awesome engineering, like I consider ARM to be, is scared to the point of authoring some FUD, RISC-V has to be _really_ promising!

<comment><USER4> When I search for "risc-v basics arm" in Google, this article comes up first as a paid Ad.

So somebody is paying google to make this thing come up on top.

<comment><USER5> Can you screenshot that and link to the screenshot? I don't see it marked as an ad.

<comment><USER4> I wish I did. It doesn't come up like that anymore.

<comment><USER6> Someone on reddit made a screenshot [https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/8xbqlv/arm_launches_...](https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/8xbqlv/arm_launches_facts_campaign_against_riscv_ie_fud/e22fnto/) [https://imgur.com/a/U2XGVee](https://imgur.com/a/U2XGVee)

<comment><USER4> Yes, I got the same one!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Some of the "facts" here are pretty weak. The "years of security expertise" is not really a feature I'd be proud of given the recent processor-level vulnerabilities that in fact, paint a very different picture about how traditional processor vendors treat security.

Even if there is some validity here, this is in surprisingly poor taste. I've known people who have worked for ARM. I wonder what they think about this.

<comment><USER8> How would an open source processor be better from a security perspective? I might still be a little shell shocked from my attempts to setup a MythTV Box 10 years ago but this is what's running through my head:

"Did you RTFM?"

"Debain CPU doesn't have that issue."

"Just disable the ALUs in firmware, they're not necessary in modern processors anyways."

"That's been patched, just download processor v22.214.171.1242 and send it to your FAB, they should spin you a new CPU in 8-12 months."

<comment><USER7> Some open source projects are different. A lot of them do not cater to end users directly. But if you want to talk about open source security, take a look at how OpenBSD handles issues; they definitely aren't messing around.

<comment><USER8> That's all true, I'm just wondering how things would be different if everyone were using an Open Source CPU vs what we have today.

If everyone is running the same CPU design but sourced from different manufacturers who had them spun up at different fabs, how would that affect support? Today we have one or two device manufacturers we rely on for support and answers about if security fixes can be done in firmware vs requiring a hardware fix. We can pull the CPU ID of our system and then check with AMD or Intel for an authoritative answer. What does that look like when anyone can manufacture a chip?

Will there still end up being one or two predominant CPU manufactures for desktop/mobile/server CPUs to simplify support? Are we going to have to rely on OEMs to support the CPUs they put in their machines?

I'm fearful we might end up in a situation similar or worse to what we have with Android where smartphones are shipped in their final state and never receive anything beyond failure support from the OEM/ODM.

<comment><USER9> That's the case today: ARM CPUs are sourced from different manufacturers and packaged together with other cores into SoCs, which have wildly varying support from their vendors. Some of these processors also have custom extensions. If you're worried about chip security when anyone can manufacture a chip, then sorry, we're already there, and RISC-V doesn't change that.

<comment><USER8> So what does it solve that's a problem today?

* Serious question. Apart from the freedom and control aspects of the Open Source model, what is solved with an open source CPU architecture or what are the benefits?

I can see being able to spin your own chips would enable an OEM/ODM to keep producing the same old design indefinitely where as reliance on Intel/AMD/Samsung/Mediatek means you have to refresh your design. That could be both a benefit and a detriment depending on how you look at it.

<comment><USER9> Again, being able to spin your own chips isn't really at issue here, that's already possible. ARM and MIPS will likely happily let you continue to make chips based on old cores as long as you continue to pay your license fees.

The freedoms from the Open Source model is substantial enough to make it attractive on that basis alone, just as for Linux/BSD. One example is Western Digital transitioning to RISC-V for their hard drive controllers. I would imagine being able to add your own instructions without having to deal with NDAs and non competes with ARM will be attractive to a lot of OEMs.

Just like with Linux, it's difficult to anticipate what intersting things will come out of RISC-V, but one interesting example is a formally verified RISC-V core, picorv32: [https://github.com/cliffordwolf/riscv- formal/tree/master/cor...](https://github.com/cliffordwolf/riscv- formal/tree/master/cores/picorv32) (presentation here: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VU97ffHF_IQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VU97ffHF_IQ)). According to the author, this core will power safety critical applications at a synchrotron: [https://theamphour.com/374-an-interview-with-clifford- wolf/](https://theamphour.com/374-an-interview-with-clifford-wolf/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This page should be archived alongside the Halloween documents as a reminder of the endless FUD campaigns against FLOSS software/hardware.

</comment><comment><USER11> I call shenanigans, this is a fake page. First off the page isn't coming from arm's own domain yet it appears to mimic the look and feel of the arm site. No cookie acceptance policy and the missing links from the bottom of the page are further proof.

<comment><USER12> Yeah, WHOIS lists DomainsByProxy.com - why would they hide their name in the domain registration if they write "arm" on the header in big letters, linking to arm.com?

This actually looks like a smear campaign _against_ ARM.

<comment><USER13> But the diagram is actually hosted by ARM. Maybe it's ARM wants to think us that RISC-V supporters launched a campaign against them \s

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> A friend works in ARM and was extremely surprised (negatively) when I shared this link with him

RISC-V may, perhaps, compete in two fields with ARM: education, where ARM doesn't give a fuck, and hacker boards, which is a tiny market compared to smartphones, smarttvs and so on. There have been around 15 million Raspberry Pi (the most popular SBC) sold in 6 years. Samsung sold 321 million smartphones last year alone.

Whoever is thinking today about replacing some production anything with a RISC-V is insane to begin with, but this campaign ups the insanity further.

<comment><USER15> > RISC-V may, perhaps, compete in two fields with ARM: education, where ARM > doesn't give a fuck, and hacker boards, which is a tiny market

Those seem like very similar markets to those that Linux started out with.

AFAIK, Sun never ran FUD/attack ads against Linux, but this feels similar to a _hypothetical_ world where they did so very early in 1993.

I doubt FUD will ultimately be able to prevent the adoption of RISC-V, but it may be able to delay the inevitable for a few years.

<comment><USER16> If I recall correctly SCO did. At least they pointed out how much more stable they were than Linux.

And SCO was much more vulnerable to Linux than Sun was. Linux could even run SCO binaries unmodified.

And we know what happened to them later.

And I say this as someone who used to work for a SCO distributor, and later Sun.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Assuming that this is not a fake - who is the target audience for a such page? They are not talking about baby diapers there, but CPU architectures. I just can't imagine that someone responsible for choosing a CPU architecture will base his/her decision on a page like this. Then why it exists? To show us that ARM is afraid of RISC-V? Ok then, message received.

<comment><USER18> You think that all CPU architects and semiconductor company employees are elites who can't be fooled by marketing.

You'd be surprised...

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> ARM is playing a very, very dumb game here. Do they seriously think any prospective RISC-V user has not taken this information into account? Whomever goes on to design an ASIC probably knows what they are getting into well enough.

ARM would be much wiser to embrace RISC-V early, spearheading this effort and bringing RISC-V users into their tools and ecosystem.

</comment><comment><USER20> ARM is apparently and unsurprisingly scared shitless about the RISC-V threat.

<comment><USER17> They may be scared and this is completely normal. What is not normal - it's the fact that there is a person placed high enough in the ARM's chain of command, who sanctioned this dumb page - like "oh, that's really nice - <USER2> will help us a lot, publish it".

<comment><USER21> maybe the world would be better off if we treated marketing as a sunk cost and stopped encouraging them to actually try to control the narrative.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> IDK...

Everyone freaking out about how "disruptive" an open source core would be... You still need someone to place it on silicon (unless you want to waste most of your FPGA on a soft core) and you need someone to make peripherals which lets be honest is 80%-95% of what Cortex M-type embedded processors are doing at any given time. These seem like the major barriers that aren't solved by removing a licensing fee for the core.

Maybe I just don't get it, but it seems a LONG way out for RISC-V powered top tier phones.

<comment><USER23> Let's say I'm making an SoC and I need an always-on service processor. It's a waste of effort for me to make it myself, so I'll either license one or grab one off the internet, if I could trust it.

In the past, people just threw a little bit of money to ARM and called it a day.

But now, I could grab picorv32 or rocket for free off the internet. Both have been taped out in this capacity before, both speak standard bus interfaces, and the former has been fully(?) formally verified.

Sure, it's not a resounding success story, but it helps me get my SoC to market sooner and at a lower cost (no need to even spend time negotiating with anybody).

<comment><USER22> >Sure, it's not a resounding success story, but it helps me get my SoC to market sooner and at a lower cost (no need to even spend time negotiating with anybody).

Ok, but you're then dumping what at least a million dollars into someone else's firmware that is unsupported if there is an issue? IDK. I can think of lots of cases where it might make sense for the hobbiest, or for softcores or for weird applications - but...

There are engineers from STM with desks at ARM, and engineers from ARM with desks at STM. I just don't see STM saying "fuck it, let's just spool up some core we contributed to as a fully in house project". They already need to support their peripherals and production, maybe they are paying enough to ARM to make it worth it to add core code to that list, maybe not.

ARM makes a ton of money, but they also assume all of the contractual obligations for issues and support. I'm not sure the entire industry would be using ARM if it made sense to spool up your own, even as open source. But again, IDK.

<comment><USER23> I think you underestimate just how many hardware startups there are and how many of them are NOT going to license an ARM core for their service core.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Are we sure this is published by Arm? The whois and certificates seem a bit anonymous.

<comment><USER25> The header tags reference a copy of the "infographic" hosted on arm.com: [https://www.arm.com:443/-/media/global/company/arm-risc-v- in...](https://www.arm.com:443/-/media/global/company/arm-risc-v- infographic.png?revision=c8e7b9ff-7eee-45b0-aedd-a6ebee15976d)

<comment><USER26> Ok, looks genuine now, thanks for proofs.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> The hn title could replace «Facts» with «FUD» since this is literally what this campaign is.

<comment><USER28> I'm a rather uninformed reader, and I would be interested to read about sources that say the facts presented here are wrong, rather than just read "it's a FUD campaign". At the end of the day, no camp rigoursly shared information

<comment><USER29> As with all FUD campaigns, there's an element of truth. ARM does undoubtedly have a very large ecosystem and more features (RISC-V lacks hardware virtualization for example).

But there are also loads of companies using and producing real RISC-V cores and all the major Linux distros are already shipping on RISC-V. The barrier to entry to RISC-V is far lower since you can quite literally download the cores off github and program them into just about any FPGA (there's even a version which works with an 8k-LUT FPGA that costs $10 in quantity). Or just fire up a qemu RISC-V VM at no cost at all.

As with Linux & Windows servers c.1999, who would you bet on winning in the end?

<comment><USER30> > As with Linux & Windows servers c.1999, who would you bet on winning in the > end?

It was more about UNIX & Windows.

Linux won on the servers thanks to majority of UNIX guys cutting down costs by outsourcing their development costs into Linux.

Had Linux not gotten the money of IBM, HP, Compaq, SGI, Intel, Oracle, Sun, Google, ...., the outcome would have looked much different.

<comment><USER31> "Had Linux not gotten the money of IBM, HP, Compaq, SGI, Intel, Oracle, Sun, Google, ...., the outcome would have looked much different."

Linux would win anyway. I've worked in the late 90s-early2k in places which were then already planning the move from proprietary Unix to Linux, some of them also in pretty critical contexts. Most of the companies you mention already had their own Unix: AIX, Digital Unix / Tru64, Irix, Solaris; they shoveled all that money into Linux (apparently against their own business) because they realized that selling products and services would pay in the long run a lot more than selling also the operating system, especially when the OSS competitor was gaining support every day. Soon or later that abundance in developers and testers would turn into less bugs, more features and faster response to vulnerabilities that no corporation in the world could equal.

<comment><USER30> > UNIX guys cutting down costs by outsourcing their development costs into > Linux.

Apparently people can't read.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> I have to say that I'm surprised that it seems to be pretty factual.

The main points seem to be that RISC-V is not there yet and that customization is expensive. I guess for most projects you currently use ARM processors ARM will make most sense for a while. RISC-V will probably slowly eat a growing piece of that market though over the next years to decades.

<comment><USER33> When it starts off saying there are "currently" no royalties, as if royalties could be added in the future, I'm not inclined to call it "pretty factual". Maybe "contains some facts, among other things".

Also point 4 is pretty useless, and point 5 is basically nonsense. It's implying that you should avoid the higher costs of customizing by using Arm instead of just... not customizing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> [https://www.arm.com/-/media/global/company/arm-risc-v- infogr...](https://www.arm.com/-/media/global/company/arm-risc-v- infographic.png?revision=c8e7b9ff-7eee-45b0-aedd-a6ebee15976d)

The article is not fake

</comment><comment><USER35> what I read: RISC-V is a very serious competitor for ARM

<comment><USER36> Indeed. We've arrived at the 'fight' stage of ignore, laugh, fight, win.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Yes, it's from arm, who has a vested interest, yes it's in poor taste, and yes, it's stretching in some places, but it's not necessarily inaccurate...

<comment><USER37> I do not understand the commotion either. As far as attack ads go, this keeps very close to the truth and points out legitimate concerns.

This so far away from the early 00's Microsoft anti-Linux campagin that you can't even really call it FUD

<comment><USER38> Because it's fud. Each of the five points are either lies or stretching the truth, and is missing a key element: RISC-V allows people to innovate (on the implementation, not necessarily adding instructions to the ISA). To do this for Arm requires an architectural license which is insanely expensive (you can start many start ups for just this alone).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Haha, that reads so much like Microsoft's FUD in the early 2000s targeting Linux ... so I guess we can conclude from that that ARM's assessment is that RISC-V is a viable alternative that's worth using and investing in?

</comment><comment><USER40> Looking forward to "The Year of the RISC-V Desktop" articles.

That's a joke, but I think Windows vs. Linux is the right reference frame here, assuming that RISC-V proves out. Those who want to roll their own and control their own destiny may go with RISC-V, while those who want a packaged solution will go ARM. And ARM will have to get better to compete.

Western Digital has gone with RISC-V for a controller, because Western Digital is the kind of company that wants to commoditize its inputs so it can sell a packaged solution to its customers as cheaply as possible. I can also see Amazon or Google finding uses for RISC-V in their data centers.

Phones ... I'm not so sure. Maybe Apple could go that way, as they're vertically integrated and already make their Ax chips in house. But the Android OEMs wouldn't unless Google leads the way.

<comment><USER41> Jokes aside. Since February you can already buy RISC-V SoCs that run Linux... at pretty high prices, e.g., [https://www.crowdsupply.com/sifive/hifive- unleashed](https://www.crowdsupply.com/sifive/hifive-unleashed) costs 1000$ bucks and the expansion board costs 2000$...

Still not practical for the masses, but not more expensive than similar extravagant architectures like PowerPCs (IIRC a PowerPC9 desktop system costs about 9000$ today).

Someone joked that you could get a 30$ xeon system on ebay from a couple of years ago that would crush these on pretty much any benchmark, but who knows, maybe some day riscv chips will become cheaper and more powerful. What we are seeing in the market today are the very first such systems, from the very first vendors.

<comment><USER40> Oh, I'm sure that there will be hobbyists who do this. Just like there are people who run Arch on their home PC, or automate their house with Arduinos. The joke about "The Year of the Linux Desktop" is predicting mass consumer adoption. That doesn't seem too likely, unless someone like Apple or Google decides to move their stack over to silicon they can design and control in- house without need for ARM's long term support.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Can somebody please verify the authenticity? Why didn't arm use a subdomain of arm.com?

<comment><USER43> Good question. Domain is registered with wildwestdomains (GoDaddy), anonymized:

        Domain Name: RISCV-BASICS.COM
        Registry Domain ID: 2277459939_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN
        Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.wildwestdomains.com
        Registrar URL: http://www.wildwestdomains.com
        Updated Date: 2018-06-20T21:54:44Z
        Creation Date: 2018-06-20T21:54:44Z
        Registry Expiry Date: 2019-06-20T21:54:44Z
        Registrar: Wild West Domains, LLC
        ...

        Registrant Name: Registration Private
        Registrant Organization: Domains By Proxy, LLC
        Registrant Street: DomainsByProxy.com

Hosted on Azure:

          Name Server: NS1-07.AZURE-DNS.COM
          Name Server: NS2-07.AZURE-DNS.NET
          Name Server: NS3-07.AZURE-DNS.ORG
          Name Server: NS4-07.AZURE-DNS.INFO

SSL cert is from GoDaddy. This is very different from arm.com.

At first sight, I'd assume it's fake.

Link to arm.com though has GA tags for tracking:

        ?utm_source=riscv-basics.com&utm_medium=website&utm_campaign=18.06_riscv-ds-eval-confidence_riscv_na_na_web_pg2956a1_02

HTML has:

        <meta name="server" content="ARMGSCD2" />

which matches arm.com

        <meta name="server" content="ARMBPCM1">

Of course, these can also be fake.

But maybe it's real.

EDIT: It's real:

[https://www.arm.com/-/media/global/company/arm-risc-v- infogr...](https://www.arm.com/-/media/global/company/arm-risc-v- infographic.png?revision=c8e7b9ff-7eee-45b0-aedd-a6ebee15976d%22)

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> "Get the facts"... sounds way to familiar...

</comment><comment><USER45> This is a marketing page with little if any information, how did it get voted up?

<comment><USER39> The information isn't in the text itself, it's in the fact that ARM feels like publishing this is a good idea. They don't publish such nonsensical marketing for competition they consider irrelevant.

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> Let's not forget ARM sold out to Softbank right about when RISC-V was picking up steam (2016). As engineers they probably saw it coming. The bankers not so much.

<comment><USER23> And then they started raising the licensing fees. Man what bad timing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER47> It was a legit website - here's Arm's admission and explanation of intent.

[https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/07/10/arm_riscv_website/](https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/07/10/arm_riscv_website/)

They sure did the RISC-V community a great service over the last 48 hours ....

</comment><comment><USER47> It was a legit website - here's Arm's admission and explanation after they took down the site today:

[https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/07/10/arm_riscv_website/](https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/07/10/arm_riscv_website/)

</comment><comment><USER48> Am I the only one getting a blank page when I run it with an adblocker?

</comment><comment><USER49> An important missing feature: something resembling "Intel Management Engine"

Does ARM have this? Does RISC-V have this?

If Management is good, then someone's Remote Management of your computer must be even gooder!

</comment><comment><USER50> Scary! Scary! Don't go in there - it's SCARY!

But scary for whom? For ARM maybe? Is it just me, or is this pure FUD?

</comment><comment><USER51> Can't tell if parody, legit, or an amateur false flag.

</comment><comment><USER52> These facts seem fairly true, it's a new thing and doesn't have much momentum yet.

I don't think there are that many people yet considering risc V seriously for current commercial implementations, rather than keeping an eye on it for future projects, but I'm sure there will be once momentum builds.

<comment> Iwan-Zotow [https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/12/01/wdc_risc_v_edge_str...](https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/12/01/wdc_risc_v_edge_strategy/)</comment></comment>


As L.A. plays tech disruptor, Uber fights back - <AUTHOR> https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2020/02/los-angeles-transportation-data-mobility-scooter-mds-uber/606178/ <comment><USER2> > L.A. requires operators to send start and stop locations of individual > vehicle trips back to City Hall, within five seconds, in addition to the > routes they traveled within 24 hours

Wow, this is dystopian. I support Uber fighting back on this. It's an egregious privacy violation by the city. I trust Uber with the data a lot more than the city. Let's say you take a scooter to an area where a crime happened and suddenly you're being interviewed as a suspect. No thanks.

<comment><USER3> Is there any indication it contains identifying information? Send the start and end location fuzzed by a few hundred metres and the time and it would be very difficult to deanonymize within an urban environment.

<comment><USER4> A similar release of "anonymized" NYC taxi data from 2013 shows that trip information can be pretty revealing.

[https://gawker.com/the-public-nyc-taxicab-database-that- acci...](https://gawker.com/the-public-nyc-taxicab-database-that-accidentally- track-1646724546)

<comment><USER5> That wasn't anonymized, strictly speaking, it was (badly) hashed/encrypted, and it didn't actually reveal anything, it was pairing the data with photographs of the celebrities (and photos that included the cab license number).

And after all, out of 173 million rides some 5 (five) were "identified".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> As a user of LADOT I think they are failing to do the basics, so I doubt they would put that data to good use.

The DASH routes are fairly short, should be pretty easy to manage it so it is reliable and frequent, but they are far from it. They have a web app showing the locations of all buses (a pretty ugly and inefficient UI btw) and I often see all buses very close to each other, often 4 of them (out of 5 or 6 in the whole line) in just two blocks.

This means that one day I can wait 5 minutes, but others I have waited 30 or even 40 minutes. This is by pure incompetence. I complained several times through the site, never got a response.

<comment><USER7> [http://setosa.io/bus/](http://setosa.io/bus/)

it's harder than it seems, _pure_ incompetence seems a little unfair.

<comment><USER6> I come from São Paulo, a bigger, poorer, and more chaotic city than LA. The bus system there was much more reliable than in LA. And I am talking here about 5 or 6 buses at any given time on a circular route that's probably less than 5 miles total.

Of course, I am reliving my frustration on these times that I have to wait more time at a bus stop than I spend inside the bus, so it is a harsh critique. But I do think it's fair and justified.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Being deeply involved in LA politics the notion of city being proactive about anything came as a shock. After reading the article its Clear: "In particular, critics have pointed to the city's alliance with a secretive venture capital- backed start-up that is building its business on helping cities gather reams of vehicle data. A CityLab probe of that start-up, Lacuna, reveals that it played a significant role in MDS, even though the city devised the project in part to be a check on the power of such technology companies."

</comment><comment><USER9> It's a real shame that cities didn't do this aggressively as a condition of licensing the TNCs; they could've demanded detailed speed and location data, could've put systems in place to _reliably_ and _consistently_ fine the TNCs every time a driver went over the speed limit or stopped in a bike lane. Wasted opportunity.

<comment><USER10> This suggests an interesting tactic to build public support for mass surveillance. Don't do it it secret, but also don't talk about monitoring individual behavior. Instead, make it about regulating the service provider.

"We need all your GMail so we can fine Google for failed deliveries and spam" is a much better story than "We need all your GMail to make sure you're not a terrorist" but of course the effect is the same.

<comment><USER11> They are already heavily using it. See the telecom retroactive immunities, the lawful intercept requirements, and their persistent attempts to draft corporations to break Cryptography. Despite the US being the biggest beneficiary of Cryptography. They are all lazy stupid bastards.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Fascinating. Government and corporations fighting over our private trip data; no one has thought to consult the little people.

<comment><USER13> That's why we elect representatives. Vote them out if you don't like what they do. Also, your more than welcome to let them know how you feel:

[https://bos.lacounty.gov/About-Us/ContactUs](https://bos.lacounty.gov/About- Us/ContactUs)

<comment><USER12> What makes you think I haven't? And one can see how well it's worked.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I still don't understand LA's case for needing the data. How does it intend to use it?

<comment><USER15> "At LADOT, our job is to move people and goods as quickly and safely as possible, but we can only do that if we have a complete picture of what's on our streets and where"

<comment><USER16> "we need this data to move people and goods more quickly and safely" doesn't really seem like an answer to grandparent's question- what are they actually going to do with the data?

<comment><USER17> This is a bit like asking an electrical engineer what they would use a voltmeter for. For measuring voltages. Not a good answer? Well, uhm, do you have some time to spare?

<comment><USER18> > Well, uhm, do you have some time to spare?

Will they answer if we do?

<comment><USER17> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_flow](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_flow)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Is the right direction though? I think it's basically false to imply any organization should need this microdata for any reason.

We need some trend data, surely, and some good regulation as well. But we don't need to monitor and regulate every little microtransaction. This is ultra 'make work'.

</comment><comment><USER20> Rather than requiring users to give them information, the city might improve things by providing real-time information about its traffic. This would enable individual users to make their own decisions as to where and when to travel possibly with help from third-party companies who specialize in providing advice. Google, Apple, and the wireless companies may already have a good- enough version of traffic data because they can track people via their phones.

There is no need for the government, the organization that fixes the roads, provides the police, administers a court system, etc, to also be in charge of traffic management. It can be handled through the market.

</comment><comment><USER21> > This suggests an interesting tactic to build public support for mass > surveillance.

I'm not entirely convinced that mass surveillance by government is worse than mass surveillance by huge private corporations. In democratic societies at least, the public has at least some control over the government. It has virtually none over private entities.

<comment> barry-cotter > In democratic societies at least, the public has at least some control over > the government.

Indeed. That's why the CIA was disbanded after the Snowden revelations, he was hailed as a hero and how he became Governor of DC.

<comment><USER18> Have you considered the public may have some control, they just don't want to use it as you'd like them to?

<comment><USER11> If they don't even consider it when it is harming them because of its emotional impact do they really have control or is it controlling them?

I mean a heroin addict technically has control but it would be delusional to claim the heroin has no power over them and they could easily quit any time they liked.

<comment><USER18> _Is it_ harming them? I mean, I'm opposed to widespread spying on principle, but I couldn't point to an actual harm the americans have suffered due to it yet.

<comment><USER11> That has been the general prevailing wisdom of the idiots and psychopaths in robes but if you strip away the brainwashing commonly referred to as "norms" it becomes clear that is a moronic double standard that I wonder how the hell it has gone so collectively unchallenged.

If you were to personally spy on the entirety of the CIA and keep the data within your basement you would make history and record books with the harm your grand act of treason did or would cause. Hell if you did it to one neighborhood let alone one town you would be widely regarded as a terrifying criminal!

The fact they are government and not one deranged citizen only makes matters far worse not better. They have no legitimacy.

The fact so few see the goddamned obvious because they are so brainwashed is deeply disturbingm</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: A cheap and different option to promote one's product or service - <AUTHOR> https://pivotshopping.com/index.php <comment><AUTHOR> Created to help businesses big and small promote their products for cheap.

Main function is that the site lists 36 random listings and on every "pivot", those 36 listings are changed with 36 new random listings. Making sure no products are "left in the dust"

Currently more than 200k shoppers monthly

Thank you for your time.

</comment><comment><USER2> I kinda like the whole random selection part of it, Good Luck!

</comment><comment><USER3> Not bad actually</comment>


Creating signed and customized backdoored macOS apps by abusing Apple Dev tools - <AUTHOR> https://email@example.com/creating-signed-and-customized-backdoored-macos-applications-by-abusing-apple-developer-tools-b4cbf1a98187 <comment><USER2> I'm not sure what the point is. You can create malicious packages and sign them using your certificate? Like you can host a malicious webpage on a secure server with your certificate?</comment>


Why Are Manhole Covers Round? (on Microsoft brainteaser job interviews) - <AUTHOR> http://www.hachettebookgroupusa.com/authorslounge/articles/2003/april/article16887.html

<comment><USER3> Because they are easier to manufacture than other shapes which will not fall through the hole either: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reuleaux_triangle>

Want to attract nerd tourists ? Build your city with Reuleaux manhole covers in the streets and Penrose tilings on the walkways.

<comment><USER4> Seen in SF: <http://flickr.com/photos/ojbyrne/224171975/> :-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> So you can roll them out of the way more easily. Also - no orientation required. My physics is kind of rusty, but isn't there a strength benefit from the shape as well?

Incidentally, many sewer covers in Australia are square, only the larger ones are round.

Okay, I'm done taking this article literally now. :)

</comment><comment><USER6> Good god, I'm dumber for having read that.

(Why is the cover the same shape as the hole? Because otherwise it's a pretty shitty cover (i.e. gaps are bad))

It's astounding to me that people still care about these artifacts of another era where people fawned over whichever corporate master they sought to please. Good riddance to that, and if PG had never done anything else, he'd still be able to point to that genius ad with "Larry and Sergey won't respect you in the morning" and remain a hero.

<comment><AUTHOR> I couldn't agree more. I think it's an asinine practice that, if it is in fact being discredited, deserves it. I posted this as an example of the brainteaser interview being discussed elsewhere (<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=162672>), and am a little disappointed that most of the comments here are actually about manholes.

Brainteaser interviews are an artifact of the fundamental problem: there's no easy way to identify good programmers, so people come up with these ersatz, dysfunctional substitutes instead. The brainteaser is a seductive one because it's easy to think "programmers are smart so let's test for smartness instead". This confuses a necessary condition with a sufficient one. It also begs the question, since smartness isn't easy to test for either. The concept of "smartness" underlying the brainteaser interview is a shallow one of the party-trick variety. I see no reason to believe that it's correlated with the kind of programmer I'd want to work with on a project. Brain-teasing opaqueness is not a good thing in production code, and real programming problems are not much like riddles.

I also agree with your other point. Interviewers probing a programmer for "smartness", like a horse might have its teeth examined, or better, like a cow might have its udders palpitated - just feels unseemly to me. It's part of a corporate culture that is the modern version of the feudal system. It's the way you'd treat a peasant. The genius of the Larry-and-Sergey ad is that it speaks truthfully about this issue of respect, which is a very deep one, and of course is ultimately all about self-respect. (Look at some of the reactions to PG's lion metaphor to see just how true that is.)

So large organizations have no reliable process for hiring good programmers. As Paul Graham's writings have articulated so clearly, the fact that they have that problem doesn't mean that you do; they need you more than you need them. There's actually a much better test for which programmers add value in the long run: the market itself. Pass that test and you won't have to ask anyone to approve of your "smartness".

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> > "I'm happy to say that we're recommending you for immediate hiring into our > marketing department."

It was worth reading this just for the Feynman anecdote at the end.

<comment><AUTHOR> Too bad the Feynman story is completely made up. It seemed pretty realistic.

I don't get the bit about the marketing department, though. How does cutting through bullshit constitute an immediate qualification for marketing? The story would make more sense if he were hired immediately for the technical job. But that wouldn't be much of a punch line.

Edit: I was going to say that MS would never have interviewed Feynman, they would have hired him immediately. But actually the anecdote is quite good in this respect. Feynman would have insisted on going through the standard hiring process.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> My guess would be that (many, most) manhole covers are round because it is the obvious shape for most lids. There are so many poorly designed urban objects that I tend to believe that the feature of not falling into the hole was a lucky accident.

Think of stop signs, for example. It would be really easy to have a different shape/color for four-way stops, but at least in the US all they do is add "four way" to the sign in an inconsistent way.

<comment><USER9> I think having multiple shapes for stop signs would be a _terrible_ idea. The red octagon is an international standard. Messing with it is just asking for trouble. The "4-way" signs are just an aid to drivers, to indicate what behavior they can expect from other drivers. They're not required, and no replacement for plain old good judgment.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> because manholes are round

<comment><USER11> I think they are round because circular shape is the only shape that cannot fall into itself.

If manholes are square or any other shape... at certain angles the cover could always fall into the hole

<comment><USER12> You can make a cover of any shape you want that won't fall in. It depends on how much the cover overlaps the hole. Even with a round cover, you can't have zero overlap or else the cover would fall in.

Now back to the correct answer, which is because the manholes are round - <USER2> begs the question of why manholes are round. It's probably a matter of equally distributing the sideways forces from the dirt plus a matter of being able to manufacture round tubes more easily than, say, square tubes or hexagonal tubes.

<comment><USER13> Actually, no, a square cover would have to have a much wider flange in order to ensure that it could not fall in . (rotated 45 degrees in relation to the whole and tipped up, a square cover would fall in)

<comment><USER12> Actually, yes, that's exactly what I was getting at. You'd have to make the square cover sqrt(2) times wider than the hole, but you could still prevent it from ever falling in. (Granted, it's not a very efficient solution, though.)

<comment><USER13> Ok, agreed :-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I didn't have a single brain teaser in my msft interviews!

I was almost disappointed because I am usually quite good at them.

<comment><AUTHOR> When was your interview? In another thread, somebody said that msft had mostly given up on this practice.

<comment><USER14> 2006 I believe.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Round ones are easier to screw on ;-)

Short answer: They're not. At least, they're not round everywhere in the world. There are plenty of square and square-like covers in the UK/Ireland, some of which split in half diagonally. Perhaps a better question is why _should_ they be round or what advantages do round covers have?

<comment><USER16> If they weren't round, superheros couldn't use them as frisbees/weapons.

If a car hits them and they bounce and spin, they will still (most likely) settle back into the hole correctly. Even a Reuleaux polygon won't always do that.

There are no points more highly stressed than others. Put an extreme amount of weight on them and the force is evenly distributed around the circumference, rather than overly stressing the corners and bending the cover (on a square lid).

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Manholes have flanges.

Circular and reuleaux triangles aren't the only shapes that won't fall through.

</comment><comment><USER18> So why are round shields better?

<comment><USER16> Corners don't get caught on crap and slashes are deflected tangentially around the circumference rather than cleaving the shield itself.

<comment><USER18> Thanks. Based on some shield images ([http://images.google.com/images?sourceid=mozclient&ie=UT...](http://images.google.com/images?sourceid=mozclient&ie=UTF-8&oe=utf-8&q=shield&um=1)) it looks like there are non-circular shapes which provide at least some of those benefits as well as possibly improved coverage of an elongated object, like a soldier.</comment></comment></comment>


A few thoughts on Swift symbology - <AUTHOR> http://ericasadun.com/2016/01/13/a-few-thoughts-on-swift-symbologygist/ <comment><USER2> > In the following settings, when I type (chicken) in Xcode, OS X > automatically replaces it with . For common, internal API symbols, that's a > trade-off many developers are willing to make.

Am I missing obvious sarcasm here? Do not do this unless your goal is to royally piss people off.</comment>


New York Times website/email back up after two hours due to 'internal issue' - <AUTHOR> http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/new-york-times-website-hour-article-1.1426640

<comment><AUTHOR> Story in the times:

[http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/15/business/media/new-york- ti...](http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/15/business/media/new-york-times-web- site-returns-after-hours-offline.html?hp&_r=0)</comment>


Judges tentatively order Calif. inmates released - <AUTHOR> http://apnews.myway.com/article/20090209/D968C2K05.html <comment><USER2> Better idea: stop throwing people in prison for nonviolent, victimless crimes like possession of marijuana, etc.

Prisons should be used to prevent people from causing further damage to society, not for lack of a better punishment, assuming punishment is even appropriate in the first place.

This concerns me. Even if all the inmates released committed completely harmless crimes, dumping 10,000 people out of a prison and onto the streets is not going to turn out well.</comment>


Nikola: How to Parlay an Ocean of Lies into a Partnership with the Largest Auto - <AUTHOR> https://hindenburgresearch.com/nikola/ <comment><USER2> When I saw the GM news I noted that Nikola brought literally nothing to the partnership except "hype", and that there was no indication that they possessed any technology of their own that wasn't the work of their partners.

I'm deeply skeptical of this company.

<comment><USER3> Trevor Milton can't manage to get through an interview without contradicting himself. Telsa-fan YouTubers have been calling him out for months.</comment></comment>


Remote pairing in the browser and it's open source - <AUTHOR> http://thechangelog.com/remote-pairing-in-the-browser-pssh/

<comment><USER2> I might be a bit biased, but I've found that one of the biggest hurdles in pairing is the setup. I wrote this project to make that process extremely easy for both the client and the server sides.

One of my favorite by-products of this is that it's super easy to disable access for when I don't want people connecting to my machine.</comment>


Drug dealer loses codes for €53.6m Bitcoin accounts - <AUTHOR> https://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/drug-dealer-loses-codes-for-53-6m-bitcoin-accounts-1.4180182 <comment><USER2>
      Garda officers said they were hopeful advances in technology would one day enable them to access the bitcoin so it could be sold.

At which point Bitcoins value would be approximately zero... :-)

</comment><comment><USER3> Well, if the police was asking for the private keys that protected my million- euro stash of drug money... I would have 'lost' them too. In that vein, I wonder if they keep an eye on the wallets, and for how long.

<comment><USER4> If I were in their position, I would sign up for one of those services that alert you when coins move. I run one [1].

I'd then set the alert to go to email@example.com saying "new evidence on case number xxxx". That way even if the current staff retire, it'll be followed up on.

[1]: [https://serverthiefbait.com](https://serverthiefbait.com)

<comment><USER5> The chance that some random service run in the Bitcoin space exists in even a years time is vanishingly small.

Yes, even yours.

<comment><USER6> It is plausible to run a service on a $5 VPS. Pay $120 ahead of time and you have it for two years. I don't know why you think it would be so fragile. It wouldn't be difficult to run locally either.

<comment><USER7> Until it gets owned by an unpatched CVE, anyway.

<comment><USER4> Pretty hard to own a VPS which has no external ports open, even if the software on it is years out of date. In fact, updating software is probably a bigger security risk than not doing so, because you never know when someone manages to package a malicious bit of code into a common debian package.

Also, if it did get owned, I'd just have to spend a few hours rebuilding it - no bitcoin wallets or anything to steal on there.

<comment><USER7> Fair point about updates being a mixed bag. But "no ports open" doesn't always mean safe. Maybe someone can pass some evil bits inside transaction metadata? (Disclaimer: no idea what I'm talking about w/r/t transactions, or how much parsing you're doing)

<comment><USER6> If that were possible it would be exploited on every instance of the insecure software. Luckily what you are saying is far fetched. Why is it that you think a VPS is some fragile thing that is sure to be exploited? There are literally millions of instances chugging away, serving up files. Let's use our best judgement.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Sparing himself from the old '$5 Wrench attack,' I see... well, goes to show you that Bitcoin does in fact work after all: it proves to be capable of averting confiscation, even if it means giving up (perceived?) ownership.

I'd like to believe people who amassed this much wealth in Bitcoin would have backups of backups etc... but I've heard too many goxxing like stories about people losing millions, and other similar exchange exit scams over the years.

</comment><comment><USER9> Is there anything preventing them from brute-forcing the wallets from now until the end of time?

They might get lucky in a millennial or two.

<comment><USER10> I'm sure IBM has a Quantum Watson for this.

<comment><USER11> ........

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Imagine how many lives were destroyed with drugs worth €53.6m.

<comment><USER13> Oh no, anything but the devil's lettuce. Wont somebody think of the children!

<comment><USER14> Don't make light of cannabis, it is a drug and like all drugs has side effects. Even moderate use can seriously retard and arrest brain development in teenagers and it can accelerate the onset of schizophrenia in those who are at risk. It's also been associated with lack of motivation, focus, bipolar disorder, depression, and anxiety among a host of other issues later in life.

Fully grown adults should be able to choose to do what they want but people who peddle drugs to children deserve nothing short of the death penalty.</comment></comment></comment>