Nicole Wong, former top lawyer for Google and Twitter, is the new deputy US CTO - <AUTHOR> http://qz.com/98582/the-most-important-person-entering-us-government-youve-never-heard-of/

<comment><USER2> This article reads like a press release - completely uncritical. I wonder how much of this was independently researched by the reporter and how much was fed to them by the White House press handlers. It even quotes Jay Carney the master propagandist who leads these efforts.

It is clearly targeted at the tech community. This is in hen originally announced on June 20th very similar articles appeared in CNET, All Things Digital, SF Chronicle and the Register. After SOPA they are paying special attention.

By itself this appointment does nothing but give the impression of reform for a news cycle or two. The basic strategy is lie and delay the delay and lie until the public moves on to something else.

If they really want to have a debate about the balance between security and privacy lets have it. The first step is to state your position by revealing exactly what you are doing today instead of continued lies, stalling and doubletalk.

</comment><comment><USER3> "This doesn't conform to my current view of the US government, so I will now baselessly criticize and flag this submission!"

\- Hacker News 2013

</comment><comment><USER4> How does a lawyer have any business being a CTO - this is just like hiring Jill Finney as COO for nominet (.uk registry) when she has zero technical knowledge about IT or the DNS system.

For non UK people MS Finny was involved in a dodgy cover up of mum and baby deaths in the NHS.

FFS I would make a better C level exec for nominet I have worked for a registry before.

</comment><comment><USER5> E-gads, an article that is trying to convince me that adding a good person to a totally screwed up system is a good move.

Some context the article overlooks. Number of CIOs in the federal government: over 250. Number of agencies keeping private or sensitive data on citizens: well over 200. Procedure to change policy on privacy or anonymity: byzantine at best, impossible for most mortals. Who is actually in charge of privacy policy: that's a good one. I'd go with Congress instead of some executive- branch person, but you'd probably need participation of both _in each agency_ to make a difference.

Wong is probably a great person, and I congratulate her willingness to sacrifice her time for the public good, but the problems we face are not due to the lack of some special position or magic person coming into office. At best, this is a fluff piece on Wong, which is fine. At worst, it's propaganda. It eliminates important context and supports a narrative that's terribly unrealistic. Farcical even.

<comment><USER6> I don't see why any of this makes it not a good move. I agree that the article overstates things, and we should absolutely not lose sight of the larger picture, but I have some hope she will make things better not worse.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> _" Beyond that, Weiss wouldn't elaborate on what Wong will be doing."_

So here's someone who is appointed to a non-classified position in the government and paid with taxpayer dollars, and the government isn't even going to tell us what she'll be doing? As a taxpayer, I find that to be disturbing and insulting. Let's have some of that much-touted transparency here.

<comment><USER8> There is no transparency except for carefully crafted releases that make the administration look good.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> "Nicole Wong, dubbed by many as the US's first chief privacy officer"

</comment><comment><USER10> Note for those skipping the article, the 'important person' is not a Karl Rove or Darth Cheney work-alike, you might in fact be pleasantly surprised.

<comment><USER11> "At best, it's a fluff peice, at worst, propaganda."

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5966222](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5966222)</comment></comment>


Pinterest Applying Deep Learning to Related Pins - <AUTHOR> https://engineering.pinterest.com/blog/applying-deep-learning-related-pins <comment><USER2> What'd be even more awesome is if they'd stop polluting google images with spam pages generated by their site.

"1000 ideas for ..."</comment>


Giving your real name to an advertising company isn't a great idea - <AUTHOR> http://howwl.com/post/?p=55

<comment><USER2> If you're using revenue numbers, Facebook and twitter are advertising companies, as are many print magazines and newspapers. I'm fine with providing them with my real name as long as they continue to provide the great services that I expect them to.

I get junk email and spam from people who don't know or care what my real name is. At least these guys are using data to try to make their advertising experience better.</comment>


Ask HN: Mastering math word problems for upper elementary student - <AUTHOR> Hi, my kid will be 5th grader this fall. One thing I have noticed consistently is the kid struggles to solve math word problems. The kid gets the problem when I explain but again struggles with a new problem for the same concept. Are there any techniques to improve this? Thanks <comment><USER2> Lots of practice with lots of feedback on process.

Once you have walked them through a problem and shown them the process, have them implement that process. If they have cognitive breakdown, then engage in scaffolding (e.g., ask them what was done in a previous problem you did together).

Try to avoid just doing the problem for them over and over. Modeling is great at the start, but you have to have them implement the model on their own for them to learn.

This is a very brief answer to a problem that has a lot of nuanced issues. That said, it's a start.

If you know a good teacher or tutor, ask to watch them work on this stuff. Some of these folks make it seem like magic (although it's not).

</comment><comment><USER3> Your child, I assume, can solve algebraic equations. He/she may need help translating the words into equations. You may want to check out the worksheets available here: [https://kiddymath.com/worksheets/translating-problems- into-e...](https://kiddymath.com/worksheets/translating-problems-into- equations)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> In my experience parents get frustrated because their child doesn't get a concept, but don't automatically think that the child needs more _practice_. If they think about practice, it is not systematic or structured and doesn't generate enough information about what's confusing the kid.

Doing homework or exercises in the kitchen isn't enough, because how many exercises is the kid going to do? They won't do all the mistakes kids make and won't get enough corrections. The feedback loop is very wide, if it exists at all. The session drags forever.

I've had similar experience when a parent complains that a child is behind in say, addition. I'll take a sheet of paper, and make it into a table with horizontal and vertical lines to make cells. Say 8 by 8: that's 64 cells on an A4 sheet.

I'll then put 64 random additions in those cells and give it to the child. The child then starts making mistakes with "carrying" for example. I'll correct the mistake (check mark or cross and invite the child to re-solve it), and add an operation (so it's 64 + n_wrong_answers), and the child goes on to the next operation. They may make the same mistake and I'll correct again. Generally speaking, a couple of examples and they'll stop making that mistake because the frequency of the "cases" is high. They're doing one after the other, not a couple every week.

When they're done, I'll go over the cells and either notice a pattern like systematically forgetting to carry. I'll correct the cells and make another sheet of paper. This goes until the kid gets _all_ of them right.

Paradoxically, doing it this way is _faster_ : the session is more intense, there are more examples, the child is more focused, they get many, many exaples and correct their mistakes, and then they're done. This is different than the half-assed approach with a low intensity session that goes on forever.

One requirement is that it has to be crystal clear to the kid that they're going nowhere. I won't get upset and dismiss them when they start getting things wrong or just put random answers. They're doing it so they can go play because that tactic works with a _lot_ of parents: they get impatient, and they'll dismiss the child who can then go play.

Even the kids that concentrate the least or are distracted the most get laser- focused, because it becomes clear to them they're not leaving until they get none of the operations wrong.

Just one session and the parents notice a dramatic improvement and it's not magic. It's 64 mini exercises that drill down a concept until a kid doesn't get it wrong. Some parents are impressed with the _speed_ a child starts doing operations, even doing mental calculations of multi digit additions.

As far as I can tell, children lack practice. They're not solving enough problems. They'll do one homework exercise here, another there. Spend hours and hours doing the simplest things in the kitchen because they lack the incentive to get it done, and they know the parent is going to lose patience and dismiss them.

<comment><USER5> I got confused with your fourth and fifth paragraph. In the fourth one, you seem to be checking each operation after it's done by the child and adding another one if it's wrong.

In the fifth paragraph, it seems you let the child finish the entire sheet and then add another sheet of operations (with n amount of operations based on the number of failures or another 64?)

Could you clarify this further? Your method seems very interesting to me.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Are there any good fictional books about Coders/Companies? - <AUTHOR>

<comment><USER2> "Microserfs" was an interesting read 10 years ago, I'm unsure how it would read today.

A non-fiction recommendation that reads like fiction: "The Soul of a New Machine".

<comment><USER3> I immediately thought of "Microserfs", but you might be right about it being dated. Coupland also wrote "JPod", which was also about programmers. I would not recommend it (or any of his books since "Microserfs") at all.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Cryptonomicon.

<comment><USER5> I second this one. It's more than just about code -- it's a multiple narrative that touches on 2 different WW2 stories, along with a modern tech narrative. Which all tie in together. It's awesome, but it's a bit overwhelming.

I'm surprised you didn't say Snow Crash. Same author (Neil Stephenson), and also about coders. Specifically, languages, viruses, and reality. It's also much, much more accessible. I usually recommend that people start with Snow Crash and move to Cryto, if they like Stephenson's stuff.

<comment><USER4> I just thought of Cryptonomicon first, mostly because I've been rereading the Baroque Cycle. I think it also matches the original poster's request better, though, because it covers life in a raw startup.

<comment><USER5> Fair enough. I just usually avoid recommending Crypto, due to its sheer size and density. At least until someone finishes Snow Crash -- if they're interested in more Stephenson, then I go to Crypto.

What did you think of Anathem? I thought it was interesting, but pretty much agree with the XKCD comic -- <http://xkcd.com/483/>

<comment><USER4> > _I just usually avoid recommending Crypto, due to its sheer size and > density._

Good point. And you can hook someone on _Snow Crash_ by reading them the opening bit about the Deliverator.

> _What did you think of Anathem?_

I love it. It pulls in hard science, philosophy of science, epistemology, geometry, geek love, sociology...wonderful.

> _but pretty much agree with the XKCD comic_

I really didn't have any trouble with the vocabulary. There was a lot of it, but it was introduced gradually, and most of it was from European roots. And I _don't_ consider it gratuitous; it was a big part of setting the mood of the book.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Here's a couple that I've enjoyed lately. Only "The Deal" and "21 Dog Years" are tech centered, but all of them are good reads and amusing. Descriptions are pulled from Amazon. I've included affiliate codes, but feel free to strip them.

"Then We Came To The End" by Joshua Ferris

[http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/031601639X?ie=UTF8&tag=...](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/031601639X?ie=UTF8&tag=keysofgeni-20)

It's 2001. The dot-com bubble has burst and rolling layoffs have hit an unnamed Chicago advertising firm sending employees into an escalating siege mentality as their numbers dwindle.

"Company" by Max Berry

[http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1400079373?ie=UTF8&tag=...](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1400079373?ie=UTF8&tag=keysofgeni-20)

Barry once again satirizes corporate America. This time, he takes aim at the perennial corporate crime of turning people into cogs in a machine. Recent b-school grad Stephen Jones, a fresh-faced new hire at a Seattle-based holding company called Zephyr, jumps on the fast track to success when he's immediately promoted from sales assistant to sales rep in Zephyr's training sales department. "Don't try to understand the company. Just go with it," a colleague advises when Jones is flummoxed to learn his team sells training packages to other internal Zephyr departments. But unlike his co-workers, he won't accept ignorance of his employer's business, and his unusual display of initiative catapults him into the ranks of senior management, where he discovers the "customer-free" company's true, sinister raison d'être.

"The Deal" by Joe Hutsko

[http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1438235844?ie=UTF8&tag=...](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1438235844?ie=UTF8&tag=keysofgeni-20)

Hutsko debuts with an effort to re-create the near-demise of Apple Computer with a thinly disguised cast of fictional alter egos. Hutsko, who worked closely with Apple CEO John Sculley, casts Peter Jones in the role of Apple founder Steve Jobs. As the novel opens, Jones is unseated from his position by his best friend, Matthew Locke, a buttoned-down Sculley type who engineers a power-play and steals control of Jones's innovative computer company, Via Technology.

"The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement" by Eliyahu M. Goldratt

[http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0884270610?ie=UTF8&tag=...](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0884270610?ie=UTF8&tag=keysofgeni-20)

In this intriguing, readable business novel, which illustrates state-of-the- art economic theory, Alex Rogo is a UniCo plant manager whose factory and marriage are failing. To revitalize the plant, he follows piecemeal advice from an elusive former college professor who teaches, for example, that reduction in the efficiency of some plant operations may make the entire operation more productive. Alex's attempts to find the path to profitability and to engage his employeesi n the struggle involve the reader; and thankfully the authors' economic models, including a game with match sticks and bowls, are easy to understand. Although some characters are as anonymous as the goods manufactured in the factory, others ring true. In addition, the tender story of Alex and his wife's separation and reconciliation makes a touching contrast to the rest of the book. Recommended for anyone with an interest in the state of the American economy.

"21 Dog Years : A Cube Dweller's Tale" by Mike Daisey

[http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/074323815X?ie=UTF8&tag=...](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/074323815X?ie=UTF8&tag=keysofgeni-20)

In 1998, Daisey gave up his life of frequenting cafes, temping and participating in small-time theater to join an up-and-coming bookseller called Amazon.com. Here, he offers a kind of workplace coming-of-age memoir the young hero comes to terms with his ambition, synthesizes it with his liberal arts education and finally spits it out. All the dot-com punching bags are here: the lampooning of new economy jargon, the girlfriend worrying about her boyfriend's sudden obsession with the company picnic, and jokes about Pets.com. What saves the book from being an exercise in shooting fish in a barrel is Daisey's sharp eye: he renders even banal corporate moments with energy and wit.</comment>


Go Concurrency Patterns: Pipelines and cancellation - <AUTHOR> http://blog.golang.org/pipelines <comment><USER2> The beauty of Go is, I have been writing these pipeline functions without even being explicitly taught the pattern.

<comment><USER3> Likewise, it simply makes sense if you have a proper understanding of channels and go-routines.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Note the use of receive-only channels:

        func merge(cs ...<-chan int) <-chan int {

Inside the function you cannot send to a member of cs - it will give you a compile-error.

Outside the function you cannot send to its return value.

An example to play with: [http://play.golang.org/p/6AJLpZkLBe](http://play.golang.org/p/6AJLpZkLBe)

<comment><USER5> I've cleanly used that in a lil' game I'm working on.

Players send their move to the game on a channel they expose through Move(). They receive regular updates of the game state on a channel they expose through Update().

        type Player interface {
            Name() string
            Move() <-chan Move
            Update() chan<- State
        }

> > [https://github.com/aybabtme/bomberman/blob/master/player/pla...](https://github.com/aybabtme/bomberman/blob/master/player/player.go#L30-L34)

The game reads the player moves, if moves are available[1]:

        for pState, player := range g.Players {
            if pState.Alive {
                select {
                case m := <-player.Move():
                    movePlayer(g, board, pState, m)
                default:
                }
            }
        }

> > [https://github.com/aybabtme/bomberman/blob/master/bomberman....](https://github.com/aybabtme/bomberman/blob/master/bomberman.go#L250-L251)

The game sends each turn's update to players that are ready to listen for it:

        for pState, player := range game.Players {
            pState.Board = board.Clone()
            pState.Turn = game.Turn()
            select {
            case player.Update() <- *pState:
            default:
            }
        }

> > [https://github.com/aybabtme/bomberman/blob/master/bomberman....](https://github.com/aybabtme/bomberman/blob/master/bomberman.go#L262-L269)

This leans to surprisingly clean implementations:

      * A websocket player [2]
      * A keyboard player [3]
      * A random AI player [4]

Note that the rest of the game (`bomberman.go`) is a hairy ball that needs refactoring.

[1]: this, to prevent an unresponsive player from hanging the game, or an AI player from unfairly computing longer than it's opponent

[2]: [https://github.com/aybabtme/bomberweb/blob/master/player/pla...](https://github.com/aybabtme/bomberweb/blob/master/player/player.go)

[3]: [https://github.com/aybabtme/bomberman/blob/master/player/inp...](https://github.com/aybabtme/bomberman/blob/master/player/input/input.go)

[4]: [https://github.com/aybabtme/bomberman/blob/master/player/ai/...](https://github.com/aybabtme/bomberman/blob/master/player/ai/random.go)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> > In Go, we can do this by closing a channel, because a receive operation on a > closed channel can always proceed immediately, yielding the element type's > zero value.

        for n := range c {
            select {
            case out <- n:
            case <-done:
            }
        }

This, is brilliant.

<comment><USER7> I wasn't quite getting that code when I first read it.

Now I can see it allows you do "discard" all the pending reads from the input channel (and avoid writing to a possibly-closed 'out' channel), but wouldn't it be better to break the loop in this case for an immediate exit?

i.e. go for 'interrupt' semantics, rather than 'drain'?

<comment><USER8> Yes, interrupt is better, and the article explains how to do that a few paragraphs later:

            for n := range in {
                select {
                case out <- n * n:
                case <-done:
                    return
                }
            }

If you allow pipeline stages to interrupt their receive loop instead of draining the inbound channel, then _all_ send operations need to be governed by done. Otherwise the interrupted receive loop may block the upstream sender.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I use channels to single-file data to a SQLite db. Data gets pushed into channels from multiple users / locations of the web app. A single goroutine (concurrently running function) reads from the channels one channel at a time and, for each channel, writes everything in the channel to the db in a single transaction. SQLite isn't the best at concurrency. Go's channels help resolve that issue nicely.

</comment><comment><USER10> Cool. Can the concurrency guru's out there tell me what is the difference between the "Go Concurrency Pattern" and the Java SingleThreadExecutor? ([http://docs.oracle.com/javase/6/docs/api/java/util/concurren...](http://docs.oracle.com/javase/6/docs/api/java/util/concurrent/Executors.html#newSingleThreadExecutor%28%29))

      ExecutorService pipeline = ExecutorService.newSingleThreadExecutor();

      FutureTask<String> step1 =
           new FutureTask<String>(new Callable<String>() {
             public String call() {
               return "step1";
      }});

      executor.execute(step1); // execute single-step pipeline

      step1.cancel(true); // interrupt the task

<comment><USER6> I guess an obvious difference is that Go has these stuff built into runtime and syntax, which makes those light-weight threads / tasks a first class thing.

Furthermore, is there a way in "Java SingleThreadExecutor" and its related components that allow automatic scheduling tasks on different threads? For example, you are on a quad-core and you want to have 4 threads running together, with millions of tasks mapped to 4 threads and dynamically balanced.

<comment><USER11> I believe that's what the ForkJoinPool is for.

[http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/util/concurren...](http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/util/concurrent/ForkJoinPool.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'm a C++ developer by day, and I haven't tried Go yet. This looks really intresting. There is a massive gap for some Dataflow Programming based languages; not sure Go is quite there yet, but we're moving in the right direction.

<comment><USER13> The future of programming is somewhere in the field of dataflow and (functional) reactive programming. It brings easy state to the declarative programming world.

<comment><USER14> Said often and probably false. Neither frp nor dataflow are very expressive. Probably something still imperative but more reactive is the future.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Great explanation in document form of these patterns. Also very succinct and easy to reference.

For those that would rather read this in presentation form: [http://talks.golang.org/2012/concurrency.slide#1](http://talks.golang.org/2012/concurrency.slide#1)

And for those that would rather watch a video presentation: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6kdp27TYZs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6kdp27TYZs)

<comment><AUTHOR> Both those links are in the original article, but they are not the same content.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Node.js has another beautiful way of doing this. It's called streams there.

[https://github.com/substack/stream- handbook](https://github.com/substack/stream-handbook)

[http://nodejs.org/api/stream.html](http://nodejs.org/api/stream.html)

</comment><comment><USER17> Interesting, I'll have to compare pipelines in Go to pipelines in Haskell.

<comment><USER18> > Interesting, I'll have to compare pipelines in Go to pipelines in Haskell

check out the "power series, power serious" paper by doug-macllroy. he does that...

<comment><USER17> As jerf said, this is a little different since it's comparing to lazy io rather than pipes or conduit.</comment></comment></comment>


Introducing ClojureScript - <AUTHOR> http://clojure.com/blog/2011/07/22/introducing-clojurescript.html

<comment><USER2> The best thing with the introduction of ClojureScript, at least for web applications, is that we can now write the whole application in Clojure without context switches. Gaka for CSS, ClojureScript for JavaScript, Hiccup for HTML and Clojure for everything else. Possibly someone could design a form validation library that validates both server side and client side with the same code. Love the possibility being presented here.

<comment><USER3> Sandbar has form validation in it,though not sure if it would work for clojurescript. And personally I'd still use enlive for HTML so can buy prebuilt templates and just tweak my code to work within those, but that could just be me :)

<comment><USER4> the enlive vs hiccup battle is not really changed by ClojureScript. I am glad that we have enlive, hiccup and fleet so everybody can take whatever he wants.

<comment><USER3> Don't even know Fleet, but Hiccup certainly has a place for when you WANT code as HTML. I'd never want it but I can understand why some would.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Great Introduction! It is nice how this project makes the point that _"JS is Assembly Language for the Web"_ [1][2]

[1] <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2783060>

[2] [http://www.hanselman.com/blog/JavaScriptisAssemblyLanguagefo...](http://www.hanselman.com/blog/JavaScriptisAssemblyLanguagefortheWebPart2MadnessorjustInsanity.aspx)

</comment><comment><USER6> Unless I'm doing something wrong, they need to do some optimizations to code size if this is going to be used client side nearly 30k is a lot of overhead for a function that returns "Hello, world!"

<http://pastebin.com/P5MTvP5Q>

<comment><USER7> I didn't read either the article or what you did carefully, but I do wonder if either (a) you're supposed to run the output of their compiler through Google Closure's compiler which removes most of the code (which is probably library functions unused by your little function), or (b) the 30K is a pretty much one time cost, and if your code grows the output increases moderately.

<comment><USER6> I believe it's already going through Google Closure. That's what {:optimizations :advanced} does.

I'm certain it's a one time cost. Though I suspect that given that Closure [optimizes out unused code]([http://blog.fogus.me/2011/07/21/compiling- clojure-to-javascr...](http://blog.fogus.me/2011/07/21/compiling-clojure-to- javascript-pt1/)) the more I use of the goog namespace, the larger that baseline will become.

That being said, 30k is the size of minified jQuery, so folks that are alright with building apps on jQuery won't find 30k to be that terrible.

<comment><USER8> It's a one-time cost, but we're also not done improving Closure Compiler's ability to minify core.

There's a lot of Closure Compiler-specific metadata we're not leveraging yet, and our goal is to reduce the baseline to much, much less.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> """ClojureScript also makes use of the Google Closure library for capabilities such as event handling, DOM manipulation, and user interface widgets."""

Kinda wished they had stopped at the language and left the DOM out of it.

Still, very cool.

<comment><USER4> Your understanding this wrong. You can use all java script libs (with sometimes more sometimes less work) but the google closure library is really easy to use. This DOM library has nothing to do with clojurescript itself its just there and easy to use.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Now that this one is done, I'm going to get started on COBOLScript!</comment>


A Synonym-Substitution Based Algorithm for Text Steganography (2012) [pdf] - n-s-f http://www.cs.bham.ac.uk/~nagarajs/papers/J.gardiner-MScReport.pdf <comment><AUTHOR> Laughed out loud reading that title. So clever.

I once implemented a steganography system to manipulate the ordering of class files in a java jar file (they retain order therein).

The "distance from alphabetically sorted" was calculate-able as a BigInteger. That BigInteger was encode-able to a text message. Hence, a text message could be hidden in the ordering of the class files (assuming there were some reasonable number of class files - and there usually is)

<comment><USER2> Clever. Inspired by this?

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

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I kept wondering if the author applied any of the text/image steganographic techniques discussed to the paper itself, in a self referential sort of way. Had I been the author, I'd have felt obligated to do so.

</comment><comment><USER4> From the document:

> One proposed solution by Judge [14] uses spelling errors to hide data, for > example spelling "is" as "iz". A correctly spelled word indicated a zero, a > incorrectly spelled word a 1.

And one can see some spelling mistakes or variations across the document... (For instance:"This attack involves the analysis of know patterns the correspond to hidden information" or "being able to here the data hidden in audio" )

<comment><USER5> Good catch. Also, from the sentences you've just quoted: "a incorrectly" instead of "an incorrectly"... Now, is the author doing these misspellings deliberately?

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I have access to some of Apple's secret documentation and they watermark your name and email address over all the PDFs. I often wondered if they do something like this as well, just in case.

Only using synonyms is pretty limited though. You could go much further:

1\. In PDF documents use layouts that differ by only a couple of pixels. 2\. Change the placement of figures. 3\. Change brackets to dashes (like this) - or like this. 4\. Add double spaces in places. 5\. Adjust the hyphenation at the end of long lines. 6\. Use unicode look-a-like characters. 7\. Use different unicode variations of dashes and quotation marks.

If you only had a single document and wanted to leak it while being certain that your name wouldn't be leaked too, the only way I can see to do it would be to rewrite it in your own words.

<comment><USER7> Out of curiousity, is this watermarking you speak of actual visual watermarking, or is it more stenographic like the techniques you mention. (If you may share in general terms, of course...)

<comment><USER6> It's visual (large grey text across the page at an angle).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This is a good idea. I wonder if deep-learning will be useful to strongly test it this way:

1\. divide a set of documents from the same person , apply stenography to half. represent each word by a number.

2\. take half of this data and use it to train your deep-learning algorithm to categorize documents as clear/stegoe'd. Than test how well it can detect stego in the other half.

The inputs to those deep-learning should be as followed: num_of_word_0, synonym_number(num_of_word_0), .., num_of_word_n, synonym_number(num_of_word_n)

Where synonym_number(word) is: if we start with home-house-abode from wordnet as synonyms, home=1, abode=3.

This way we give the deep-learner info about your synonym use stats.

3\. run algorithm.

Not too complex, and there's a decent likelihood that if there are statistical patterns, the deep-learner will find them.

</comment><comment><USER9> It seems like this would be detectable using a technique talked about by Bruce Schneier in 2011 ([https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2011/08/identifying_p...](https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2011/08/identifying_peo_2.html)) called forensic linguistics ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forensic_linguistics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forensic_linguistics))

<comment><USER6> No that is something unrelated. The way you would have to detect this is by obtaining the document from multiple sources and checking them for differences.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I've wondered about doing this before for copy protection; mixing the order of bullet points, and so on. You can't stop copies, but you can see who made the copies potentially.

<comment><USER11> >I've wondered about doing this before for copy protection

Something similar -- using functionally-equivalent machine language instructions instead of synonyms -- was (is?) used by the shareware A86 assembler[1] to detect unregistered use.

From the A86 manual:

        A86 takes advantage of situations in which more than one set
        of opcodes can be generated for the same instruction. [...]
        A86 adopts an unusual mix of choices in such situations.
        This creates a code-generation "footprint" that ... will
        enable me to tell ... if a non-trivial object file has
        been produced by A86.

[1] [http://eji.com/a86/](http://eji.com/a86/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> This might also be useful for combating attempts to reveal authors' identities using forensic linguistics.

<comment><USER13> How would you ensure that you replace the right parts?

<comment><USER14> I don't think you can be. You could train authorship attribution on many kinds of features. But checking against common methods would probably go a long way in avoiding detection.</comment></comment></comment>


TinyCert REST API - <AUTHOR> https://www.tinycert.org/docs/api <comment><USER2> Not saying it's a good or bad api - but it's not restful

I've had a quick go at redesigning it to be more restful. Not perfect, but better i think. Would like to hear others opinion.

/sessions [POST|DELETE]: Open|Close a API session

Certificate Authority management

/cas [GET]: Get a list of all CAs in your account

/cas/{caId} [GET]: Get further details on a given CA

/cas/{caId}/cert [GET]: Download the CA's certificate

/cas/{caId} [DELETE]: Delete a given CA

/cas [POST]: Create a new CA

Certificate management

/cas/{caId}/certs [GET]: Get a list of all certificates for a given CA

/cas/{caId}/certs/{certId}/details [GET]: Get further details on a given certificate

/cas/{caId}/certs/{certId} [GET]: Download the certificate

/cas/{caId}/certs/{certId}/sigreqs [POST]: signing request

/cas/{caId}/certs/{certId}/private-key [GET]: private key for a certificate

/cas/{caId}/certs/{certId} [put]: Re-issue an existing certificate

/cas/{caId}/certs/{certId}/status [put]: Change certificate status

/cas/{caId}/certs [POST]: Create a new certificate

<comment><USER3> > _but it 's not restful_

Absolutely mandatory comment on each REST API discussion!

<comment><USER2> Agreed :)

I tried to be constructive at the same time though

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> A self hosted and open source version of something like this would be amazing. I'm not sure I feel comfortable leaving my private key on third party servers, even for non-production/purely personal usage.

<comment><USER5> We have one of those, a bit more limited as it only works on a single CA.

Give me a week and poke an email to firstname.lastname@example.com and I'll see about giving preliminary access.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> A number of network devices and software applications include a root CA certificate that allows them to unwrap SSL (for example Charles Proxy). The problem with that model is once installed, all users of that application implicitly trust each other. Integrating something like this would allow each user to have their own root CA.

<comment><USER7> That is actually a very interesting application of the service that I hadn't even considered.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> This is nice for non-production environments - I've been issuing self-signed certificates, but this is a much more convenient approach and I'm pulling sleeves up to implement this.

</comment><comment><USER8> I see generating new certificate happens on the server so it keeps the private key. Instead of sending the CSR and keeping the private key on the client. Sigh.</comment>


Senior Engineers need more than just "8 years of experience" - <AUTHOR> https://levelup.gitconnected.com/8-years-of-experience-isnt-the-definition-of-a-senior-software-engineer-f3ed904e3bc9 <comment><USER2> I see this on a daily basis and have seen in at multiple companies:

"Non-Senior" engineers who have to pretty much mentor "Senior" engineers; the "Senior" being given the title due to X years of experience instead of actual knowledge and knowhow and of course the reverse where the "Non-Senior" does not get promoted because he does not have the required ~years of experience~.

I see it more rarely amongst higher job titles though. It's more difficult for a senior engineer to make it to lead or principal when they do not have the skills.

<comment><USER3> I'm living this reality. Not to mention the seniors come in with a significantly higher salary.

<comment><USER4> The last time I had a job like this I left it. There was a sr. who consistently turned out sloppy work, scoffed at tests, and constantly caused production fires.

His boss loved him because he was always working hard after hours to correct his own sloppy mistakes.

I realized that I was probably more senior than my own boss and went and found a new job.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I used to wonder about this when I was younger. Now, older, I think the answer is that "senior" people are paid more, etc., because they can be trusted to generally tow the rope in the direction the company wants. They're usually not disruptive and usually do act professionally.

None of that has much to do with skill. As for skill, on average they're somewhat more skilled, but it's a smallish effect.

I _do_ happen to be more technically skilled than most around me, but other skills matter more. I can avoid needlessly ruffling feathers. I can often foresee that a project will crash and burn months or years in advance. I can talk to people going through personal crises. This is all learned over long years.

</comment><comment><USER6> Of course they do, they actually need senior knowledege. I've seen a lot of people who were given senior titles without the accompanying knowledege, its really polluted the talent pool.

Finding "senior" engineers who write forkbombs is more common than you'd think.

<comment><USER7> Job titles in the software dev world haven't been terribly meaningful for a very long time.

<comment><USER6> Fair enough, but its still sad.

<comment><USER8> Based on what I've seen across multiple companies, only the biggest and most experienced ones understood how to do leveling correctly. Everyone else was basically flying by the seat of their pants.

I think it's much more productive to label software engineers as being in stage 1 through stage 4 for most companies, and for 1000+ add stage 5 and for 10000+ add stage 6.

<comment><USER7> There was also a stretch of time following the dotcom bust when companies were handing out inflated titles rather than actual promotions or pay increases. I could be misremembering, but my memory is that was when titles became meaningless.

<comment><USER8> Heh, yeah. People problems tend to get solved in weird ways more often than not.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Hell, what I've seen is that you get called "senior" if you have more than three years of experience. Talk about mind boggling.

Those kinds of companies tend to be incapable of comprehending how to handle interviewing someone with 30 years of experience in the field.</comment>


Show HN: ExifShot – A beautiful way to show metadata  of your photo - <AUTHOR> https://exifshot.com/ <comment><USER2> How do you extract the Exif info? As I understand it, it's terribly complicated if considering the various manufacturer's quirks.

<comment><USER3> I'd always found this to be the opposite - Exif data is generally universally readable by photography/file management tools regardless of the camera that took it. I've never heard of photographers encountering trouble reading Exif data, unless it was because they accidentally stripped the metadata in a save as/export somewhere.

There are a fair few libraries out there for pretty much any programming language you like that will return this data.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> And the result is a JPEG holding both the original JPEG and ... text? JPEG and text is a horrible idea. Even with best quality settings, compression artefacts are visible.

Why don't you offer SVG export? That would solve all problems and make the embedding into websites really easy. You even can embed your JPEG into SVG (base64, you will loose a ~30% in file size but the lesser storage for the text gives it back).

<comment><USER5> I'm not the author, but I think the idea would be that you are sharing on instagram or similar, maybe in a story where you have the full image, then one or a few variations with the exif info displayed. I could see where it would be better than using an unformatted list of info in a comment, plus it doesn't crowd the description.

<comment><AUTHOR> Exactly! Thank you.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Cool, I like it.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks. I hope you will find it useful.</comment></comment>


U.S. Justice Dept Considering Apple Probe: Sources - <AUTHOR> https://finance.yahoo.com/news/exclusive-u-justice-dept-considering-174301198.html <comment><USER2> I wonder whether the 3 threatened investigations (Google by DoJ, Facebook by FTC, now Apple bu DoJ) are not so subtle signaling by the current administration to fall in line (China trade war, working with Pentagon on AI, etc) "or else".

There's little evidence, but the fact that these 3 major companies are now moved against in roughly the same timeframe while the administration and DoJ have already their hands more than full is suggestive ...

<comment><USER3> > _subtle signaling by the current administration to fall in line_

Everyone who's been lobbying for one of these investigations has been lobbying for the other three. A couple key folks at the DoJ started prioritizing tech antitrust, in part due to some other time-consuming matters having recently been sunset. (Previously, it was being pursued as a civil matter though the regulators. Big legal teams have an easier time squashing those compared.)

No need for a political conspiracy. (In any case, these investigations take a long time to get going. None of these efforts were started in even the last months.)

<comment><USER4> Under another administration (either Democratic or Republican) it might be reasonable to accept this explanation. The problem with this administration is that "assume this decision is being made by career employees acting with no political self-interest" has not proven to be a good betting position.

<comment><USER5> In fact, Occam's Razor would suggest that any action taken by this administration should be assumed to be politically motivated, barring evidence to the contrary. Especially since the current administration has always been very vocally hostile to any sort of regulatory or antitrust action.

<comment><USER6> I try very hard to give some grace to the "Trump bad in everything" that I hear so much. However, his moronic tweets aside, I see nothing more than normal politicking, and right-of-center governance. The biggest flaw I see is the inability to admit and correct policy problems, which is absolutely not unique to President Trump.

<comment><USER7> Privatized child cages for the explicit reason of brutalizing those applying for asylum are normal right of center governance? Calling an investigation which found numerous cases of foreign involvement a coup?

I think you might be suffering from severe change blindness.

<comment><USER8> Nonsense, everything is normal. Look;

> _" I believe that if people stoped_[sic] _using or subscribing to @ATT, they > would be forced to make big changes at @CNN, which is dying in the ratings > anyway. It is so unfair with such bad, Fake News! Why wouldn't they act. > When the World watches @CNN, it gets a false picture of USA. Sad! "_

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 3, 2019

[https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/11354990026261544...](https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1135499002626154496)

<comment><USER6> Trump just does it on Twitter.

[https://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/28/obama- says...](https://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/28/obama-says-fox- news-promotes-destructive-viewpoint/)

[https://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/12/business/media/12fox.html...](https://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/12/business/media/12fox.html?pagewanted=all)

[https://www.thenation.com/article/bushs-war- press/](https://www.thenation.com/article/bushs-war-press/)

<comment><USER8> I know, that is why I said that everything is normal.

I am in complete agreement that all of those examples make Donald Trump appear quite normal.

This is because Donald Trump is an ordinary president in a very normal way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I hope that this is a sign of increased scrutiny overall, that will lead to the ISP/media conglomerates too. Comcast is extremely exploitive of it's regulatory capture of my local government and has a far more detrimental direct effect on my life than Google does, because I am able to block Google and use alternatives. Though perhaps the investigation around Google is mostly about their customers and not their users, I.e. ad purchasers.

<comment><USER10> What about this administration suggests they're really into antitrust enforcement on its merits?

Only reason the GOP is interested in regulating tech is because they believe tech platforms should be forced to carry their political message without restrictions.

<comment><USER9> Forgive my naivete, but based on what I've seen elsewhere I think this administration is so incompetent that they can't get the levers of government to do much of anything, unless it's unilateral actions like tariffs. So I'm not sure that much of the choice to pursue this even comes from temporary political appointees.

Some of the Democratic candidates (e.g. Warren) also support similar measures, so it's not required that this is purely a political play.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Interesting Elizabeth Warren's campaign just bought up some big billboard in SF stating this as one of her major campaign promises.

<comment><USER12> Is this a popular sentiment in SF? I haven't seen any of it in Massachusetts where she is from but I would think it would be more popular here.

<comment><USER11> They are a very visible industry so they get used as scapegoat as the city fails to provide basic services to its population.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I don't see how any anti-trust laws based on having monopoly-level market control could possibly be applied to Apple.

Apple simply does not have a monopoly in any market, from either a narrow "by the book" perspective or in a broader functional perspective.

Unless the DoJ Apple is unfairly monopolizing the market for Apple's products and services...

<comment><USER14> Just because someone can go buy an Android doesn't mean it's not a monopoly. Having only two options for mobile phone operating systems, both with locked- in, walled gardens that take a cut from developers isn't competition, it's a rigged system.

<comment><USER13> Yes it does mean it's not a monopoly! That's the literal definition.

You could describe it as a duopoly but I think it's pretty clear that Apple and Google are fierce competitors. And Apple has minority market share by far.

Neither company has anywhere near a well protected position in the market. The mobile computing market has not seen companies establish long running monopolies.

Two of the top competitors in the sector, BlackBerry and Nokia, are long gone, shells of their former selves.

The problem you complain about is due to structural elements in the market, specifically that network effects are inevitable in the market for operating systems.

The purpose of anti-trust laws is to protect people against predatory markets practices, not to interfere with market function because it doesn't support a product.

FWIW, there are other mobile OS options available. You just don't want to use them because they have not reached a market share significant enough to support the kind of rock app ecosystem we expect.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I can see Amazon and Google. What is the complaint against Apple and Facebook?

<comment><USER16> The control over what iOS developers can do has been the source of a lot of contention recently. Facebook is Big Bad as we all know, but I agree that they're not as much a monopoly.

<comment><USER17> Duopoly isn't much better than a monopoly. Especially when the other half does basically the same anti-competitive behaviors.

Really, of all of these, Apple is seemingly the most blatant in their anti- competitive behaviors. Google and Facebook at least offer choice even if that choice is a somewhat of an illusion. Apple just flat out forbids competing with it in distributing iOS apps and vigorously guards its cut of subscription revenue.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> So when are the telecoms going to be looked at?

</comment><comment><USER19> I think the only surprise here is that Amazon hasn't been named yet, but maybe they are setting the table here, so that that one doesn't look politically motivated. :)

</comment><comment><USER20> In the past few days or so there have been articles about potential antitrust stuff against Apple, Facebook, and Google. What is going on here?

Facebook article, three hours ago: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20084703](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20084703)

Google article, three days ago: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20066288](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20066288)

Don't get me wrong, I'm pretty excited to see these companies get smacked around because I think all are too powerful, too influential, but with these three in a row in such quick succession I have to wonder if the motivation is political.

Edit: Here is a similar article for Amazon (one day ago), that slipped through the cracks: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20074593](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20074593)

<comment><USER2> I wonder why this is downvoted. The timing is really curious.

<comment><USER20> The Amazon/WaPo article notes the timing as well and hints that it might not be totally partisan.

> _" Antitrust also has become an early flash point among Democrats vying for > the White House ahead of the 2020 election. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) > recently threatened major investigations of Amazon, Apple and Facebook. This > week, she offered early support in response to news that the Justice > Department could bring such an investigation against Google."_

Maybe this is a case of numerous parties having a diverse set of motivations that all line up? Democrats who blame these companies for Trump's election _(makes the least sense in the specific case of Apple or Amazon...)_ , and Republicans who say these companies are censoring them _(makes the least sense in the specific case of Apple or Amazon...)_ Maybe these companies are just running out of friends in Washington.

<comment><USER21> Seems like this takes the wind out of her presidential campaign. So maybe partisan after all.

<comment><USER22> That would be a calculation if were a front runner but she isn't (at least not at the moment).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> If the App Store is forced open, say goodbye to privacy and security on iOS.

<comment><USER23> Why? Apple doesn't vet apps for privacy or security. The API surface is what affects these.

<comment><USER24> APIs that depend on policy to prevent abuse will now just not be available at all.

<comment><USER23> As it should be. Apple doesn't have the ability to verify what you do with the data that gets to your app, so they should not pretend to be able to certify it.

<comment><USER25> What? Apple, today, has enforced the ability to ensure that a flashlight app isn't vacuuming up your location data.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I expect Amazon to be next.

</comment><comment><USER27> I hope so, it's bogus the app store is locked down like it is. I own my iPhone, I should be able to download a gab app.

</comment><comment><USER28> I feel like this is just a gentle reminder to the "masters of the universe" about who really runs the country. They've been getting into politics a little too much lately. If nothing else, this should cool down that ambition. I can only welcome increased scrutiny for trillion-dollar entities that, to a large extent, control the flow of information like never before.</comment>


Ask HN: What is the best Twitter feed for HN? - <AUTHOR>

I tried searching for past ASK HN but to no success: there are 50bajillion Twitter accounts for Hacker News syndication and none of them seem to accurately mimic the RSS feed for HN - which is incredibly annoying. Which one do you use? I feel like I'm missing out on a ton of stories I used to get through Google Reader, but I'd rather use Twitter. <comment><USER2> @newsyc20 (20 can be 50, 100 as well) - which shows items that have at least 20 points.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1528652></comment>


Is CO2 an Indoor Pollutant? (2012) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/wp-content/uploads/120/12/ehp.1104789.pdf <comment><USER2> From the abstract:

 _" Relative to 600 ppm, at 1,000 ppm CO2, moderate and statistically significant decrements occurred in six of nine scales of decision-making performance. At 2,500 ppm, large and statistically significant reductions occurred in seven scales of decision-making performance (raw score ratios, 0.06–0.56), but performance on the focused activity scale increased.

Conclusions: Direct adverse effects of CO2 on human performance may be economically important and may limit energy-saving reductions in outdoor air ventilation per person in buildings."_

Since all the researchers seem to have been behavioral scientists, they concentrated on decision-making tests. But it would be interesting to know whether spending a large part of your day breathing a relatively high concentration of CO2 also has long-term health consequences. (That's not an experiment that's easy to perform on humans, however.)

Also, it would be interesting to know how many plants you'd need to put in an office space to absorb the CO2 that one human generates. Although the cost of maintaining the plants could be higher than the cost of providing adequate ventilation.

<comment><USER3> Have you seen this?

[https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/199300...](https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19930073077.pdf)</comment></comment>


Dr Bronwyn Tarr: How to live a happy life - <AUTHOR> http://www.ox.ac.uk/research/research-in-conversation/how-live-happy-life/dr-bronwyn-tarr <comment><USER2> This makes me wish there was a dating app which could match me with people based on the similarity of the music we listen to. Just yesterday I was driving to work rocking out to some Spanish punk rock and thinking that if I could just find a partner who also listens to Spanish punk rock we'd probably have a lot more in common than any of the people I meet though existing dating apps.

Edit: There is such an app. It's called Tastebuds. Downloading it now to check it out.

Edit: Ok, the app sucks. It doesn't match you with people based on your music, it just lets you add music you like to your profile.

<comment><USER3> Sharing music tastes is about as important as sharing hair colour.

<comment><USER4> Written by somebody who likely has a very bland, unadventurous taste in music.

<comment><USER5> Or a very exciting, adventurous taste in hair color

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Bronwyn Tarr's research on synchrony is fascinating. See e.g. her paper on silent disco dancing. I speculate that good teamwork programming may be activating related areas of the mind. I know coders who develop together can achieve a kind of flow, a synchrony of purpose. Can these coders gain the health benefits of bonding and endorphins?

See her publications [https://www.psy.ox.ac.uk/team/bronwyn- tarr](https://www.psy.ox.ac.uk/team/bronwyn-tarr)

"[W]e propose that synchrony might act as direct means to encourage group cohesion by causing the release of neurohormones that influence social bonding. By acting on ancient neurochemical bonding mechanisms, synchrony can act as a primal and direct social bonding agent, and this might explain its recurrence throughout diverse human cultures and contexts (e.g. dance, prayer, marching, music-making)."

<comment><USER7> I wonder if she's ever looked at rowing (she should have enough guinea pigs in Oxford). Nothing else I've done in life has come close to the bonding I've felt after a hard season's competition in a rowing crew, the epitome of synchrony.

<comment><USER8> Rowing is explicitly mentioned in the article.

<comment><USER7> Indeed. Apologies, I didn't make it that far down.

There have been occasions in very coherent crews when I have felt outside my own body and not in control of it, as if the whole crew was being driven by a single external force.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> MARTIAL, the things that do attain The happy life be these, I find:— The richesse left, not got with pain; The fruitful ground, the quiet mind;

The equal friend; no grudge, no strife; No charge of rule, nor governance; Without disease, the healthful life; The household of continuance;

The mean diet, no delicate fare; True wisdom join'd with simpleness; The night dischargèd of all care, Where wine the wit may not oppress.

The faithful wife, without debate; Such sleeps as may beguile the night: Contented with thine own estate Ne wish for death, ne fear his might.

— Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey. 1516–47, translated from Martial's Epigrams (Born 38 AD).

</comment><comment><USER10> Ah yes. The one stop shop to a happy life.

We are quite a finnicky species and trying to shoehorn everyone into the same mold is probably not a recipe for great happiness.

Just accept that people are different, you won't find happiness following someone else's rulebook and do the things that matter to you. Accept those things as your source of happiness.

If your sources of happiness are not compatible with society in general do them where you can enjoy them on your own or with a group of likeminded peers.

Do not be concerned about how unique you are. Embrace it.

If you are not unique embrace that too.

Focus on what it is that you really want to do.

Life will be over soon enough.

Stop chasing your happiness and live life. Happiness will follow :)

<comment><USER11> So instead of listening to a Doctor from Oxford University, who has obviously studied this extensively, we should listen to you?

<comment><USER12> Why not? He seems a bit happier than the Doc.

In all seriousness, critique the ideas, not the source.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Bronwyn is a beautiful Welsh name.

</comment><comment><USER14> Don't be born working class, don't take student loans, if you want to be happy you have to exploit other people cause it's a dog eat dog would be exploited or exploit kind of world with no love or caring or community

<comment><USER15> What a negative view of life...

<comment><USER16> Perhaps, but what if it is accurate? It's been said that religion is opium for the masses. Deluding yourself might make you feel good but you're still suffering.

As I type this the following is on the front page: 'Body Brokers' Get Kickbacks to Lure People with Addictions to Bad Rehab.

<comment><USER17> it was said by Marx, who had his own delusions that have led to the deaths many many people. I don't think we as a species are capable of being 100% rational.

<comment><USER18> The quote with some context:

Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual point d'honneur, its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the fantastic realization of the human essence since the human essence has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose spiritual aroma is religion.

Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo.

Criticism has plucked the imaginary flowers on the chain not in order that man shall continue to bear that chain without fantasy or consolation, but so that he shall throw off the chain and pluck the living flower. The criticism of religion disillusions man, so that he will think, act, and fashion his reality like a man who has discarded his illusions and regained his senses, so that he will move around himself as his own true Sun</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Hire the Right VP of Marketing, or You'll End Up with Blue Pens - <AUTHOR> https://www.saastr.com/hire-the-right-type-of-vp-marketing-or-youll-end-up-with-a-bunch-of-blue-pens/ <comment><USER2> (2015). Its nice to tag articles with the date in the title. Other than that, its a decent read. Fingers crossed that its relative to me in a few months once my side app is complete

</comment><comment><USER3> There are two types of articles those that are read, and those that have email pop-ups. (Penalized by Google and and readers).</comment>


What If The Very Theory That Underlies Why We Need Patents Is Wrong? - <AUTHOR> http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100107/0517167656.shtml

<comment><USER2> In reality there's a spectrum. If the patent office would actually enforce the non-obvious clause rather than running as a cash cow then a lot of problems would be solved off the bat.

I think of drug companies and software companies as the two extreme examples. Drug development is basically a money-losing proposition without patents, because it takes millions to get to anything useful, and once you do it's distilled down into something that's almost trivially easy to copy.

With software on the other hand, innovation happens in tiny steps. Often patents are granted to ideas that took someone a few days to come up with. As software is built, hundreds or thousands of these ideas come together to (hopefully) create a high value application. Once you have a high value application as long as you don't release the source code it's not easy to copy. The patents don't help someone recreate it. They have to pour blood and sweat into the codebase to come up with something that actually replicates the value. In other words the patent helps no one but the trolls.

Of course this is obvious to any software developer which is why we reflexively assume patents are bad. However in between software and drugs, in the space real physical inventions, things are quite a bit grayer. In the case of physical things, the "obviousness" test is a little easier to apply because everyone has some familiarity with tools and objects, and R&D can be fairly expensive for a lot of simple end products. It seems to me that the underlying theory of patents is fundamentally sound, but just has absolutely no applicability to software.

<comment><USER3> Why do you think software business model can't be applied to drug development?

On of the biggest problem with drug research is that it's highly regulated by government, so it's too costly for a small startup. Remove this regulations and you'll get a software-like situation with thousands of startups and new drugs.

e.g. read this: [http://daniellefong.com/2010/02/11/how-law-shapes-the- busine...](http://daniellefong.com/2010/02/11/how-law-shapes-the-business- landscape-and-a-patent-puzzle/)

<comment><USER4> While the current FDA system may be overkill, do you really want the market flooded with new drugs whose effects aren't well understood?

<comment><USER3> Do you really want the market flooded with new software, whose effects aren't well understood?

You can find effective software despite almost no government regulation, why do you think it won't work for drugs? I'm sure a lot of private rating agencies evolve in the such free market of drugs.

<comment><USER5> software doesn't kill people

<comment><USER5> should i revise to iphones don't kill people?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I think patents are a big impediment to innovation.

And I think they are morally wrong. Why do I lose my right to do something because you write that thing down before I do?

Coming up with an idea is only a very small part of the battle. Making a viable product is much harder but also not the biggest problem.

The biggest challenge often is getting people to buy a thing. And we already have significant incentives in place for that.

There are things that we need that take a great deal of investment to discover and that cannot be protected with trade secrets.

But if the innovation is of significant value, presumably one can make a profit from it and get to market faster than the competition, so there is reward for innovating.

People that need an innovation can also create a bounty or reward for making it happen. And we have seen a lot effort in response to things like the x prize and darpa's grand challenge.

So I don't see how the alleged benefits of patents justify the curtailment of individual rights.

<comment><USER7> > Why do I lose my right to do something because you write that thing down > before I do?

The inherent problem with patents and (to a lesser extent) copyright is that they attempt to fix one problem and as a side affect enforce this too.

Playing devils advocate for a moment; a society without patents is unfairly weighted (in terms of invention) towards BigCo. i.e. you get a lot more innovation but only those with big cash can do something with it - and not necessarily by paying the inventor.

Under current law things are potentially unfairly balanced to the patent holder. I realise that in practicality it is still weighted towards BigCo anyway because they can fund lawsuits etc.

There is, surely, a balance between the two extremes (I don't believe we have it at the moment).

As it happens I think we need to be careful considering the broad concept of patents. We are all familiar and, probably, all opposed to the idea of Software Patents in their current form (or at all). However making software is reasonably trivial - and getting a patent is, thought relatively costly, not too difficult.

This is not entirely the case in other industries; which makes a slight difference (in the sense that the investment for software development is generally lower for an individual inventor)

<comment><USER6> but is the cost of developing software lower than simply coming up with an idea?

You say that no patents would favor big companies. But without intellectual property, wouldn't it be EASIER for anyone to compete with the big companies?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The idea behind patents is to given inventors an incentive to disclose their inventions to the public in exchange for getting a monopoly on them for a limited time. Even the word patent derives for its Latin antecedent meaning "open" (in contrast to its English-derived counterpart, "latent"). And, of course, a monopoly grant over any invention will by definition hinder others from using that same invention during the term of the monopoly.

In open, collaborative environments, you have openness by definition and you have no need to give inventors incentives to disclose because they are doing this axiomatically day-by-day as they routinely share their development work. In such an environment, it will appear absurd to the inventors that they should be hindered from doing their work by arbitrary restrictions granted to a monopolist over what they regard as routine tools of their trade. This seems arbitrary, capricious, and damaging. Such a system can even be perceived to be obscene in allowing others who happened to win the rush to the patent office door by a hair's breadth to bring damage claims for up to two decades against others who were not quite so fleet of foot. And all the more so if the "inventor" is not really anything of the sort but rather some troll who lays about conceiving "claims" that get patented for the sole purpose of extorting money from those who truly are in the real world inventing useful products. And hideously so to those who philosophically oppose the idea of such monopoly grants altogether, and see them as being even vicious and oppressive as they are condoned by the social policy of the day as upheld by politicians, lawyers, and lobbyists.

That is the case against patents as reflected in the spectrum of opinion pretty widely found here on HN, and it reflects the open, collaborative perspective many of the members here take with respect to the very idea of innovation.

In essence, the paper cited in this piece says that the whole world of innovation has moved, or is rapidly moving, to a state where openness is the governing principle behind most inventions. If that is indeed true, then the authors of that paper are right by definition - a patent system that is designed to spur public disclosure by, in effect, "paying" the inventor via a temporally-limited grant of a monopolistic advantage over the invention makes no sense where inventors are more than happy to disclose it all for free based on other things that may motivate them (the gaining of recognition, the belief that useful information ought to be free, or whatever).

The real question, though, is whether this assumption of the authors is a correct one. Things clearly have changed in major areas of innovation but to generalize this to the whole world of innovation may or may not be valid. And that is why the patent reform movement is in fact moving quite slowly in the broader society, whatever its fervor in the narrower circles frequented by the members here.

Not saying that reform is not needed - it plainly is. Just don't be surprised if others aren't eager to join in the movement, especially when they are subjected to the counter influences brought on by lobbyists, lawyers, etc. The movement may take sway with Congress but I wouldn't expect this to happen any time soon.

</comment><comment><USER9> As usual, history provides a slightly more useful perspective on patents, and on how their utility is changing along with society.

Although the idea of patents was first introduced a very long time ago, their modern version didn't show up until the 1800s or so. At that time, there were meager tools available to the average citizen, and innovation then wasn't like it is today. It more typically required a disproportionate outlay of resources, especially given that (at the time) labor was relatively cheaper than technology in the southern parts of the U.S.

Later, the U.S. underwent the industrial revolution, and innovation moved from profit-motivated individuals to profit-motivated companies; again, patents were seen -- correctly, at the time -- to be fostering the innovation that was advancing America's technological development.

But the landscape is much different today. The average individual has at hand resources that would have been remarkable to Ford or Edison, and probably dumbfounding to Eli Whitney. For roughly a month's salary, I might accumulate all of the materials I need to invent a new kind of robot, and if I'm interested in software, then all I need is a computer, some time, and a problem to solve.

So, _now_ patents are no longer as justifiably the protectors of innovation, and _now_ the case can be made that they are actually hindering it.

Conditions aren't the same now as they always were.

<comment><USER10> The newly industrial US ignored foreign patents and copyrights - claiming they were an attempt by europe to keep the new country down. Dicken's Martin Chuzzlewit is an attack on the widespread (legal) piracy of his works in the US. It's also how US steel got it's head start - by not having to pay a license for the Bessemer converter.

Then at the end of the 19C when the US was industrialized it suddenly got a lot more interested in patents. It's rather like how Disney wants to use 19th century fairy tales in it's cartoons for free while making sure it's stories will still be copyrighted in the 29th century

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Here is the paper they cite: <http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1502864>

One of the authors of the research paper has a lot of work on innovation and open source in general:

<http://web.mit.edu/evhippel/www/papers.htm>

<comment><USER12> Do I ever _hate_ the SSRN web site. Damned thing never actually produces the file for me.

Thanks for the link to the author's site. He has a non SSRN link to the paper on the following page; the link text is the "(PDF)" that follows the SSRN link he first cites.

<http://web.mit.edu/evhippel/www/papers/evh-08.htm>

<comment><USER13> Thanks for that - I'd found a free version via scholar.google.com

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I thought this was an elegant defence of open source:

> This result hinges on the fact that the innovative design itself is a non- > rival good: each participant in a collaborative effort gets the value of the > whole design, but incurs only a fraction of the design cost.

<comment><USER15> Nope. Without some sort of patent, each participant in a collaborate effort gets nothing and whomever is most successful in marketing the result gets everything.

<comment><USER16> You assume they collaborate to _sell_ whatever the result of the collaboration is.

<comment><USER15> Don't get me wrong... I _used_ to totally buy the open source idealistic worldview. Then I actually got involved in business.

You don't understand what a brawl business can be. People almost _never_ collaborate to sell! You want the customers, you want the leverage!

Heh... collaborate to sell... how cute...

Marketing is more winner-take-all than anything else.

Nice happy idealism sounds really great until you end up in the real world with people competing over money when they have kids, mortgages to pay, etc.

<comment><USER10> You are a US car company - you find the cheapest supplier and every year cut the amount you are willing to pay - when the supplier goes broke you start again. Most of your costs and effort is put into writing contracts and NDAs and making sure that no information leaks from your engineers to the supplier. If the supplier makes faulty brakes - you sue them, spending 10x as much on lawyers as on engineers.

You are a Japanese car company - you work with your suppliers and often invest in them, you lend them your engineers to make their process more efficent, every year their costs go down and you both make more profit. If they make bad parts you spend the money you would have spent on lawyers on fixing the problem and stopping it happening again.

Of course this level of cooperation is the reason Japanese car companies can't pay their mortgages while US car companies dominate the world.

But I suppose it works for cute little outfits like Mitsubishi or Fuji.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Regardless of the validity of this or other arguments against the current patent system, how viable would an effort to reform the system be? I think it would take a tremendous force to do so. Something on the order of a developed (not even imminent) and undeniable disadvantage relative to other countries who have a different system.

An analogy would be that you'll never be able to remove government entitlements unless the nation faces bankruptcy because the recipients will fight tooth and nail to keep them.

<comment><USER18> You can work around the system until it becomes irrelevant.

For example, patents are not prevalent in software. There is hardly an innovation crisis in software.

Hardware design is also becoming more like software design. Same with business processes.

<comment><USER14> >There is hardly an innovation crisis in software.

Tell that to the HTML5 video codec people.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I think the bar is just far too low.

</comment><comment><USER20> I was going to comment here but I went off on a bit of a tangent: [http://jheriko-rtw.blogspot.com/2010/04/why-patents- irritate...](http://jheriko-rtw.blogspot.com/2010/04/why-patents-irritate-me- so.html)

I believe that no scientific theory or logical argument can support patents - further I believe my opinion can be proved fairly rigorously. Although the utility of such proof is not obvious.

</comment><comment><USER21> The basis for the patent system reflects the tradition of individualism in this country. The idea of a lone inventor (or lone company) creating new stuff is romantic but unrealistic. Invention is often building on top of other ideas and knowledge. It's more of a collaborating effort, as this paper re-affirmed.

</comment><comment><USER22> "the putative theory that..."

this is bad usage. it's definitely a theory.

</comment><comment><USER18> I've found plenty of research that concludes that patents hinder innovation.

I have been able to find any studies that conclude that patents help innovation. Can somebody provide links if there are any?

I only see the number of patents mentioned as "evidence" of innovation.

<comment><USER23> What about drug discovery? The road to approval is a long, risky, and amazingly expensive one. Without patent protection, there wouldn't be a lot of incentive to develop new drugs.

I think, as software people, we tend to generalize the ridiculousness of software patents, and we decide that all patents are ridiculous. There are industries where innovation is the result of serious risk and serious investment, and it is in everyone's best interest to encourage that. The rub is figuring out which industries and which classes of innovation should be protected, and which should not be protected.

<comment><USER24> Even with patent protection, there's only direct incentive to develop new drugs for rich people, who can pay for them---which is why you don't see as much research on medicines for malaria as, say, erectile dysfunction.

<comment><USER4> Is that true? Is there really less research on medicines for malaria than erectile dysfunction? I've met a whole bunch of malaria researchers, but never an erectile dysfunction researcher.

<comment><USER25> It is clear from the context that he is talking about private-market research, not NSF funded university research, etc.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Billionaire Marc Benioff donates $30M to research homelessness - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/01/business/marc-benioff-ucsf-donation-homeless-research-trnd/index.html <comment><USER2> Although I applaud the donation, I'm skeptical of what will come of it.

In Canada, at all levels of government, every few years we see a new study being funded on how to end homelessness. Everyone cheers. Finally, someone is doing something! Then the study goes unnoticed, ignored, or is otherwise unactionable.

But no worries, because someone else will fund a study and we'll get to the bottom of it this time!

It's an endless cycle.

Maybe this will be different. It's not government afterall, it's private money. Maybe he'll take an approach similar to Bill Gates and actually do something about the problem he paid to study. It would be a pleasant surprise.

But for now? I'm taking a "wait and see" approach. Marc certainly goes out of his way to portray an image of a good man trying to use his wealth to accomplish good things. I'd really like to see some of that come to more than just P.R.

</comment><comment><USER3> Here's a recent exposé about homelessness in Seattle:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpAi70WWBlw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpAi70WWBlw)

My takeaway: drug addiction and mental illness are the real problems. Homelessness is just a symptom of the disease. Why does that distinction matter? Building affordable housing without infrastructure and services to address addiction and mental health will not work.

</comment><comment><USER4> It's 4981 years of hotel here (16.5€/night). There is no secret to discover in homelessness. They have housing and/or drug and/or mental disorder problem. They need to stop using drug, a good psy with a working treatment and a house. House is the simpler to fix. Let's start with that.

<comment><USER5> How does housing fix the drug or mental disorder problem? How do we pay for the housing or address the issues with supply and demand when providing free housing?

With engineering, very few engineers would start work on a design that only addresses a small part of the known problem space.

<comment><USER6> As someone who knows struggling addicts with good housing who would otherwise be homeless, yeah, housing does absolutely not fix the problem. It's so complicated.

Nihilism and a lack of a reason to care about getting better. Drugs offer a cheap escape from their grim view of reality. No friends who aren't addicts, so it's normalized.

A criminal record blocking gainful employment. Court mandated treatment programs that prevent people from moving away from their deadend town and self reinforcing social circle of addicts. Court mandated treatment that's forcing them to spend all of their time around other addicts, who only have drugs in common and thus have their relationships built on the shared interest in drugs, preventing them from participating in anything that would lead to a more productive social circle.

Their criminal record might mean that by an enormous margin the most lucrative thing they can do, and perhaps actually their only realistic hope of financial independence, freedom, and an escape from their miserable reality of barely scraping by spending most of their time doing things they hate, is to sell drugs, which is self reinforcing their environment.

<comment><USER4> Yeah. You describe that well. It is a very difficult problem.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> My father is homeless. No matter how much money you throw at him, he's never been able to be self-reliant. He has not had his own place for over 20 years (I'm 31 years old). He has problems with alcohol and can never stick with anything (jobs, education, trade schools).

I think my father's homeless situation is very similar to 95% of the homeless population. They can't break their old habits or just don't want to. It takes a very competent person to stick with a job, make sure all your bills, and to acquire the skills needed to make someone want to pay you more than minimum wage.

If someone has drive and is competent, there is no reason for them to be homeless. There is so much free information out there or very cheap courses to learn many skills that are in demand.

</comment><comment><USER8> For $30 million he could pretty much end homelessness, surely? At least in a couple of cities.

<comment><USER9> I think the last 50 years have shown that simply throwing money at homelessness won't make it go away. Most modern projects to reduce homelessness have either had unexpectedly underwhelming results or surprisingly large unintended consequences.

I think that is about as clear a sign as we're going to get that our common sense notions about how to solve homelessness are insufficient, which means further scientific research is necessary.

<comment><USER10> They had a different experience with throwing money at the problem in London. There it actually worked for their test group.

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/free-money-might- be-...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/free-money-might-be-the-best- way-to-end-poverty/2013/12/29/679c8344-5ec8-11e3-95c2-13623eb2b0e1_story.html)</comment></comment></comment>


How to Set Up Spark with Jupyter Painlessly on AWS EC2 - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/PiercingDan/spark-Jupyter-AWS <comment><USER2> Or just use AWS Lambda + AWS Codebuild if you need some longer running higher RAM nodes.</comment>