Protecting My Copyright - <AUTHOR> http://www.baldheretic.com/2012/05/23/protecting-my-copyright

<comment><USER2> What I learned from this story: Godaddy will take down your site, without contacting you first, because they get a copyright infringement claim from some random dude on the internet.

<comment><USER3> What I learned from reading her blog post (<http://chicksandpolitics.com/jayleecheapshots/>) -- Candice Schwager is batsh*t insane!!!

<comment><USER3> This has been posted to Slashdot too ([http://yro.slashdot.org/story/12/05/25/1744246/photographer-...](http://yro.slashdot.org/story/12/05/25/1744246/photographer- threatened-with-legal-action-after-asserting-his-copyright)) ... Candice, welcome to the Streisand effect!!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> As other people have said, the real story here is how badly GoDaddy handles DMCA requests. Taking down a site for a single image is like using a bazooka on an ant. Yes it will stop the infringement, however it will probably damage some surrounding property. While that does not necessarily excuse the personal attacks the woman in the story may have made I think it offers perspective for all website operators. "Horror" stories of people sites being taken down (much like her's) have been on HN in the past with great sympathy shown and in this case I _do_ feel sympathetic towards her cause (despite her reaction). I guess the lesson is talk to your registrar and hosting providers about their DCMA process before it bites you.

<comment><USER5> What should GoDaddy be doing instead? If they want the safe harbor protection from the DMCA so that they're not liable for the infringement, they are required to remove the content. There need be no direct mapping between the website URL reported in the complaint and any specific file they can identify on a server's file system; it might be dynamically generated, served by a CMS doing URL rewriting, coming from a database, etc.

So their choices are:

1) Invade your privacy, directly access your private source code and databases, and deduce how to remove the content, potentially destroying your data in the process over what might be a false claim... all of which is completely non-scalable to the millions of customers they have.

2) Edit their web server configuration to not serve that URL, and reboot the service, hundreds of times a day while this server is handling requests for thousands of websites.

3) Click the suspend site button and your site goes back online as fast as you can remove the infringing work, or file a counter-notice.

<comment><USER6> As low as my opinions of GoDaddy have fallen, the more I think about it, the more I think that Candice was probably trying to cut costs and inadvertently tied GoDaddy's arms behind its back.

The GoDaddy "Deluxe 4GH" plan costs $6/month and could easily hold 14 web sites, and one feature they offer at this stage is "Multiple Web Sites: Unlimited".

At first it sounded like GoDaddy had simply rerouted _all of her domain names_ to null addresses, when they could have just rerouted one of them. But no, they were _providing the hosting service_. If she put fourteen businesses on one account to amortise the cost among them, then she is responsible for linking them together, not GoDaddy. Presumably GoDaddy would have just shut down _one_ hosting account -- the one that held the infringing content -- but the problem is that she only _had_ the one hosting account.

This is why I try to keep abstraction layers. The people I research with don't hang out with my Ultimate (as in frisbee) friends or my web development colleagues; the Ultimate folks are the only ones I'm letting friend me on Facebook, and I make it a point not to preach my religion to any of the above.

Spolsky is correct that all abstraction layers are leaky, and these are too -- my professor has met my father for example, and the folks at work know that I say something quietly before lunch every day -- but there is a great value in compartmentalising. Robert Frost's neighbour confidently asserts, "good fences make good neighbours" -- I guess it's more that good neighbours respect the fences and use them to lower your own mental stress and drama.

Candice could have used a good fence between her charity and her infringing account.

<comment><USER7> > Candice could have used a good fence between her charity and her infringing > account.

Agreed, but GoDaddy could have also taken option 2) from dangrossman's post above, which happens all the time with "live" servers anyway, every time people change their own configurations through the web "control panel" for their hosting provider. For the kind of plan it looks like she had, her URLs were most likely being served by the same Apache instance as the URLs for dozens of other customers; so any time _any_ customer changes their setup, the "web server" has to reconfigure itself. That's why servers like Apache do that on the fly, without requiring a restart.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> To be clear, I took no joy in shutting her site down. GoDaddy is a bit heavy handed in their response and I have learned a lesson here. The main point is that she used the image without permission and her site went down because of it. To turn around and accuse me of being a part of a diabolical conspiracy was out of left field. She should have contacted GoDaddy and worked it out. I did my part by rescinding my DMCA when I realized the impact it was having and offered her my willingness to resolve this one on one.

<comment><USER9> She's still using the image on the business' Facebook page. Are you going to tackle that one too or is the burn not worth it at this point?

<comment><USER10> I wonder whether DMCA stuff is applicable for Facebook also and if anyone had real experience in that?

<comment><USER9> It is and it was mentioned in the article we're discussing.

"Facebook, for example, would remove the image in a matter of hours."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Yeah, people like that exist. I've run into a few that blew up exactly like this, throwing everything they can at me in an endless tirade of e-mails for days, including the nonsense legal threats, and "think of the children" guilt tripping.

It takes very little to set them off -- something as simple as a declined credit card for an advertising purchase has led to multiple accusations of "denying my child food in violation of federal child protection laws". One guy CC'd every e-mail to every United States senator and the FBI.

I just send a polite reply and try to ignore the follow-ups... communicating after there's nothing more to say on the real issue just spurs them on.

<comment><USER11> I'm no mental health professional, but I play one on the internet – and that woman sounds like a straight up example of borderline personality disorder with a dash of narcism thrown in.

It's awesome how the internet shortens the distance between you and crazy – reach out and touch someone, indeed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I've just been reading "Against Intellectual Monopoly" and it's interesting how things change when you mentally substitute "protecting my copyright" with "exercising my monopoly". It completely changes the dynamic of who is acting and who is reacting.

<comment><USER13> While those terms are interchangeable, I don't think they are equivalent. The OP doesn't have a monopoly over the Houston skyline, and anyone is welcome to set up a camera in the same spot and take an identical photo and use it for their website.

Is this the link to the book mentioned? <http://www.dklevine.com/general/intellectual/against.htm>

<comment><USER12> He's not got a monopoly on all pictures like that but he has a monopoly right on that particular image he took, lasting for 70 years beyond the date of his death, or else he wouldn't be able to send out DMCA takedowns for it and otherwise control the manner in which it is duplicated and used.

(I just googled to check the length and found this heartbreaking message on one of those cheesy Q&A sites: _My grandmother has a senior picture of my mom from 1969 and I wanted a copy of it. Is the copyright for that picture up? If not is there a way for me to get a copy of it?_ )

And that is the book, though note it's a slightly out of date version. The final version is here:

[http://www.dklevine.com/general/intellectual/againstfinal.ht...](http://www.dklevine.com/general/intellectual/againstfinal.htm)

It's not a great work by any means, but it's a good overview of the craziness of copyrights and patents when viewed from the perpective of economics.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I wonder... Does the original website from which the photo was taken had: 1\. A statement that the photo was not public domain? 2\. A way to contact the author with the clear purpose of license it?

I can understand that someone might react against seeing their work all over the Internet used for free, and use the DMCA to prevent that. I can also understand a generous reaction, and feeling flatter instead.

While I don't agree with Ms. Borderline, I do think that if I am going to react handing take down notices, providing a way to buy the image up front it is a fair preventive measure.

After all, the internet is like a world wide getto street, and it would be naive to leave my precious jacket out night after night and be surpriced that someone finally run away with it. Attaching a price sign to it at least, and some people might respect it, while others will actually consider buying it as initial offer as oppose to a legal threat.

<comment><USER15> "I wonder... Does the original website from which the photo was taken had: 1. A statement that the photo was not public domain? 2. A way to contact the author with the clear purpose of license it?"

It doesn't work that way.

Just like you don't need to put a sign on your door saying "The belongings in this house belong to me. If you want to buy them call me on 5555-1234".

The _default_ is that if you dont own a photograph(/song/story/program/movie), then somebody else does - and unless they've explicitly permitted you some rights to use it, you have _no_ right to use it. (with some very specific "fair use" exceptions, which are far less well understood by just about everybody than they should be. If you're ever tempted to claim "fair use", make sure you know what it means first…)

<comment><USER14> In theory there is no difference betweem theory and practice, but in practice there is.

I agree that in default should works the way you say, but that is theory, in practice it is not what actually happens a the OP found out. And we need to acknowledge the reality that people does not behave as theory, law, or whatever other abstract term expects (the law is so abstract that it needs a punishment machinery to be respected, it is not natural at all, and while some people will surrender their free will to goverment compliance, others will not, not even under the threat of heavy legal pain). Not realising this fact of life is naive.

You can go around beating people over their head for their wrong doings (natural or artificial), and if that makes you feel better about yourself or your position then take your measuring stick and go on your merry way.

I, on the other camp, rather attempt to figure out how people actually works, and make decisions accordingly.

Try to understand how things work vs. Do a I say or I'll beat you up. I guess that is one of the differences between tinkers and lawyers.

One book that explain tis concept better than me would be Nudge by Sunstein and Thaler.

<comment><USER16> It may be hard to reach you way up on your high horse there, but I don't think a "these photos are mine, all mine" disclaimer would have done a ton for him.

Take Candice as an example. She's crazier than a bucket of ferrets on meth. Even normal users don't read much of the text on websites; look at any of Jakob Nielsen's eye-tracking studies. People who are task-focused (e.g., find an image for their site they're rushing to get up) read even less. Given that, how much do you think Candice will read?

And once it's on another site, people will start stealing it from there too. _Coughpinterestcough_.

So as someone who _also_ tries to look at how things work, I don't think he did anything wrong here. Suddenly everybody's a publisher, and it's going to take a while to teach them about copyright. This is part of the education process.

<comment><USER14> Is not a matter of high or low horses, but a matter of choices.

"She's crazier than a bucket of ferrets on meth"... love it.

"how much do you think Candice will read?" A bucket of ferrets on meth... none. But that was not the only place the he found the photo.

"and it's going to take a while to teach them about copyright. This is part of the education process."... teaching, that is something that I can agree with. On the other side, in principle I cannot agree with Goya's picture "La letra con sangre entra" (Teaching by punishment, or spare the rod and spoil the child) [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:La_letra_con_sangre_e...](http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:La_letra_con_sangre_entra.jpg?uselang=en)

If I am in a high horse, then then that kind of "teaching" is egocentric and self entitlement.

<comment><USER16> What disappoints me about your argument here is that you're basically complaining that other people aren't doing things the way you'd like them to be done.

You mention egocentricism, but don't seem to realize that _he_ is under no particular obligation to live up to _your_ standards. Reasonable people can disagree on how to handle this. He apparently disagrees with you, possibly as a matter of morals, but more likely as a question of how best to solve a problem with limited resources.

If you really care about this problem, solve it yourself. Go make something that makes it easier for somebody like this to act the way you want than the way that's easy for them. Until then, you're just one more person telling the Little Red Hen how she should bake her bread.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Wow. That is quite a story.

I hope he doesn't actually file suit against her. Partly because she's so obviously nuts that I'd feel a little bad. And partly because it's a bad idea to get involved in a court case with a crazy person. You may win in the end, but your lawyer can rack up some big bills keeping up with a manic loon.

<comment><USER17> Worse if the crazy person is themselves an attorney. She can just file crazy motions all day long and it won't cost her anything.

I think GoDaddy is to blame in this. Taking multiple sites down for one DMCA take down request. And the blogger too seems too happy about taking sites down as he does. He should work harder (at least for GoDaddy sites) to contact the sites directly and get a license fee.

Diplomacy before nuclear war.

<comment><USER18> The state bar association will make quick work of her. Real pro lawyers hire other impartial lawyers to represent them in lawsuits.

<comment><USER19> Impartial lawyers? How can you be impartial if you're representing your client?

<comment><USER20> I assume he means 3rd party/independent lawyers (i.e. not yourself).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Is she a lawyer? She claims to be a lawyer. In the UK it is not legal to claim to be a solicitor if you are not one. Isn't it the same in the US?

<comment><USER22> It is very much illegal to impersonate a lawyer. Being a member of the bar means state regulation, and it is very much an institution.

<comment><USER23> But on the other hand, that's likely only ever applied in instances where a person offersactual legal services to others without being admitted to the bar.

Having worked service jobs in the past, I know that the population of the area where I worked was at least 70% lawyers, judging by the number of people who'd threaten to sue me/the business/the owners/unrelated parties when they didn't get what they wanted.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> > The most interesting actions come from GoDaddy. If you file a complaint with > GoDaddy and they find your complaint has merit, they will completely disable > the site until the matter is resolved.

What happens if I forget about the issue and never tell GoDaddy the matter is resolved? Is the site permanently down?

<comment><USER24> I'm no expert but I think the owner of the site in question can file a counter-notice and then GoDaddy has to put the site back up.

<comment><USER9> A counter notice would imply some kind of dispute, in which case the matter is definitely not resolved, possibly headed for the courtroom.

It does seem rather heavy for Godaddy to disable the entire site, instead of just the infringing content.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> This is ridiculous, and I don't mean the response of that site owner. While yes, that woman is at least slightly nuts, the problem in the first place was "oh the horror, people are using my image, let's throw around DMCA takedowns". Yes, it's not nice to not give attribution, but I don't see a fundamental problem here. What was the loss involved? Nothing. People liked the image, so they used it. Where's there any theft? Nobody stole anything. Just another example of why the DMCA is a very bad law and needs to go away. Ideally along with copyright as a whole.

<comment><USER26> I can understand where you're coming from, but I think you lack empathy and experience. If you like, send me a copy of every piece of creative work you've ever produced -- songs, poems, articles, computer programs, graphics, whatever -- and I'll just go ahead and post it wherever I want without giving you any attribution. If you can tell me you're OK with that, I'll modify my opinion: rather than saying you lack empathy, I'll say you have a very different worldview than anyone I know, and I'll acknowledge that, under your worldview, your opinion is entirely consistent and reasonable.

<comment><USER25> _> I'll just go ahead and post it wherever I want without giving you any attribution_

Actually, I use the WTFPL[1] for a lot of code I produce, so yes, you could do that, though it wouldn't be nice to do that.

My opinion is that copyright should not exist. While I can't demand copies from anyone, I don't think anyone has a right to stop me from sharing anything that I have access to, either. Putting things on the internet counts as giving me access. I simply reject the notion that people should be able to control the distribution of digital data. It's both illogical to assert ownership of something abstract and harmful to society at large.

On the other hand, I think people should be credited for their work (if they want). But that's a social issue and not one that can be solved by laws. Look at the scientific community: plagiarism is _highly_ frowned upon and proper attribution is required. And that's mostly by social pressure, not by laws.

So in short, my believe is "Give credit where credit is due, but don't try to tell others what they can or can't do.".

[1]: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WTFPL>

<comment><USER26> OK, I can see that your worldview differs from mine, but I can't reconcile the last part of your first sentence ("... though it wouldn't be nice to do that") with the rest of your comment. If copyright -- by which I mean the right to copy, not necessarily any laws pertaining to that right -- did not exist, there would be no justification in saying it "wouldn't be nice" to ignore it. It's like: if I didn't like redheads, and I said I didn't want to see any out my window, but I acknowledged that there is and should be no law restricting them, then clearly I'm being unreasonable somewhere along the line.

<comment><USER25> You're misunderstanding the "it's not nice" part. For example, it's not against the law to be (somewhat) rude, either - but it's not nice. As I pointed out, the whole attribution thing is something that needs to be addressed on a social level, not enforced by law.

And in general, I don't think it's an unreasonable world-view to dislike something, but be against regulating it. For example, I'm vehemently against right-wing ideology and fascism, but I still would not want laws restricting nazis to voice their misguided opinions, because everybody is entitled to free speech. That's not being unreasonable, that's being consistent.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> All she had to do was take down the image, it's not like it was beneficial to her charitable business to have the image on the site in the first place. Being someone that gives out legal advice, you'd think she would know better. Glad it worked out in the end, sheesh I would be way less patient if I had to go through this hassle just to get an image removed.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading, great story.

</comment><comment><USER7> I've seen other indications that GoDaddy is a bit heavy-handed, to put it mildly, in responding to DMCA takedown notices. This confirms it. Assuming that the notice was worded properly, they should only have taken down the one specific site that infringed, not _all_ the sites belonging to the same person.

<comment><AUTHOR> Apparently many of her sites used that specific photo. Hell, her business page on Facebook still uses it as its cover photo. [https://www.facebook.com/pages/Schwager-Consulting- Marketing...](https://www.facebook.com/pages/Schwager-Consulting- Marketing/345405795498111)

<comment><USER7> > Apparently many of her sites used that specific photo.

Ah, didn't catch that.

<comment><AUTHOR> A lot of people fail to understand what's legally protected by fair use.

<comment><USER7> Are you implying that the use in question was fair use (i.e., that the OP should not have sent the DMCA takedown notice for this use)?

<comment><USER28> No, she claims she is covered under fair use because she doesn't make any money from it, blah blah blah.

<comment><USER29> Actually, there _have_ been fair use decisions when an entire work was used non-commercially:

<http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/06/fair-use-defense/>

I'm not saying that's the case here, but whether the use was commercial or not is one of the four factors considered when deciding fair use.

<comment><USER7> I don't think "commercial" requires you to "make money" from the use. I think using the photo as an illustration on your business website qualifies as "commercial" even if you can't show that it brought you any business. (Of course, IANAL.)

<comment><USER29> There are different degrees "commercial." It's not a binary distinction.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> What is not explain in the post is how do we prove to be the author of a photo ?

</comment><comment><USER31> Is it possible to own the copyright of a photograph of a city? You own none of the buildings in the photo.

<comment><USER32> People are copyrighting the composition of the photograph, not necessarily the subject of it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> Copyright infringement isn't theft you huge douche.

<comment><USER26> Agreed - and I usually don't agree with people who express strong opinions regarding copyright in internet fora. But just because it's not theft doesn't mean it's not wrong. The accusation is hyperbole, not error.</comment></comment>


How Your Cat Is Making You Crazy - Parasites - <AUTHOR> http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/03/how-your-cat-is-making-you-crazy/8873/1/?single_page=true

<comment><USER2> Previous submission (not the only previous submission) with 76 comments as of when I type this:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3573694>

Submitting the canonical URL

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3571353>

helps avoid duplicate submissions.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks. I thought this was the canonical single page URL.</comment></comment>


Ravens Are Evolving and Not in the Way You'd Expect - <AUTHOR> https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2018/03/ravens-animals-evolution-species/ <comment><AUTHOR> Decided to share because this is the first time I've seen evolution discussed as a process of branching and merging!</comment>


18 Things Everyone Should Start Making Time For Again - <AUTHOR> http://thoughtcatalog.com/brianna-wiest/2013/11/18-things-everyone-should-start-making-time-for-again/ <comment><USER2> \- Nice read. I definitely feel people need to make more time and spend more time with their kids.</comment>


Interactive Queries in Apache Kafka Streams - <AUTHOR> https://blog.codecentric.de/en/2017/03/interactive-queries-in-apache-kafka-streams/ <comment><USER2> Esper[1] was the go-to solution for these problems, in the last generation - the reason there are alternatives is primarily because that was GPLv2.

And even from the same stable as Kafka, there's Samza[2]

[1] - [http://www.espertech.com/esper/](http://www.espertech.com/esper/) [2] - [https://speakerdeck.com/ept/turning-the-database-inside- out-...](https://speakerdeck.com/ept/turning-the-database-inside-out-with- apache-samza)

</comment><comment><USER3> I've been eyeing Kafka for a long time now - tried to set it up on a smaller DO box and had memory issues. Is it worth using this for smaller operations (<100k requests per day)? The stream processing seems extremely useful for my use case. Is there something else that may be a better fit?

<comment><USER4> If they're evenly distributed, 100K requests per day are barely 1/sec. It's peak throughput for which you should be planning. At 1/sec you can use just about anything.

That aside, if you're not sure if you should be using it I'm going to guess the answer is, "No you shouldn't". It's very cool tech but most likely overkill for whatever you're doing. Also, until recently securing it was a particular pain due to lack of TLS and authentication (I think this may have been resolved now).

<comment><USER3> All right, that makes sense. It is likely that we'll see a peak in the 10s of thousands at a time, if that. Probably more as we move into the future.

I want to avoid deploying a piece of software now that we'll need to swap out in a year since it does not provide what we need anymore, though I suppose that is a natural part of scaling.

What would you recommend as an alternative to Kafka that does adequate real- time processing? The real-time-ness of it is important for our use-case. Maybe even some kind of time-series database system could work.

<comment><AUTHOR> If you really need "real-time-ness" TSDB will probably not work. You could go with sparkstreaming or flink but for that amount that will be overkill. Kafka scales quite nicely and is relativly easy to operate (compared to spark etc). But thats only if you really need to scale, for your current usage even kafka is a bit overkill.

<comment><USER3> All right, thank you. I'll look into the other options you mentioned

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Have anyone using the C version in librdKafka and how was your experience? [https://github.com/edenhill/librdkafka](https://github.com/edenhill/librdkafka)

<comment><USER6> Confluent relies on it for their non-Java clients (Python, Go, .Net at least).

<comment><USER7> Confluent also provide commercial support for it and employ Magnus who developed it.

I've been working closely with librdkafka for a few months now and find it fast and reliable. Many companies rely on it in production. In addition to the Confluent clients, Blizzard has also developed a client that wraps librdkafka for nodejs (which they use in production).

Disclaimer: I work at Confluent.</comment></comment></comment>


New Aluminum-Air Battery Powered Car Travels 1,800 Kilometers Without a Recharge - <AUTHOR> http://www.21stcentech.com/aluminum-air-battery-powered-car-travels-1800-kilometers-recharge/ <comment><USER2> Previous thread: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7847829](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7847829)

This is not a very green technology. It is _not_ the same as recycling aluminum. The aluminum is turned back into alumina by the reaction. "Recharging" this "battery" (it's more of a fuel cell) means shipping a 220lb module back to a far-away aluminum smelter and reforging it anew.

Forging aluminum is a _hugely_ energy intensive process that produces significant greenhouse gases. It's a cheat to say the smelters use hydropower -- if this were to scale up to power the automotive industry it would require more dams which have major ecological impact. Plus there's still the greenhouse gas emission and transport problem.

<comment><USER3> This still has the potential to be quite green, despite CO2 in the manufacturing process. When combined with a Li-ion pack for regular journeys, the average driver isn't going to be using the Al-O2 battery very much.

Our current solutions to range issues are packaging a shit-ton of li-ion capacity (model s), or including a separate engine (volt). These both add enormous weight and manufacturing costs to the car. The much higher energy density of this solution means that you carry a lot less weight with you during most of your journeys.

Let's say that these guys' estimates hold up, and the average driver does < 2000 miles in long distance journeys out of a total of, say, 12000 miles per year. How much difference in total energy consumption will shaving 200kg (lose 300kg for 2/3rds of the tesla's battery pack, gain 100kg for the new al-o2 pack) off the weight of the car make?

edit: I realise this is rather hand-wavy, considering the 1800 mile range for this system is based off a smaller car than the model s, but I still think it's worth considering the difference in overall energy consumption that the higher energy density of this pack provides.

<comment><USER4> > 1800 mile range for this system

It is 1800KM, which is closer to 1000 than 2000 miles. At 12000 miles a year that is about a battery a month rather than a battery every other month.

<comment><USER3> They're claiming that it has a max range of 1860 miles for a 100kg battery system:

> The Phinergy aluminum-air battery at 100 kilograms (220 pounds) weight > contained enough on board energy to allow the vehicle to travel up to 3,000 > kilometers (over 1,860 miles)

The article does seem slightly unclear on that point, though.

Again, if you have normal driving patterns this Al-O2 system is a backup battery. You'd be using a smaller li-ion battery for the day-to-day drives. That means a normal user wouldn't need a new Al-O2 battery every month, because they'd only rarely be using it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Phinergy claims an energy density of 8kWh/kg here:

[http://www.phinergy.com/default.asp?catid={00658B18-2755-468...](http://www.phinergy.com/default.asp?catid={00658B18-2755-468E-92CB-E66021BB4D4C})

The following ComputerWorld article is related, but it's worse than the linked article that nkurz submitted.

[http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9248966/Electric_car_...](http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9248966/Electric_car_battery_tech_lets_you_go_1_000_miles_between_charges)

EDIT: The two Alcoa press releases are below, but they don't add much:

[http://www.alcoa.com/canada/en/news/releases/2014_phinergy.a...](http://www.alcoa.com/canada/en/news/releases/2014_phinergy.asp)

[http://www.alcoa.com/car_truck/en/news/releases/2014_02_05_A...](http://www.alcoa.com/car_truck/en/news/releases/2014_02_05_Alcoa_and_Phinergy_to_Develop_and_Commercialize_Batteries.asp)

<comment><USER6> 8kWh is around 28 MJ which places it several orders of magnitude above the currently available battery technology according to Wikipedia: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_density](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_density)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> As I understand it, these types of batteries are not rechargeable. They would need to be taken back to a factory and be recycled.

I'd like to know how energy efficient the recycling stage would be. I've not seen that information anywhere so far.

<comment><USER8> Recycling is not desirable unless the battery casing is valuable. The alumina is nearly worthless, especially in small chunks (and to an aluminum plant 200kg is tiny).

Instead I'd like to see some continuous process, granulated aluminum perhaps, and the alumina simply ejected as granules. Its present everywhere already, so not an un-green thing to do.

<comment><USER9> You mean the alumina ejection will be a manual procedure performed by the car's owner or mechanic, right? When I first read this I pictured a spray of dust out the tailpipe. I'm sure there would be complaints...

<comment><USER8> Yes I meant exactly that. Its one of the least objectionable things a car could spray (dribble?) out the tailpipe.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> There are two big questions here:

1) What's the cost per mile (over the car's lifetime, including battery replacement costs) compared to petrol and standard electric cars?

2) What's the CO2 per mile (over the car's lifetime, including battery re- smelting) compared to petrol and standard electric cars?

Without knowing either of these figures it's impossible to make a decent comparison.

</comment><comment><USER11> Just thinking of different use case here, this would make great alternate for home inverter (India) for me if the size is like small fridge. Please note currently i use small UPS for home computer and battery fan to cope up with 3 to 4 times a day power cut and it work fine. But once month if get 10 to 12 times power cut then there is no time for UPS to catch up. I will wait for it to make to developing countries. I hope the safety requirements are similar to current UPS/Inverter batteries

</comment><comment><USER12> >>For the air-battery operator it will mean swapping out the old battery for a new one every few months

I don't know how much the author of this article drives, but 1800km range would mean that I would have to swap the battery every month. And I imagine that the range depends heavily on how you drive, so I would like to see real- world usage test.

<comment><USER13> "The recharge of the aluminum-air [battery] is user-friendly and consists of refilling water and replacing aluminum when depleted," a spokesperson for Alcoa said in an email response to Computerworld. "The water refill is an easy task that can be performed by using tap water  on average every one or two months according to mileage driven.

The battery's aluminum replacement is also a "quick operation" that will be performed at periodic maintenance checks at a local service station  on average once a year according to mileage driven, the spokesperson added"[1]

[1] [http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9248966/Electric_car_...](http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9248966/Electric_car_battery_tech_lets_you_go_1_000_miles_between_charges)

<comment><USER14> You can't just dispose the old water into the sewer because it has a lot of aluminum salts. You must store it and send it back for recycling. Probably this task should be done in a gas station or a car repair shop and not at your home, so they have the tanks for the old liquids.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> While overall benefits of using them in EVs are speculative, it might be a good idea to use them in robotics applications. If a 100kg battery can power a EV through 1000 miles it might power a simple robot for years - like a powercell in terminator movies :)

</comment><comment><USER16> One problem is that these battery swap stations need to be almost as ubiquitous as gas stations (at least along highway routes) to be convenient, otherwise it'll take very careful planning on road trips. But because swap- outs are the rare exception rather than the norm, they don't benefit from scale, so it's unlikely they'll be ubiquitous unless there's a cheap way to automate it.

</comment><comment><USER17> Haters Gonna Hate: this is developed in Israel.

</comment><comment><USER18> ok, Aluminum industry has come up with new aluminum battery. Of course, they couldn't invent any other battery type, even if the alluminum one is an environmental disaster, non-rechargeable, troublesome to use and replace, because they _are_ alluminum industry and they aren't interested in anything that's not alluminum.</comment>


All-Female Crew Conducted First Space Walk of 2020 - <AUTHOR> http://alugy.com/news/all-female-crew-conducted-first-space-walk-of-2020/ <comment><USER2> What a momentous achievement of finding so many qualified females!</comment>


José Mourinho's Body Language Analysed by Professor Geoff Beattie - <AUTHOR> http://m.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/34672094 <comment><USER2> A very depressed Chelsea fan here. I can't even watch us play anymore. I just hope we don't get relegated. I am on the east coast in the U.S and it sucks to wake up early to watch and get hammered.</comment>


VeritasDB: High Throughput Key-Value Store with Integrity - <AUTHOR> https://eprint.iacr.org/2018/251 <comment><USER2> Google's featured search results for Intel SGX are all about Spectre-like attacks against it in the last week or so. None of them seems to have gotten traction here on HN yet.

<comment><USER3> Disclaimer: I am an author of this paper. One thing to note is that Spectre and related side channel attacks violate confidentiality guarantees of SGX, whereas VeritasDB relies on SGX's integrity guarantees.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This paper seems to be coming from Visa Research. However the database name seems to contain name of a company in a similar(fs/db/distributed) area.

<comment><USER5> Veritas - formerly Symantec. Makers of Norton Antivirus. Your missed out a key industry in your suggestion viz Network Security.

Veritas is right in front of my workplace.

May I ask what's FS?

<comment><USER6> File system.</comment></comment></comment>


Ultrafast Motion-Planning Chip Could Make Autonomous Cars Safer - <AUTHOR> https://spectrum.ieee.org/cars-that-think/transportation/self-driving/realtime-robotics-motion-planning-chip-autonomous-cars <comment><USER2> \- While most autonomous cars rely on motion-planning systems running at a rate of between 3 Hz and 10 Hz, Realtime Robotics' system runs at 1,000 Hz, going through a massive data lattice of possible trajectories in parallel.

Motion planning is important for sure. However, the bottleneck for autonomous cars is perception. How do you detect the outside world reliably in real time is way harder than motion planning.</comment>


Tagtile is Joining Facebook - <AUTHOR> http://tagtile.com/so-that-happened.php

<comment><USER2> Facebook on a shopping spree!</comment>


Web users skeptical about paying for content - <AUTHOR> http://www.cnn.com/2009/BUSINESS/05/08/web.content/index.html <comment><USER2> "As long as there is internet, there will be free content. And as long as there is free content, sites trying to grow on a paid-content business model are not going to survive. It is as simple as that," said Syeed Ali.

That's like saying that as long as there is drinkable water available from taps, wine-makers won't make any profit charging for wine. (We won't even mention Desani water... )</comment>


HP Slate Officially Launches for $799 - <AUTHOR> http://mashable.com/2010/10/22/hp-slate-official/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Mashable+%28Mashable%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher

<comment><USER2> Fantastic. A touch-screen with small buttons, stock Windows 7. Ships with IE8. $200-$300 more than an iPad: you could buy a netbook _and_ an iPad for the same price.

WTF? Total shit. Who wants Windows 7 on a tablet?

<comment><USER3> I'm a heavy user of Captivate and Camtasia and I teach math. I need digital ink for my classes. It allows me to markup graphs and all other documents. I would be a user of this tablet. I think the greatest shortcoming of the iPad is the lack of digital ink and native pen support. Also, screen recording apps.

From the promo videos it seems that this device is targeting vertical markets.

<comment><USER4> > I would be a user of this tablet. I think the greatest shortcoming of the > iPad is the lack of digital ink and native pen support.

My wife agree's. She's also a teacher of math and physics and she was excited to get an iPad until she found out she couldn't use a stylus to mark with.

if this tablet fulfills that need then this may be the tablet for her.

<comment><USER5> There are some very nice feeling styluses (and some that aren't nice feeling at all, too) that work on iPad - this one from Griffin is by far my favorite from the ones I've tried. <http://www.griffintechnology.com/products/stylus>

<comment><USER4> I didn't know this, thank you:)

The use case my wife has is she wants to mark math homework, similarly to how you would mark it on paper, ie arbitrary pen input anywhere.

Does the iPad allow for this? or is there any app that does this?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> You gotta love the slide out licensing tab: <http://www.engadget.com/photos/hp-slate-hands-on/#3494156>

</comment><comment><USER7> Can't see this doing well:

\- Uncompetitive price.

\- No 3G.

\- Odd quilted effect on rear. Nobody's going to buy it _because_ of that, and it will only look tacky in the long run.

\- Distracting HP logo at the edge of the screen, looks bad when held vertically.

From the video linked to by BigZaphod, a lot of it is a guy working on a spreadsheet or presentation everywhere he goes. It's not exactly an inspiring scenario - there have even been cases of people choosing holiday locations for their lack of BlackBerry reception.

[http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/lawyers_wrestle_with_...](http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/lawyers_wrestle_with_the_constant_pull_of_24_7_technology/)

</comment><comment><USER8> I can predict the market response: "meh".

EDIT: I figured I should add that I have looked at the large touchscreen PCs as sold in Best Buy, etc. and while the concept looks very intriguing, playing around with them for even a few minutes shows why they would be frustrating in practice.

The UI requires too much precision - for instance, to close an application you have to stab precisely on the X in the upper right corner - there should be a modification that is either more forgiving or the X should be larger, etc.

Further, higher resolution (which should be nicer) is just as bad if not worse - as the need for precision increases.

Lastly, the focus by the big manufacturers still seems to be "stack em deep and sell em cheap" - leaving little $$$ or motivation to improve the UI to a level as good as an iPad.

I think that NotionInk.com is on to something, though when shipping product will arrive, I don't know.

</comment><comment><USER9> I remember some time ago seeing a Youtube video of a leaked testing version of the Slate. The reviewer flipped it over and pointed out the hardware ctrl+alt+del button on the side. Everybody thought the video and device were fakes or a prank, because who in their right mind would include a hardware ctrl+alt+del button? But now I see according to this Wired article that it is indeed for real: [http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/10/hp-slate- official-800...](http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/10/hp-slate- official-800-business-netbook-without-keyboard/)

The article mentions the button though I can't see the button myself in the pics. Way to go, HP!

<comment><USER10> I think it's the button to the left of the home button in this : <http://www.engadget.com/photos/hp-slate-hands-on/#3494151>

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Here's one of their promo videos: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xX-B2wG1e4&feature=playe...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xX-B2wG1e4&feature=player_embedded)

<comment><USER2> That video makes it look even worse. Don't they realize that people can type faster than they can write with a pen? It took that guy a long time to pull out the pen, write "Rear Light" and put the pen back. Should have been <2 seconds with a touch keyboard.

<comment><USER12> Evidently you've never tried to write something like "Rear Light" one-handed on the iPad keyboard. Or, you don't have ogre fingers like I do.

More seriously, the pen is pretty fantastic for things like reviewing papers. Having used tablet PCs for years and now having used an iPad for a while, I can say it takes significantly longer to annotate PDFs via iAnnotate or goodreader and either my finger or the iPad keyboard than it did with Acrobat and the pen+tablet pc input panel.

<comment><USER11> I just tried typing "Rear light" on my iPad with one finger of my right hand while holding the pad itself with my left hand. It took about 2 seconds. On my iPhone, with only my left hand holding it and using my left thumb to type leaving my right hand doing nothing, I can bang that phrase out in about... 2 seconds. In the promo video, it took the guy just about 5 seconds with the pen.

Not that this matters a whole lot - just adding my own data points to the discussion. :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Cool, so it's got a 1.8 gigahertz processor, and 2 gigs of ram and... and.... What's the battery life?

Unless HP is aiming for people to run Solidworks on this, a nominal amount of processing power is a given these days. The truly important question is battery life, _more_ so for a 'business tablet' than an iPad 'toy'.

( _I_ don't think the iPad is a toy, but HP's position that theirs is for business; they're saying that the iPad's a toy)

</comment><comment><USER14> With the Galaxy Tab and now the HP Slate priced the same or higher than the iPad, I wonder if the "Apple tax" meme will give way to a "non-Apple tablet tax".

<comment><USER15> If history is any indicator, it's only a matter of time before the pc tablet prices drop below the cost of the iPad.

<comment><USER16> ummm, what history of pc tablet prices dropping below ipad prices is this?

the history i'm aware of is when mac products start out fairly expensive then slowly drop in price over new generation releases.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> One thing going for it: They almost resisted putting intel/windows stickers all over it. <http://goo.gl/vXKi>

<comment><USER18> Please don't use URL shorteners here. Space isn't a constraint, and lots of people like knowing where a link goes to (in this case, it's just an image of the tablet, so it's safe, but it could lead anywhere).

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I don't understand why it is priced so high. If you look at a similarly spec'd netbook for $400-$500, plus a touch screen (say +$100), you should still be under $799. Does Windows 7 really cost that much more? What on earth makes it that much more expensive when it doesn't even have 3G?

</comment><comment><USER20> Windows 7? HP, come on, you're better than that.

</comment><comment><USER21> Great. When can I get Android on it?

</comment><comment><USER22> wow what fail..</comment>


Greenkeeper: Always up-to-date npm dependencies - <AUTHOR> http://greenkeeper.io/ <comment><USER2> Here's my 2 cents coming from experience with Rubygems (and my minimal experience with Node).

You simply cannot auto upgrade dependencies. Period. On an application running in production with development spanning over a couple of months this will break a lot of stuff.

For that to happen, all package developers have to follow semantic versioning and make sure they never break API with minor updates, but that's hard to achieve when you have so many developers.

Updating packages is unfortunately a manual process that you have to go through, you have to pin, upgrade, run tests, rinse and repeat.

I would love a notification when an upgrade is available, whenever a package is released, that'd be good, but still, the upgrade process on my side would be manual.

<comment><USER3> Heya, you summed up the problem perfectly and we are not trying to be all clever solving this unsolvable riddle.

All Greenkeeper does is send you a Pull Request, which then runs your test. Only when you as the maintainer are satisfied this works, you get to merge the PR.

We have another project [https://github.com/semantic-release/semantic- release](https://github.com/semantic-release/semantic-release) that you can use to make sure your project leaves semver to computers and keeps humans out of the process, because they tend to screw this up.

With both Greenkeeper and semantic-release, we hope to get npm into shape that we, one day, _can_ do more automated updates and it's gonna be a long road, but we'll have to start somewhere.

For now, Greenkeeper takes a lot of the chores out of the process you described to well in your comment.

<comment><USER2> "All Greenkeeper does is send you a Pull Request, which then runs your test. Only when you as the maintainer are satisfied this works, you get to merge the PR."

This is actually golden. When you do this for Rubygems. I will be the first paying customer.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Greenkeeper dev here, Another fun thing we can do with this is, say Node 5.0 comes out, we send a PR for everybody's .travis.yml, to also test against 5.0 and see if a package is still compatible. And all that with without the maintainers having to install the new Node version, or fearing they screw up the dev environment.

Let computers do the chores for us :)

</comment><comment><USER4> Use next-updater - tested dependencies update for projects in bulk. Npm publish, github tag, push, etc. Flexible ranges (major, minor, patch), etc. You control everything. [https://github.com/bahmutov/next- updater](https://github.com/bahmutov/next-updater) built on top of next-update [https://github.com/bahmutov/next-update](https://github.com/bahmutov/next- update)

</comment><comment><USER5> Great idea - I wish this existed for Ruby gems. Currently we use Gemnasium to keep track of our dependencies and have a manual process to:

\- check Gemnasium

\- bump the gem locally and push to branch to GitHub

\- find the changelog for the change (or a diff link) and paste create a PR with that as the description

\- merge and deploy if our test pass and the changelog looks OK

Everything except the final step should definitely be automated. I can totally see how doing the same across many repos and sharing aggregated information could make the final step a lot easier, too.

Psyched to see you guys expand.

<comment><USER6> Actually, Gemnasium now has an auto update feature.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Question to the devs: you mentioned [0] that you eventually hope to auto- upgrade peoples' app code for package BC breaks. My initial thought was that this would be the logical conclusion for a service like this, but my next thought was realizing how much magic it would take.

But, apparently you are magical. ;-) What can you tell us about your planned approach to automating this? Seems like a massive undertaking.

[0] [https://twitter.com/janl/status/647406012018872320](https://twitter.com/janl/status/647406012018872320)

<comment><USER3> No plans yet, just marvelling at the opportunities :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> This has been my primary annoyance working in node.js, dependencies automatically updating and breaking our code.

So far everyone has convinced me away from committing node_modules to the repo or doing an npm shrinkwrap, but I would love seeing a future with more people pinning dependencies and using this to update.

<comment><USER9> If you have sufficient test coverage and a proper merging and deployment flow then package upgrades that break your code will be caught, and you'll have a chance to adjust your code in response to the package changes.

The one minor issue I've still had with automatic dependency upgrades is the extremely rare case where a package maintainer actually pushes a broken package version. In those cases our tests catch it but I have to temporarily pin that specific package on the previous version until the maintainer is able to deprecate the broken package version and push a new one.

<comment><USER3> The problem here is with your downstream users, an `npm install` two months after your release might install a broken sep for your end user and create a support request for you. This is a bad situation to be in if you are doing this for Open Source projects on volunteer time :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Hey, another Greenkeeper dev here. I made a very short 3min demo video so you can see how it all works: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbQvxCLkBbw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbQvxCLkBbw)

We're super happy for any feedback :)

</comment><comment><USER11> Very cool. Any plans to support other languages/packages management systems?

<comment><USER3> Not at this point, we are aiming at deep integration with the npm/GitHub ecosystem. Happy to talk to others on how to do it, though, just get in touch: firstname.lastname@example.com

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> A bit too expensive - twice the GitHub pricing for start packages.

<comment><USER12> it's free for open source though. And provides more than server space for your repos...</comment></comment>


Democrats Declined DHS Offer to Test Caucus App - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-02-04/iowa-democrats-say-results-to-be-released-today-campaign-update <comment><USER2> The conflict of interest here is stunning. The CEO of this company Acronym, which owns the app developer Shadow, received $100K from the Buttigieg campaign and her husband is an advisor for his campaign. Buttigieg's organizing director is also a former employee of Shadow. And the entire company is all former Hilary Clinton employees e.g. centrist democrats.

<comment><USER3> >received $100K from the Buttigieg campaign

This company produces the textbanking software that the Buttigieg campaign uses. It's frustrating to watch people repeating the phrase "received money from the Buttigieg campaign" with the implication that it's a bribe when the actual situation is that both the Iowa Democratic Party and the Buttigieg campaign used the same contractor for some software.

<comment><USER4> There's a pretty clear conflict of interest between the Buttigieg work of helping his campaign and the caucus tabulating work for the DNC. There might not be _actual foul play_ , but the reason we look to avoid conflicts of interest in things like this is that it's easier to establish a lack of conflict of interest than it is to establish a lack of foul play.

<comment><USER5> Most people working in politics have done work for a zillion other candidates and the state/national party apparatus before. That's the nature of political work; campaigns only last a few months so people are always job hopping. If that counts as a conflict of interest than every staffer for every single candidate is guilty of a conflict of interest.

<comment><USER4> You're supporting my point. If a staffer worked for a campaign and in a role in charge of election integrity _at the same time_ , as this firm is doing, it would indeed be considered a conflict of interest.

<comment><USER6> I think the parent's point is that if you only consider contractors/staffers who don't have conflicts of interest of this sort, your hiring pool drops to a number that is too small to be useful.

Whether or not that's true is debatable, but I think it's a compelling point.

<comment><USER7> >your hiring pool drops to a number that is too small to be useful.

That's why it's called a swamp.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> My bet is that the contractors were incompetents who were hired based on political connections, and they both 1) just finished the app within the past week, and 2) never tested it after it was officially finalized. By bet is that they tested it weeks ago, it failed, they blamed the failure on a few bugs, they eventually marked those specific bugs fixed, then just prayed after shipping it. I know I'm being too specific, but _past trauma_.

Major sign: Not only wasn't there a dry run before d-day, but they didn't even train the people expected to use the app on the app.

The corruption is traditional corrupt procurement (apparently connected to Buttigieg and the Clinton complex) rather than an attempt to fix the primary. Primary fixing will be done out in the open with sudden rule changes.

<comment><USER9> Incompetent is a bit harsh. I think you need to be quite good to hit a home run with a new app/system that will be rolled out at an event to lots of users.

<comment><USER8> The app's entire purpose is to allow 1700 people to type in 21 numbers, and to send those numbers to a database. I don't know how that's more than a week's work, with another month or two added to design the walkthrough.

<comment><USER9> From a technical perspective where only informed and good actors are involved, I suspect many of us could code up a working website in less than an hour. But if you look at the issues reported on at the Des Moines Register [1] it seems the job was about creating a reporting system in an environment where people are actively trying to disrupt the system, possibly some of the reporters themselves cannot be trusted. I think you'd need to sit through a few meetings with the right people before you'd even understand what was required. You've got to find tech/security people from previous campaigns to understand what the dirty tricks are that people use to f with the results for example.

[1] [https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presi...](https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presidential/caucus/2020/02/03/election-2020-iowa- caucus-problems/4618371002/)

<comment><USER10> Sounds like you'd want DHS to review it then

<comment><USER11> Does anyone think DHS has the expertise on hand to review source code (and would it be cart blanche style)? When I think of DHS I think more of physical security measures. NSA is whom I think of when it comes to defensive cybersecurity measures.

<comment><USER12> They likely have a standby contract with someone like Accenture or Deloite for this kind of work.

The reason for putting this under the DHS rather then just outsourcing it directly is that the DHS have some kind of credible neutrality where as nobody trusts the DNC to not censor/rewrite any report they publish on their own.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Just so we're clear here: the results are on paper. This app was meant to simply coalesces the results to have them in faster.

And some security testing and analysis also wouldn't have prevented this problem, unless it was done at huge scale.

<comment><USER14> One wonders if they were auditing the numbers of actual registered voters vs those actually voting and came up with numbers that were wonky.

[https://twitter.com/JTHVerhovek/status/1224550235881517056?s...](https://twitter.com/JTHVerhovek/status/1224550235881517056?s=20)

So who is now in possession of the paper records and how easy would it be to manipulate those records?

<comment><USER15> [https://twitter.com/JuddLegum/status/1224697730058063872](https://twitter.com/JuddLegum/status/1224697730058063872) you are amplifying conspiracy theories, whether you know it or not.

Anyone that's worked on a system with distributed state knows data consistency can be hard, particular in situations where the system comes under load and latencies begin to increase.

You're not specifically complaining about it, but I think it's interesting that they are being criticized for not being transparent, and then being criticized based on that transparency when they are.

This isn't without precedent, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_United_States_presidentia...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_United_States_presidential_election_in_Iowa#Republican_caucuses) (or [https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/02/04/iowa- seco...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/02/04/iowa-second- caucus-debacle-eight-years/) for more narrative). Just 8 years ago in the Republican caucus in Iowa they changed the announced winner more than two weeks afterward.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> It's a little disturbing to me to see this detail featured in so many stories, because (1) DHS isn't especially qualified to review applications for security vulnerabilities, and (2) there are reasons not to insert the Republican- controlled DHS into the processes of the Iowa Democratic Party. Moreover, there's no evidence at all that security had anything to do with the failure, and lots of reasons to believe otherwise; it's not even a relevant detail.

I'm a broken record about this, but you probably don't want to work in a field where the norm is that the government checks your software engineering work, particularly for security; there is a longstanding track record of failure here.

None of this is to defend the app, which appears to have been, from conception through deployment, moronic.

</comment><comment><USER17> > Such a test from DHS' Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency would > have focused on security and not the performance issue that Wolf said was > most likely responsible for the failure. Still, Wolf said this was a > "concerning event" given the amount of scrutiny around elections security > after Russians targeted the 2016 presidential election.

> "We don't see any malicious cyber activity going on," Wolf said. "No one > hacked into it -- so this is more of a stress or load issue as well as a > reporting issue that we're seeing in Iowa."

> The Iowa Democratic Party has said there was no evidence of hacking in the > much-delayed results, merely human error.

DHS wouldn't be the one to do performance testing. Sure they should have had security scans but the issue at hand is not related.

<comment><USER18> You'd think that a lot of the allegations of foreign interference in the 2016 election would have been recalled in the past couple of months and the Iowa Democratic Party would have openly welcomed the DHS' security testing of the app to ensure minimal foreign meddling.

<comment><USER19> I think that the folks handling this software project screwed up plenty, but I also don't know if I'd fault them for not going anywhere near DHS. Given the way the current administration has shamelessly attempted to corrupt pretty much every institution it touches I think the political compromise of DHS is something that opposing parties should be factoring into their threat models.

Architecture, performance, and security reviews? Definitely should've happened. DHS? Ehh.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Having been around DHS procurement a bit, I can only imagine what their App testing looks like. It probably only can test on certified Windows CE and Zune devices.

<comment><USER21> Still better than no testing at all. They weren't securing any of their SQL queries. I made a more secure app in high school!

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> This thread is full of the dumbest takes imaginable.

There are no conflicts of interest beyond those in niche markets anywhere. There are a finite number of people and companies serving in this space. Multiple campaigns use the same contractors, and those contractors will advise campaigns. The conflict of interest is known and the key thing is declaring them, siloing information, and policing behavior. This happens in _every startup board_ where a customer participates in a funding round [and gets board seats].

Also, what was DHS going to do here? This is a private organization doing a [private] caucus in a single state. We've all read the mythical man month. DHS should focus on securing the national elections, which there is ample evidence they are behind on.

<comment><USER22> The Iowa caucus has a huge effect on the elections. Multiple employees of this shadow company worked directly for Hillary's campaign:

[https://mobile.twitter.com/heterodoxious/status/122458084831...](https://mobile.twitter.com/heterodoxious/status/1224580848319488000?s=21)

<comment><USER15> Hillary was the Democratic party nominee in the general election. Everyone in the Democratic party technical consultancy world worked for her in 2016. Just pointing this out without context is useless. How does that compare to the Democratic party in 2008, or the Republican party in 2016?

<comment><USER23> > Everyone in the Democratic party technical consultancy world worked for her > in 2016.

Well, if they worked on the Presidential general election at all, which obviously not everyone in that space did.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> This definitely proves [insert favorite conspiracy theory against your candidate of choice here]. 100%.

<comment><USER25> You're being too kind limiting it to just single candidates, in my opinion! ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. The media wanted a live, reality TV-style event and didn't get it. Last night was supposed to be huge for ad revenue and now they're out for blood. Imagine waiting patiently for conclusive results in every state. How are they supposed to run ads if people aren't glued to the screen?

What's bad for the 24-hour news cycle is good for Democracy.

<comment><USER27> Washington Post says it has been a success for ratings, with people tuning in to live coverage of the disastrous caucus phone calls process:

"'They hung up on me': Iowa caucus official's failed attempt to report precinct results makes for great TV and bad night"

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/02/04/iowa- caucus...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/02/04/iowa-caucus-cnn- sebastian/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I don't understand why this wasn't done via Google Forms instead. A bunch of sites each reporting some numbers, which are then tallied and analyzed separately. Why is a whole app infrastructure necessary?

<comment><USER8> The Democratic Party is a device for handing out contracts to friends and family.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> I would love to see some screenshots of this ridiculous app that someone approved for use after consulting their cousin who owns the business.

</comment><comment><USER30> Politicians in the United States are more similar to actors than to statesmen. The only difference between them and Hollywood is the necessity of academic credentials and perceived morality.

<comment><USER24> Brad Pitt can't start wars or make decisions about the national budget.

<comment><USER31> Reagan could

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Worth reviewing the 2012 Republican party Iowa caucus ([https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/02/04/iowa- seco...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/02/04/iowa-second- caucus-debacle-eight-years/))

 _" This isn't the first time in the past decade that the process has failed to produce a timely result, which in turn arguably affected what happened next (which, after all, is what makes Iowa important).

In 2012, it was the Republican caucus that was a mess. Back then, Mitt Romney was named the winner of the caucuses by eight votes — a narrow victory, yes, but still a victory for the favorite to be the Republican nominee.

Romney went on to win the New Hampshire primary comfortably, apparently winning the often-elusive double in the first two contests — he would have been the first Republican to ever win both Iowa and New Hampshire — and setting him on course to face incumbent President Barack Obama.

Except eight days after that New Hampshire win, we found Romney actually finished second in Iowa. The Iowa GOP announced, 16 days after the caucuses, that Rick Santorum had actually finished first — by 34 votes. But even that result was tinged by uncertainty"_

If you read the article, I'm actually leaving out the worst details (lost votes, misallocated votes, secret votes). The same explanation applies as this one. Caucuses are an overly complicated relic and should be discontinued by all parties. This current embarrassment has recent precedent in the other major party and in that respect is respecting tradition of demonstrating the fundamental, intrinsic ridiculousness of caucuses.

</comment><comment><USER32> Nevada will use the same app (apps? Android AND iOS?) for their upcoming Democratic caucuses Feb 22.

I expect:

A) A forensic analysis will quickly show where the problems lie

B) The analysis will be only superficially reported, likely due to NDAs with the app developer. In other words, no source code for you, voter!

C) With low probability, election integrity will ever so slightly increase by the time the 2024 or 2028 cycles come around,

D) No candidate will see this debacle as a big issue. Except maybe Bloomberg.

</comment><comment><USER33> After what we heard in the House Impeachment inquiries, and the general refusal of Republicans in leadership positions to disavow _illegal_ foreign interference in US elections, why should Democrats let DHS test anything? Isn't that potentially letting malevolent bad actors access your systems? In general, why would you let an opponent that more-or-less promises to not obey laws, rules and norms access your system?

</comment><comment><USER34> I think issues like this belie the fact that the real concern is executing on voter turnout and building alignment between different branches of the party (party leaders, grassroots leaders, primary candidates, old and new voters, etc). I think there is a real chance that exploits or misinformation might swing a district, then a state, then maybe the general election, but if it's still that close after everything that's happened over the past four years, it's not a great look for our future and to the world presently.

I think that also speaks to us engineers and startup founders, that there's not always a technical solution especially when the problem is cultural. I oftentimes go all gopher and dig dig dig into trying to find a technical solution, and it's hard for me to recognize this truth. I think if we all provided cultural solutions to cultural problems, at work and at the voting booth, we'd all be much better off. I'm slowly working towards this direction.

</comment><comment><USER35> Dark PAC money again.

[https://twitter.com/lhfang/status/1224562950133800961?s=21](https://twitter.com/lhfang/status/1224562950133800961?s=21)

</comment><comment><USER36> There was a big splash about the Democrats getting a CTO after the 2016 elections to fix their tech mess. Whatever happened to that?

<comment><USER37> There's a distinction to be made here between the national party organization (i.e. the DNC) and the various state party organizations. Even if the national party gets its act together 100%, the state parties have a fair degree of independence, and the national party has a limited number of levers to force them to do things the way it would like.

In this case, the tech firm was contracting directly with the Iowa Democratic Party, not with the national DNC. So the question here wouldn't be the tech competence of the national party, but of the specific state party that let the contract.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> Why didn't they just use Google Docs. It's bizarre to me that the Iowa Democratic Party is building any infrastructure at all.

<comment><USER39> Doesn't the Docs frontend have a hard limit at 50 concurrent editors?

<comment><USER40> Google Forms appends each form submission as a rows in a spreadsheet, and isn't limited that way.

Of course, some account has to own the spreadsheet and hence have write access. So it's not the _ideal_ vote-tallying system.

<comment><USER41> Although all edits are logged...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Bigger question (one always worth asking): why on earth was an _app_ necessary in the first place?

</comment><comment><USER43> What about an app by some permanent federal election commission? Several countries have a Supreme Electoral Court, which is independent of political parties.

For instance, in Costa Rica (3.4 million voters) we just elected mayors nationwide and received trustworthy results within a couple of hours (reported using a party-independent app).

Caucuses are also run by the Supreme Electoral Court. Kind of an Election-as- a-service.

<comment><USER44> The party primaries are more or less independent from "real" elections. This is how the parties like it— the DNC argued in a lawsuit that they don't have any obligation to make the process fair.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Mods: Title was copy pasted from the article at the time, but it appears to be in flux. Update accordingly, no editorialization intended.

</comment><comment><USER12> Im willing to bet the real reason there is inconsistencies is that the app used an home-brewed noSQL back end with week to no protections against duplicate entries and no real data validation despite the use of smartphones, which tend to increase data entry errors over full keyboard devices.

It's likely that you have the same precient reporting in using both the app and the phone system and entries where someone is missing an zero or mistypes a 9 instead of an 8 somewhere, causing the votes cast to differ from voters present in some precients.

Now with an well designed sql schema detecting and eventually correcting this kind of data quality issues are straightforward but as this is the work of an small relatively new digital marketing agency with almost no record outside of working for the party machinery so whats the odds that this app is backed by an well designed transactional database framework rather then a quickly cobbled together nosql schema.

To make it worse this is an case where the democratic party could have demonstrated an commitment to more transparency and less centralization as there is no secrets that needs protecting and yet the Iowa democrats went down the opposite road of more centralization and less transparency in an move that's just showcasing everything that is wrong with america's political establishment.

The open democratic way to run an election like this would be for the individual districts to publish their results for 3rd party validation directly to the public when they are done caucusing instead of placing them in escrow until the incompetents at the party HQ is done calculating the way it seems to happen now.

As of now the app is likely destined for a complete rewrite with the actual tally being done the old fashioned way using calculators and spreadsheets so an DHS code-audit would just make the issue resurface at an inconvenient time when this is no longer news, as im pretty sure anyone with a clue about IT inside of the party machine knows exactly how they screwed up and prefers strange conspiracy theories to being exposed as mundane fools.

</comment><comment><USER45> Lets forget about the politics for a moment, but I am curious. What exactly is so difficult about a vote counting app? Why is it hard? It seems like a relatively easy thing to do, but I must be missing some hidden complexities.

<comment><USER23> > What exactly is so difficult about a vote counting app?

It's not a vote counting app, it's a vote count reporting app.

And it's not particularly hard, which is why I think the tech failure angle is probably wrong and that the problem is exactly what the IDP says: the vote counts actually being reported were inconsistent which might in part be an app UX/training problem, but is probably mostly an administration-of-caucuses problem, suspicion of which from 2016 is exactly why the DNC required the additional reporting this year, so that the integrity of the process could be verified.

<comment><USER46> It wasn't just reporting the final results. They were keeping tabs on both the first and second realignments, plus delegate counts. Essentially three sets of numbers. The reason behind this is so they could report total turnout numbers, something which was not previously reported.

<comment><USER23> > The reason behind this is so they could report total turnout numbers, > something which was not previously reported.

No, the reason is because multiple campaigns (who tend to have precinct captains report the first and second alignment numbers and track how they are doing internally) complained about apparent inconsistencies in the final results in 2016, so the DNC required the additional figures to be tracked and reported officially with paper trails to provide transparency and confidence in the integrity of the results.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> I dislike the utter lack of transparency here.

You have an app that's a critical part of the voting infrastructure for the most important caucus in the Democratic Party, and yet we don't know:

\- Anything about the people who developed the app

\- The source code for the app, which should be open source in my view

\- Any information about the myriad of conflicts of interests that may or may not exist

Another learning lesson is that your startup can have poor or no marketing and have a non-functional product, but if you are well-connected, that's enough to close deals in certain verticals.

<comment><USER15> If you think that's bad, how do you feel about the RNC outright cancelling primaries [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Republican_Party_presiden...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Republican_Party_presidential_primaries#Cancellation_of_state_caucuses_or_primaries) even in cases where there were at least two serious opponents?

<comment><USER47> The RNC cancelling primaries is much worse. I'm surprised they've gotten away with it.

Iowa's Democratic Party still has a paper trail of votes. The results may be delayed but they'll at least exist.

On the other hand, GOP voters won't even get to choose who their nominee will be in certain states. Yes, I know the president will almost certainly win these primaries. But why not let people vote?

Sure, it costs money to hold the primaries, and maybe it causes embarassment to the president if he doesn't garner the vote he's expected to win.

But not holding primaries is simply utterly undemocratic.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> Apparently nobody in the DNC has heard anything about electronic voting being inherently flawed. It's astounding they encouraged the use of this app.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/03/us/politics/iowa- caucus-a...](https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/03/us/politics/iowa-caucus- app.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage)

Who are these people?

<comment><USER46> It's not electronic voting, it's electronic reporting.

<comment><USER25> True, but is this a meaningful distinction here? That is, the records are passing through the app, and the output is being used to declare the results. Does the point at which the flow enters the app -- poll workers vs. voters -- change the risk profile?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> This would seem dumb in any previous administration, but given how the agencies have been weaponized as political cudgels, this seems like the prudent decision even if there was a big fuckup.

</comment><comment><USER50> I feel like in the old days they would've just had everybody fax their results into the central office and it would've worked fine.

<comment><USER51> The last time I tried to fax some results, my confidential medical information was bounced back to the printer in my office and printed without my knowledge for my coworkers to view...

I'll take modern tech over faxes any day.

<comment><USER50> Well, it sounds like you were using one of those modern fax/printer/copier monstrosities. In the old days, it would've been a dedicated fax machine.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> How about each district just publicly publishes its numbers anywhere they want on the internet (just make it known publicly ahead of time where each district's numbers will be published officially). The main software just gets/scrapes and aggregates the numbers. Frick... the majority of us here could bang out some scripts and everyone can compare results.

</comment><comment><USER53> I am greatful for fuck ups like these. They are doing a lot much more good than harm.

For the public who does not read further than the headlines this increases their scepticism agains digital and online voting. Much more than any security expert opinions can ever do.

</comment><comment><USER54> Maybe they should've just sent results in with a phone call.

</comment><comment><USER55> Does anyone know if they hired out of work coal miners to work on the app? After all these are the same people telling everyone to learn to code when their job gets shipped overseas. If it was just some connected tech bros from elite schools making this thing, then this outcome is quite pathetic, but if it really was 50 year old miners who did a 12 week bootcamp, I'm more likely to cut them some slack.

</comment><comment><USER56> > "Yeah rigging the primary worked wonders for the Democrats last time," > Donald Trump Jr. tweeted, invoking his father's frequent claims in 2016 that > the Democratic nominating process was rigged against Bernie Sanders.

Are we.... are we still pretending it wasn't rigged? Debbie Wasserman Schultz literally was forced to resign as DNC chair over the rigging scandal. I don't think the DNC rigging their 2016 primary is controversial or in dispute is it?

If so, framing it as "[President Trump]'s frequent claims" rather than an undisputed fact is disingenuous at best here.

<comment><USER57> Disclaimer: I consider myself center-left, not really a Democrat though, mostly independent.

From what I have read, it's strongly in dispute.

The super-delegates issue was really just a poor policy by the DNC, one that could be exploited by a strong establishment/mainstream candidate. Bernie has always been an outsider, relative to the Clintons, in that sense.

Some debate questions were provided to the Clinton campaign apparently because they had asked for them, whereas the Sanders campaign had not. In retrospect, probably not a good look, regardless of whether or not he/she asked for them. Probably should have immediately released the same questions to Sanders' campaign once Clinton's received them.

I feel like DWS was forced to resign because she was incompetent and directionless, and only got the job since she was a crony of establishment Dems who wanted a "friendly" to occupy the seat. This might also be me projecting, since I have a hunch that Republicans are better at mobilizing resources to achieve specific goals (e.g. judge appointments to courts of all levels, governorships), but I think I'm starting to digress so yeah.

</comment></comment><comment><USER58> Well, given their intense commentary on previous election results & interference, that's bloody ironic...

<comment><USER59> I don't see a conflict with having a crappy app, and be concerned with those topics.

</comment></comment><comment><USER60> This entire thread is full of conspiracy, disinformation and outright ignorance.

Such a sad state of affairs for this website. If the folks writing these terrible comments are the same folks working in this industry, perhaps the sorry state of most web software is more understandable.

Since the conspiracy and lies are permeating all but one comment in this thread, here's a short roundup of replies:

* The DNC had nothing to do with the Iowa Caucuses, which are run by the Iowa Democratic Party themselves

* Caucuses have traditionally been pretty rough to manage. I remember when Mitt Romney won Iowa, until it was reported that Ron Paul won Iowa, until we realized it was Rick Santorum who won Iowa. It's not a party thing, it's a state thing.

* Nothing about a 1/2 day delay on reporting results "hurts Bernie", in fact, smart analysis is that it helps him and his narrative based campaign (just look at the comments here!)

* The people who conduct these operations are Iowa democrats, who appear to support Bernie more than anyone. So, the claim of many conspiratorial comments here is that "Bernie supporters are rigging Iowa to hurt Bernie". Disinformation doesn't really make sense when you actually follow the threads and write it out plainly!

<comment><USER61> This is the time when Democrats are most likely to engage in aggressive infighting, and also the worst possible time for them to do so.

Even if you're very spirited in your support for your candidate, it's important to do your best to be accurate and careful in your response to your fellow party members.

<comment><USER21> What if you're an independent caucusing for one Democrat and don't care about the others? There are many on Sanders' side doing just that and it's unfair to tell them that they're bad for being skeptical of the cancellation of the most important poll and delaying the results of an election that would've gave Sanders tremendous media coverage and a bump in the polls

<comment><USER61> > What if you're an independent caucusing for one Democrat and don't care > about the others?

You have a poor understanding of the American electoral process and should re- evaluate your stance in it if your goal is to affect change.

> ...unfair to tell them that they're bad for being skeptical of the > cancellation of the most important poll and delaying the results...

I'm not saying they shouldn't be skeptical, I'm saying it is wrong to attack other democrats without evidence and point fingers at other candidates because you're upset that Iowa had a poorly run caucus.

I would also caution against assuming the outcome of any poll or caucus, most of all Iowa which is a tremendously difficult caucus to interpret.

<comment><USER21> I'm only telling you that they exist. 34% of Sanders voters "may not" vote for another blue candidate. 10% voted for Trump. This isn't my opinion. This is just data.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


How a chameleon changes colour revealed - <AUTHOR> http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/mar/10/scientists-find-out-how-chameleon-changes-colour

<comment><USER2> This mechanism could be a nifty low-power basis for a color display technology, kind of like a colloidal version of Mirasol.

</comment><comment><USER3> Here's a great Veritasium video on this topic: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQggDnScsvI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQggDnScsvI)</comment>


NSA employee who brought hacking tools home sentenced to 66 months in prison - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/09/nsa-employee-who-brought-hacking-tools-home-sentenced-to-66-months-in-prison/ <comment><USER2> Considering the kind of work he did, you'd think he would assume his home systems could be easily compromised and work late in a secure environment rather than take any risks at home.</comment>


Windows Phone 7 Developer Experience [code + walkthrough] - <AUTHOR> http://www.manyniches.com/n00b-notes/windows-phone-7-series-developer-experience/

<comment><USER2> The Windows phone is certainly going to be a big hit. Android is basically dead and Windows Phone will be the big one. That's my prediction.

If there is one thing that MS knows how to do, it's treating developers right. I know C# and I will port my apps to Windows Phone because I know MS cares about me as a developer, and that MS is interested in me making money.

Google does not care about developers, and their actions with Android have shown this. They care about people getting Android on their phones so that these people will use google search, not about developers making money from their software.

As a developer, I have trusted Microsoft since 1998, and they have never let me down. Microsoft cares for us, and when we speak, they listen. Google does not, and Apple barely.

<comment><USER3> Are you sure about that? I've been a Microsoft developer for quite a while and to be honest the support they _previously_ had for the mobile market was pretty shitty.

I'll take a look at Mobile 7 but they've more or less already lost me to Android. They have a lot of making up to do to get me back to WinMo.

<comment><USER2> I don't know about the mobile division, but the rest have always been very dev friendly.

<comment><USER3> Oh for sure, most of the support is great, but .NET CF 1.1 was a total crap- fest. .NET CF 2.00 sorted that but since then (2005) there have been no great changes, improvements nor openness about the future road plan (e.g. WinMo 7).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> If I were M$ I'd try to leverage expectations of a 2nd App gold rush with better treatment of developers by a more transparent and open App Store.

<comment><AUTHOR> Couldn't agree with you more. Developers want to learn new things. They also want to get kudos or recognition for their work, and make money. Hopefully we will over eliver on all of those fronts. Our business was built by supporting developers, and we look to carry forward all of the great things we have learned over the years for the new Windows Phone 7.

I will have more posts this week with code samples and other info as I pull it out of the dev team.</comment></comment>