The Best of Material Design, Daily - <AUTHOR> http://www.materialup.com

<comment><USER3> I find the white backgrounds in Material obnoxious. It's as if Google's designers work in well-lit offices and don't test this stuff in dark environments where a white background hurts to look at. Light backgrounds also waste power with AMOLED screens.

I can understand why Google wasn't inclined to include a full theme engine on Android and ask to app developers to support that, however it seems to me that having a system-wide light-mode and dark-mode would be a great feature for devices centered around mobility and therefore not always used in well-lit offices.

<comment><USER4> Material on Android supports dark themes super well. Comes with MATERIAL.LIGHT and MATERIAL.DARK by default. It's up to the app developer to include an option to switch in the settings, but this is common in apps that are focused on reading.

Most people prefer light.

<comment><USER5> Would be nice in this case for the setting to be global rather than per app.

<comment><USER6> And force the developer of every app to do two complete themes (assuming they have some branding / color scheme)? While I agree it would be nice if everyone did have the option, I don't think it makes sense as a requirement.

<comment><USER7> You could have a global setting which is used by all apps supporting that theme.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Those are the best examples of material design? Most of them are phone screenshots, higher than they're wide, on a blah background. The "material design" thing is supposed to be about dynamic effects. You click on things and they ripple. If the site let you go to the actual site or app being described, that would be more interesting. Or they showcased the material effects on their own site.

Everybody has solid-color rectangles now. They're boring.

<comment><USER9> MaterialUp is actually pretty smart about this: \- It integrates with sites such as CodePen or JSFiddle: i.e: [http://www.materialup.com/posts/add- button](http://www.materialup.com/posts/add-button)

\- You can view app screenshots directly from the site (see below) and it you click on the big preview, it'll take you to the actual app. i.e: [http://www.materialup.com/posts/dailymotion](http://www.materialup.com/posts/dailymotion)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Material design is about _semantics_ ; the documents make that clear [0]. When people "get it wrong," that's what they are usually missing.

Even deeper than the semantics of material, though, is the ontology of the space. If you think that most bad design decisions flow from an inadequate conceptual model of the domain, check out this 1998 MIT thesis from Mark Foltz, "Designing Navigable Information Spaces." It has changed my world.

[0] [http://google.com/design](http://google.com/design)

[1] [http://www.ai.mit.edu/projects/infoarch/publications/mfoltz-...](http://www.ai.mit.edu/projects/infoarch/publications/mfoltz- thesis/)

PDF version at

[http://rationale.csail.mit.edu/publications/Foltz1998Designi...](http://rationale.csail.mit.edu/publications/Foltz1998Designing.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER11> Really hope this Material Design nonsense doesn't take off. It's awful (especially on the web).

<comment><USER12> Considering a bunch of people seem to be a) fairly keen on it and b) seem - <USER2> least at first glance - seem to have thought fairly hard about issues related to UX and aesthetics, surely you can put a teensy bit more effort into your critique?

EDIT - money where one's mouth is time. Here's my take: There's some great stuff and some slightly less convincing stuff in the original 'Material' concept pitch but the problem is that the devil lies firmly in the details and it's already getting Cargo Cult-ed to hell and back - even in Google's own core products.

However - I've generally found the quality of the critiques to be far below the quality of the topic being critiqued and I'm quite comfortable calling people out on lazy reactions if they haven't bothered to convince me that they've given the subject the attention it deserves.

EDIT2 - Another thought has congealed after reading some more comments. The cargo cult is partly the fault of the original pitch. You can't propose something that is ostensibly as based on abstract principals as 'Material Design' is and only give a single implementation as the example without inviting people to fail to see through the surface details. Show us 'Material Design' with a completely different look and feel and then we might find it easier to grok the underlying principles and not get hung up on the specific choices made for this particular implementation.

Or to put it another way - how would Material Design look if you wanted to distance yourself from the new Google branding as much as possible? What would remain constant?

<comment><USER11> I don't have to say much, just go and read the manifesto for Material Design. It's a lot of words that don't mean anything [1].

Another problem with it is that it's extremely trendy. Bright, almost fluorescent colors, ridiculous amounts of whitespace almost to a fault, long shadows, arbitrary grids for icons, etc.

The bigger problem is that Google decided to become smartasses about creating a new design language. They took it way too seriously and I think who this hurts the most is the developers who make apps for Android. They don't know what Material Design means -- really means, as in how Google sees it. Third party developers will never really be able to adapt it properly and what you're going to end up with is a whole new type of visual fragmentation in Android.

This look already looks dated, and I can't imagine what it will look like in a year.

[1] [http://www.google.com/design/spec/material- design/introducti...](http://www.google.com/design/spec/material- design/introduction.html#introduction-goals)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I'm not a designer and would like professional designers to weigh in. With most Material Design apps/sites, doesn't the ultra bold colors distract away from the content? I thought content is suppose to be king not the UI.

<comment><USER14> I design enterprise apps. I have to justify every single color used. If a color doesn't serve function, then I don't use it.

In my opinion, Google hasn't had good track record with UI/UX and building usable products.

Microsoft's take of Material design is superior. Case in point, their outlook.com.

<comment><USER15> You bring up a good point. If people want to figure out how to do Material Design in a non-Google context, all they need to do is get a Windows Phone and see how it's implemented in apps there, both dark and light themes. Google's design language is mostly a variation on Microsoft's.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> The "best" of light grey text on a white background!

</comment><comment><USER17> I just updated to Android Lollipop and now my phone is full of that MD crap. I soooo want to roll back.

<comment><USER18> Yeah, I won't accept the update, and I've disabled most of my Google apps, where they shove Material on you even if you're on KitKat.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I think people are taking Material Design too literally.

All these sites look the same.

They're letting Material Design become 'the' primary branding element.

</comment><comment><USER19> Here is a good explanation of Material Design principles: [http://materialdesignblog.com/the-ultimate-guide-to- googles-...](http://materialdesignblog.com/the-ultimate-guide-to-googles- material-design/)

</comment><comment><USER20> Anyone else notice that all images flicker slightly when you hover over any image?

I'm on a 15" rMBP and scrolling on Chromium is painfully laggy.

It's also painfully obvious that the people responsible for making this did not bother reading the actual spec.

</comment><comment><USER21> I made a couple of apps now in Material design, but I must say it is hard to maintain some form of unique identity. It's hard to not just be 'skinning' and come up with interesting ways of display UI elements and data.

</comment><comment><USER22> The constant zoom-in/zoom-out on the Tools page is killing my eyes. Dont know if that's intended but that's really annoying.

</comment><comment><USER23> I'm all for emulating good design but I feel like these guys are blatantly ripping of Product Hunt [1], right down to the last detail. Everything from the daily aggregation concept and the flyout preview to the presentation of the likes as avatars.

[1] [http://producthunt.com](http://producthunt.com)

<comment><USER4> There are tons of "ProductHunt for X" websites. Here's a list of them, on ProductHunt: [https://www.producthunt.com/kwdinc/collections/product- hunt-...](https://www.producthunt.com/kwdinc/collections/product-hunt-for-x)

<comment><USER23> Wow, I stand corrected. I had no idea the idea had spread this far. My apologies!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> flat design is dead already ? /s</comment>


HTML5 vs Flex for rich Internet applications - Pamela Fox (Google AU) - <AUTHOR> http://igniteshow.com/videos/html5-vs-flex-rich-internet-applications

<comment><USER2> Interesting to see a Google representative claiming the video format of HTML5 will be OGG.</comment>


Why Obama Should Offer Edward Snowden a Deal - <AUTHOR> http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2015/06/president_obama_should_offer_edward_snowden_a_deal_the_former_nsa_contractor.html

<comment><USER2> The author of that article doesn't seem to have the slightest grasp of who Obama is or what he's about. Hell, doing the right thing has never been what any American President has been about.</comment>


Purenode - The future of web programming? - <AUTHOR>

Check out this website: http://www.purenode.com/_home<p>Be sure to watch the video at the bottom-left of the page. Sure, it's still new and needs some work. But it's obvious from this video that it has major potential. Is this the future of web programming? <comment><USER2> Seems more complicated to me..

<comment><AUTHOR> If that's the case, could you recommend anything to help us improve our webapp?</comment></comment>


What Happens When Mice Eat Nothing But Powdered Food - <AUTHOR> http://www.popsci.com/article/science/what-happens-when-mice-eat-nothing-powdered-food

<comment><USER2> I'm looking forward to my Soylent arriving, but I am not going to deny myself the joy of cooking something delicious on my own accord.

</comment><comment><USER3> It's time for soylent green pallets.</comment>


Ask HN: What are some hard-tech blogs that you follow? - <AUTHOR> Hey HN! I wanted to know what are some of the hard-tech (loosely defined ranging from climate tech, space exploration, autonomous systems, biotech, nuclear to name a few) blogs that you follow?
My understanding is that hard tech companies usually face a different gamut of obstacles while building their tech and scaling their business, namely, unproven technology, iteration rate, endless research, uncertain milestones, regulation etc.
Please post away!
PS: Reposting this because there were no comments last time but got some upvotes, indicating interest. <comment><USER2> There's many

[https://wiki.nikitavoloboev.xyz/research/blogs#favorite- blog...](https://wiki.nikitavoloboev.xyz/research/blogs#favorite-blogs)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for sending this! This is a great collection.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> [https://blog.mainframe.dev/](https://blog.mainframe.dev/)

I'm never going to install, or even program, a Mainframe. But the technical details are very interesting.

</comment><comment><USER4> I don't subscribe, but I tend to binge read:

[https://blog.scottlowe.org/](https://blog.scottlowe.org/) (anything and everything network related)

[https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/](https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/) (anything 'pharma' but especially "Things I won't work with..")

I wonder if they're related ...

edit: fiddle with formatting / spelling

</comment><comment><USER5> IEEE Spectrum is the closest thing that comes to mind ... but the literature on hard tech is indeed scant.

</comment><comment><USER6> [https://physicstoday.scitation.org/journal/pto](https://physicstoday.scitation.org/journal/pto)

</comment><comment><USER7> [https://ipj.dreamhosters.com/](https://ipj.dreamhosters.com/)

The Internet Protocol Journal

</comment><comment><USER8> Real World Tech (David Kanter)

<comment><USER9> link: [https://www.realworldtech.com/](https://www.realworldtech.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> good question - great links.

</comment><comment><USER11> ScienceDaily.com

</comment><comment><USER12> wingolog.org</comment>


How a Company You Never Heard of Sends You Letters about Your Medical Condition - <AUTHOR> http://gizmodo.com/how-a-company-you-ve-never-heard-of-sends-you-letters-a-1795643539 <comment><AUTHOR> Super interesting article.

Shame the mixed the Walgreens stuff with the acurian problem though, as these seem to be 2 very different situations. You only notice if you read carefully and understand a bit about the tech behind it :/</comment>


Museum of the World - <AUTHOR> https://britishmuseum.withgoogle.com/ <comment><USER2> I remember some of the interactive CDROM encyclopedias that came out in the 90s. Encarta I think was one. They always had the coolest and hardest to use interfaces. I've got a Nat geo collection of a 100 years of their magazines (guessing) and it isn't really usable across a dozen disks. I wonder if this supports screen readers? The loading screen gives me warm fuzzy feelings about my days coding Flash.

I haven't been able to see what is past the spotted screens yet because I'm using a 5 year old laptop. Latest Chrome, latest Safari. Someone else tell me if it is as cool a resource as I imagine!

I tried again, still can't make it past the dots.

</comment><comment><USER3> What does the British Museum mean by this text (in several of the object descriptions)?

"The British Museum acknowledges contemporary cultural perspectives associated with the objects in its collection. Please note: cultural rights may apply to this object."

<comment><USER4> "We realize that some of our stuff may be looted from other places, and acknowledge other people have legitimate cultural claims to it, but we still aren't giving it back."</comment></comment>


ignore_rant - <AUTHOR> ignore_rant <comment> tech-historian > Eventually she tells me the code doesn't work the way I think it does, and > as such my change is much more complicated to implement, will require a > major refactor, etc.

Technical debt is a hell of a thing.</comment>


Should I buy LED or CFL light bulbs?  - <AUTHOR> http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/energy/stories/should-i-buy-led-or-cfl-light-bulbs <comment><USER2> One major thing no one ever seems to mention or realize about CFL bulbs is that if you read the fine print on the packaging, the life expectancy is based on leaving the bulb on for long periods of time like 3 hours per day continuous.

They have warnings along the lines of that damp environments like bathrooms, and turning them off quickly (less than 20-30 minutes on) significantly decreases the life of the bulb.

So if you plan to use CFLs that will be turned on and off quickly like bedrooms, bathrooms, hall lights, etc - basically everywhere except the living room / reading light that you plan to have on for hours at a time - CFLs will die faster than an incandescent - within 12-18 months of light use. You basically get punished for being good at turning off lights when not in use.

<comment><USER3> It's not only turning on/off that wears it out. CFLs lose efficiency over time anyway, down to 80-70% of the light output in as soon as 6 months. After a year or two they can be below 50%. Tri-phosphorous ones stay efficient for longer, but are harder to find, usually labeled for professional applications, and cost more.

If I'm not mistaken, LEDs being solid state don't lose efficiency over time like that, so it's always working at peak output as long as the driver lasts. That alone should make it more cost effective.

<comment><USER4> No. In fact, the LED lifetime stated on the packaging is actually the time it takes to decrease in brightness to a specified reference level -- usually 70% of initial brightness.

Since it is solid-state, though, the LED is expected to continue operating long after it reaches 70% brightness. 70% is simply the assumed reference point at which the consumer becomes annoyed and decides to replace the LED.

Source: Department of Energy, "Lifetime of White LEDs", [http://apps1.eere.energy.gov/buildings/publications/pdfs/ssl...](http://apps1.eere.energy.gov/buildings/publications/pdfs/ssl/lifetime_white_leds.pdf)

> _the Alliance for Solid State Illumination Systems and Technologies > (ASSIST), a group led by the Lighting Research Center (LRC), recommends > defining useful life as the point at which light output has declined to 70% > of initial lumens (abbreviated as L70) for general lighting and 50% (L50) > for LEDs used for decorative purposes._

<comment><USER3> Even the new generation LED lamps are like that (Cree X and such)? I read something the other day that suggested these LEDs were immune to losing efficiency over time (the efficiency would be dictated only by heat).

<comment><USER4> Yes, LEDs will last longer without heat issues. But unless you're running the LED in a refrigerator, that's not a particularly informative statement.

As stated in the DOE that I linked to: "The primary cause of LED lumen depreciation is heat generated at the LED junction." Because it's the primary cause, you can't just ignore it and say that LEDs barely degrade in the absence of heat. You have to consider the heat when calculating LED lifetime.

The stated lifetime on the LED packaging makes a number of assumptions, one of which is that the LED is run at room temperature.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> _" We already know that incandescent light-bulbs are on the way out because they're incredibly wasteful, being better at producing heat than light."_

In climates like the northeast U.S., the heat that incandescent bulbs generate isn't wasted for most of the year: it helps heat your house, which means you burn slightly less oil or gas in your furnace. They're only wasteful during the summer months. And a CFL probably takes more energy to manufacture and recycle, and needs more packaging material to prevent breakage, since nobody likes to clean up toxic mercury spills. (After having read the dire warnings on the EPA's web site about what procedure to follow if you break a CFL, I never wanted buy another CFL again.)

<comment><USER6> Interesting point, but that's mainly true if you use resistive electric heating. Heat pumps are much more efficient than turning electricity directly into heat unless it's extremely cold.

<comment><USER5> But if you're using _both_ the light and the heat generated by the light bulb, aren't you making use of almost 100% of the energy that's being consumed?

<comment><USER6> Heat pumps actually move existing heat indoors, from outside, using electricity to do the mechanical work, so it's much more efficient than just using electricity to create heat directly.

<comment><USER7> More specifically, heat pumps often have a COP of around 2, even in very cold weather (-20℃). That means that for every two joules that a light bulb turns into heat, you will save only one joule (and less in most conditions) on your overall energy consumption.

In very, very cold areas, the COP of the heat pump will reduce to 1, and in those cases the incandescent bulb isn't wasting any energy.

<comment><USER6> Thanks for putting specific numbers to it. It's really surprisingly efficient, especially at warmer temps (0℃) which are more common in most of the US.

<comment><USER7> That number is also assuming that the pump pulls from the air rather than the ground. Ground based pumps are apparently more efficient (well, energy effective; efficient is not quite the right word in this case) because the ground warms up in the sun more than the air.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> To add to the list, my experience is that half of the CFLs I have been using die way earlier than expected, which has not been the case with LEDs. Also, you cannot use regular CFLs outside in cold countries (-20C), and the special one that are supposed to work in cold temp. are as expensive as LEDs.

At this point I find that the LEDs are cheap enough to be worth buying, one to avoid the pain point of CFLs (slow start, fragile, early death), and two to support the industry into the next generation.

<comment><USER9> I also hate the hum of fluorescent ballasts and the cheaper CFLs, in my experience, have a louder hum that I drives me insane.

<comment><USER10> Fluorescents and CFLs have not hummed in about a decade - just how old are your bulbs?

<comment><USER9> Brand new. I bought 10 new CFLs at Home Depot a few weeks ago and returned them a half hour later.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This is a status report from the awesome work the DOE is doing to map the state of the art in lighting technology and continue to provide incentives to the industry to keep advancing standards, efficiency, and quality in what it takes to get an energy star label. This is from a wide range of samples in 2011, things only get better from here.

The DOE knows they didn't do so hot with CFLs and anybody you talk to will complain about them. They are not making the same mistake twice, and reports like this, as well and monitoring programs like CALIPER ([http://www1.eere.energy.gov/buildings/ssl/caliper.html](http://www1.eere.energy.gov/buildings/ssl/caliper.html)) provide great independent data for consumers to read if they want real numbers.

You have to realize that any CFL plant is just being run out to try and squeeze every last cent from the facility before it gets shut down, so the quality is going to drop as companies lose interest in them. If you buy from a reputable company (Philips, Cree, GE, etc.. etc..) you'll do much better than these averages.

(I used to be in the lighting industry)

</comment><comment><USER12> How far have LEDs come in terms of looking pleasant in terms of light quality? There's wildly different anecdotal data on how well people respond even to the highest quality CRI. Looking at spectroradiometer charts even bulbs rated 95+ CRI have very narrow spikes compared to a blackbody radiator.

<comment><USER13> > _Looking at spectroradiometer charts even bulbs rated 95+ CRI have very > narrow spikes compared to a blackbody radiator._

Are you sure you're not looking at SPDs for CFLs instead?

LED lightbulbs at least typically seem to have relatively broad and even spectral coverage, even if the distribution is a little lumpy and only a rough approximation of a BB.

All the SPDs of CFLs I've seen on other other hand, are vastly worse, with lots of super intense and narrow spikes in the middle of large areas of almost nothing.

In other words, CFL SPDs look _nothing_ like a BB SPD, whereas LEDs can kinda- sorta-come-close-if-you-squint (it depends on the particular bulb, but some are not bad at all).

[LED lighting also seems much more likely to improve significantly in the future, as it's been developed for a much shorter time than florescent lighting.]

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> So it looks like in terms of cost, LED is now to the point where it is the smart buy if you consider your time valuable at all (how much time do you want to spend changing light bulbs?). The energy expenditure might be the same between CFL and LED, but if you figure you need to change a CFL 3x as often, that's 3 times the lightbulb changing events.

Also, it seems like we are reaching diminishing returns outside of potential manufacturing efficiencies at some point in the future. How far can we go to make lighting efficient until it makes more sense to focus on other areas of energy consumption like the systems that manage your lighting or other home/office utility infrastructure like the Nest thermostat?

<comment><USER15> Unless there is some sort of significant impediment to changing a bulb (eg. a covered fixture), it takes 30 seconds to a minute _maximum_ to change a bulb. It will probably take everyone reading this more time to read the article and participate in this thread than it will to change every light bulb in their house for the next decade. It's negligible.

There are many things to take into account when purchasing bulbs; chance are, the time it takes to change them is not one.

<comment><USER16> Counterpoints: ceiling fans in high places (like, ceilings), flood lights at the corner of a three story house, sealed in-ground lights, ...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> > one by Philips that gets 200 lumens/watt.

The absolute theoretical max for efficiency is 251 lumens/watt. I find it incredibly unlikely that they are going to reach 200 with white light.

What I think will happen is they'll get there by having a very low CRI, with off-color light. It's already happening in the market - all the high efficiency bulbs have a CRI of 80 (the minimum needed to get an Energy Star rating). But the CFLs they are compared against often have a CRI of 90.

<comment><USER17> They linked the article that mentioned that 200 lumens/watt lamp ( [http://www.treehugger.com/energy-efficiency/philips-shows- br...](http://www.treehugger.com/energy-efficiency/philips-shows- breakthrough-200-lumenswatt-warm-white-led-lamp.html) ), seems a replacement for fluorescent tubes.

Quote from that: _" [...] this new LED model achieves an impressive 200 lumens/watt while meeting the criteria required for comfortable workplace lighting (ie. a color temperature of 3000–4000 kelvins, a color rendering index of at least 80, and an R9 saturated red level of no less than 20). That's not the same as having a super-efficient LED that produces horrible light quality for the sake of breaking records."_

Also: _" expected to hit the market in 2015 for office and industry applications"_.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> One thing to note is that CFLs take time to "warm up," which is significantly irritating to ensure that I don't use them in most cases.

<comment><USER18> I had the same reaction at first, but then recognized (possibly after reading someone's Slashdot or HN post) that the slowly increasing output is actually quite welcome in some circumstances (e.g., late at night, first thing in the morning). It's not a feature that I'd request, but I don't mind the tradeoff now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> With regard to bulb life, the big thing to remember about both CFL and LED drop-in replacements for incandescent bulbs is that the electronics do not tolerate high temperatures well, so they're not particularly suitable for use in completely closed fixtures.

Where practical, both for heat dissipation and optical purposes, it's far more ideal to use fixtures which are actually designed around these technologies rather than just throwing retrofit bulbs into crappy incandescent fixtures.

I'm really hoping we see more of these sold to the consumer markets. For good quality LED products, you're talking about 50k hour life which makes a non- user-replaceable solution not seem that bad -- some cheap incandescent bulb sockets might start having trouble after equivalent usage.

On the other hand, I'm concerned that we're going to see a repeat of all the cheap low quality products we've seen in CFL-land.

<comment><USER20> Interesting that you should point this out because I converted my home to full ~5000K high-CRI fluorescent in 2003 and now ten years later, I am about a third of the way through replacing all fluorescent bulbs in my household with ~5000K LED bulbs.

I recently tackled the challenge of equipping an enclosed light fixture with an LED bulb. I ended up going with the Xledia D series A19 bulb. (Warning, Xledia is a Chinese company and I think they've hired a gray-hat SEO company to spam up Twitter and the like; but don't let that taint whatever merits they have in engineering.)

The D125 [1] is my favorite LED bulb to-date. My wife, an electrical engineer, was incredulous: "you bought a seventeen watt LED bulb??" It's quite astonishing to fire that beast up. 2000 lumens. And true to its spammy marketing ("the most efficient series of omni-directional LED bulbs suitable for fully enclosed fixtures"), its temperature management is impressive.

After hours of operation, its lens is merely warm, heatsink is hot but not flinch-inducing in the same manner a fully-warmed incandescent bulb would be.

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00EW6R0EC](http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00EW6R0EC) (available elsewhere as well)

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Great comments here, and interesting article. If anyone is interested, here is a book on LED lighting: [http://www.amazon.com/LED-Lighting-Primer- Future/dp/14493347...](http://www.amazon.com/LED-Lighting-Primer- Future/dp/1449334768)

covers all the basics - CFL lifespan, lumen depreciation, etc.

</comment><comment><USER22> Are there good CFL or LED bulbs with proper color temp? I end up using halogen bulbs in every room in my house because I've not been able to find anything that's remotely as nice.

<comment><USER23> I don't know the term associated with them, but I have bought CFLs that have a more incadescent-like yellow cast than the usual prison-hallway colored ones.

<comment><USER24> How much would the light be dimmed by putting a shade of some sort over the LED lamp?

<comment><USER23> It would depend on the opacity of the shade itself.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I'm confused. The story talks about manufacturing and transport. However, I don't care about that.

As a consumer, I want to know $/lumen. That's it.

The last time I looked, the energy savings for LED were swamped by the upfront purchase costs. CFLs were still significantly cheaper.

Of course, that's for NZ, and the US might be different.

NZ Prices from Consumers NZ (Bulb + Running over 5 years)

Incandescent: $115 CFL: $30 LED: $95 (60W equiv), or $57 (40W equiv)

<comment><USER4> What year are the numbers from? I have a hard time believing that New Zealand pays 3x as much for its LEDs as the United States does.

800-lumen LEDs are already down to $15-20 _unsubsidized_ in the United States. Some utilities also provide a subsidy for each LED.

Granted, the 10-watt LED does not save you much in power costs over the 13-watt CFL of equivalent brightness. However, the LED is already cheap enough to be a viable replacement for incandescents in bathrooms, and other areas where high cycling rates will kill CFLs.

<comment><USER25> Those numbers are NZD, and from less than 2 months ago. :) To convert to USD, multiply by 0.8.

I just looked on the home hardware website, and they don't sell any MR16s that are more than 6.5W. The 12W bulb is a 650 lumen and sells for NZ$13. However, a CFL goes for less than NZ$4. That $9 will buy you a lot of electricity.

At 3hrs/day, and NZ$0.25/kwh, that's a break even point of ~5.5 years... I think... (6W difference in power usage between CFL and LED?)

Going from a 20W halogen to a 10W led would result in a payback period of 3 years. To me, these sorts of things need to pay off in their warranty period. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I've been wondering the same thing. One question I have: Will LEDs over my bathroom mirror bruise my self esteem as much as the harsh CFLs do?

Seeing a close-up of yourself with CFL complexion when you first wake up and brush your teeth, when you get out of the shower, before you leave the house... it subtly takes its toll after a while.

</comment><comment><USER27> Here's a four page pdf from the EPA on what to do if a CFL breaks. [http://www2.epa.gov/sites/production/files/documents/cflclea...](http://www2.epa.gov/sites/production/files/documents/cflcleanup20120329.pdf)

It's not always about efficiency.

</comment><comment><USER28> Rumors persist about interference between LED bulbs and WiFi networks. Any HNish insights?

<comment><USER20> I've got several LED bulbs in my household and I've not noticed any WiFi connectivity problems or degradation. Sorry I can't give you anything aside from this anecdote. This is the first I've heard of any possible interference.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> LED if you can afford them, CFL if not. There's little difference in their luminous efficacy (aka efficiency) at this point. CFLs have a small amount of mercury in them, so if product neurotoxicity matters to you, go LED.

</comment><comment><USER30> all I need to be happy is a bright set of color changing LED bulbs--you're lying to yourself if you think otherwise.</comment>


Vanishing the People's Wealth to Make the Bosses Richer - <AUTHOR> https://blog.nader.org/2016/07/11/vanishing-the-peoples-wealth-to-make-the-bosses-richer/ <comment> rm_-rf_slash The only situation where buybacks are generally considered a good idea is when the company is undervalued and has sufficient profitability and cash reserves to buy back a portion of outstanding stock. This shores up the share price in the short term, and once the company is trading at higher values it can raise much more money on additional stock offerings since investors are already willing to pay a premium for the scarcer shares.

Unfortunately, asking a CEO whether their company is undervalued is like asking a barber if you need a haircut. That's how you run into situations where companies with absurd cash reserves like Apple and Microsoft are buying back their own stock, but for what purpose? _They already have boatloads of cash! They don 't need to raise any more!_

There are plenty of simple options to deal with this. A law could require stock buybacks to be matched with dividends or taxed at a punitive rate. Alternatively, it could be mandated that buybacks require a majority of shareholder votes, thereby aligning shareholder needs with company activities.

<comment><USER2> I think with Apple and Microsoft it's like this: They've got tons of cash. They don't have any idea where to invest it to provide good returns for their shareholders. But a stock buyback also provides a return to shareholders, so...

The historically-more-normal way of doing this is via dividends (which Microsoft also started doing).

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Stock buybacks have gotten popular over dividends because Shareholders ask for it not management. For the average long term institutional investor, dividends are taxed while increase in inherent value (as opposed to market value capital gains) is not taxed at all. So most large shareholders have been pushing companies to do share buybacks instead of increasing dividends for exactly this reason.

<comment><USER4> I was struggling to think of how buying back stocks could fail to increase the value of the remaining shares. It would have to be that the cash was valued the same whether inside or outside the stock. Wouldn't paying massive dividends then decrease the value of the stock?

Shouldn't we also be asking why unusually (I'm guessing this is unusual) so many companies are earning so much money yet see few worthwhile investment opportunities for the future of the company?

<comment> rm_-rf_slash My unsubstantiated theory is that neoliberal free-market propaganda is discouraging public investment in ventures that private industry would not risk on its own (like renewable energy), at a time when research is more important than ever to handle the needs of a larger-than-ever global population and rapidly advancing climate change.

Some of the best technologies of the last 100 years have been born out of public investment. The need for intense number crunching during the Manhattan Project and the Apollo Program turbocharged computer research. The government's desire to have a self-repairing information network that could largely survive a nuclear attack led the development of what we have as the internet today.

It is unfortunate that the free-market-at-all-costs crowd balks at the idea of the public spending a portion of their money on R&D because they cannot generate a private profit, even though public investment can create new platforms for investment, lower costs for consumers, and ultimately create a larger and wealthier customer base to sell more things to.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> An interesting delve into some of the deeper nuances of the Business Judgment Rule: [http://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=10...](http://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1058&context=wmblr)

In the article, Nader is objecting to the extraction of wealth by _management that doesn't know how or want to deploy it to increase the value of the company and its stakeholders. The money flows from consumers, taxpayers (corporate welfare) and from the sacrifices of workers whose needs and increased productivity could be rewarded with better pay and pensions._

So the key distinction (at least in my mind) is the inclusion of stakeholders vs. just shareholders.

Any company that wants to change the world should include a pledge of duty to stakeholders (the "Corporate Social Responsibility" Model), as well as to shareholders. As an investor, I'm more apt to invest in a company that acknowledges it is a part of the society that enables it to profit.

Granted, companies that do this are less likely to be able to hide behind the Business Judgment Rule; but then again if you're an investor that's probably exactly what you want.

</comment><comment><USER6> More companies need to restructure as benefit corporations with their triple bottom-line responsibility for financial, environmental, and social factors.

[http://www.nytimes.com/blogs/boss/2012/03/14/for-b-corps- a-n...](http://www.nytimes.com/blogs/boss/2012/03/14/for-b-corps-a-new- corporate-structure-and-a-triple-bottom-line/)

</comment><comment><USER7> Capitalism is eating itself. It just happened to survive the first round against comunism, and go unchecked for some 30 years. Now inbalances are becoming obscene, and a breaking point will be reached.

<comment><USER8> I wouldn't say it "just happened" to survive against communism, that was because Edward Bernays [1] provided the framework to produce modern propaganda (PR) to the west while the communists were still producing fairly simple and naive versions.

I'd say the race right now is between new methods of distraction and keeping the collapsing system going just a bit longer with increasingly insane economic tricks. I'm not sure a breaking point is inevitable, there might just be a reasonably smooth slide into neo-feudalism.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_(book)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_\(book\))

<comment><USER2> You don't think that _being a superior economic system_ had anything to do with it? You don't think that _being a more humane social /political system_ had anything to do with it? You think it was just superior propaganda? Seriously?

Gorbachev noted that the USSR had a military that could have gone toe-to-toe with the US, but they couldn't provide toothpaste for their people. Everyone else noted the lines to buy basic necessities. Communism simply didn't work very well, economically. That wasn't propaganda; that was simply obvious comparison of the experience of living on different sides of the Iron Curtain.

Then there was the whole "freedom of speech" thing in the west and the whole "gulag" thing in the east. That was real. The difference was real. (Yes, I know the US seems to be rapidly eroding actual freedom, but it was a real thing at the time, not merely propaganda.)

<comment><USER9> > You don't think that being a superior economic system had anything to do > with it?

Not much -- the initial economic conditions at the beginning of the Cold War pretty much dictated how, even if the systems had been _equal_ , a spending war that _didn 't_ erupt into a full-scale armed conflict _had_ to end, unless one side capitulated in fear of a full-scale armed conflict.

That's not to say that the economic system of the developed West _wasn 't_ a better one than that of the Soviet Union and its satellites, or that their political systems weren't better, from a moral standpoint. Just that that's not why they won; the victory was overdetermined by other factors.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> No mention of Apple's mounds of cash that its holding without using it profitably.</comment>


AI development is going to get even faster - <AUTHOR> https://jack-clark.net/2016/04/03/why-ai-development-is-going-to-get-even-faster-yes-really/ <comment><USER2> _(One challenge: though neural networks generalize very well, we still lack a decent theory to describe them, so much of the field proceeds by intuition. This is both cool and extremely bad. "It's amazing to me that these very vague, intuitive arguments turned out to correspond to what is actually happening," says Ilya Sutskever, research director at OpenAI., of the move to create ever-deeper neural network architectures. Work needs to be done here. "Theory often follows experiment in machine learning," says Yoshua Bengio, one of the founders of the field. Modern AI researchers are like people trying to invent flying machines without the formulas of aerodynamics, says Yann Lecun, Facebook's head of AI.)_

One of the most interesting aspects of the field - we don't have robust ways of predicting what will work without trying it.

<comment><USER3> > Modern AI researchers are like people trying to invent flying machines > without the formulas of aerodynamics

An apt analogy, given that flying machines were designed by individuals without a robust understanding of fluid mechanics.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This doesn't really describe how development is going to get faster. It just lumps the next big leap into unsupervised learning - which isn't really an understood concept as the author describes.

The "unsupervised learning as black box" argument always bothers me. It looks too much like the consciousness debate. The theory that UL is an emergent property from massively scaled NAIs is at least plausible IMO, but that wasn't really discussed.

</comment><comment><USER5> There's no real guarantee that current success with neural networks will continue to ramp up all the way to hard AI. They're impressive, and getting more interesting all the time, but the downside of the whole "though neural networks generalize very well, we still lack a decent theory to describe them, so much of the field proceeds by intuition" is that we don't know when they'll suddenly stop being useful for some problem.

<comment><USER6> I agree that the road to hard AI is still foggy, but the applications of the current technology by itself has only scratched the surface.

For example, since Deep Learning has already shown great advance in the audio- visual tasks, the entertainment business which heavily utilize those senses will get a boost all around.</comment></comment>


Scott and Scurvy (2010) - <AUTHOR> http://idlewords.com/2010/03/scott_and_scurvy.htm?

<comment><USER2> Thanks for posting. I thought myself as reasonably informed in the natural history and biology of ascorbic acid but this article managed to teach me a lot, props.

It was mentioned briefly in the article, but a lot of the micronutrient deficiencies (beriberi, pellagra, nyctalopia, the list goes on) were similarly mismanaged despite the practical knowledge of effective cures. If anything this really highlights the danger of coming up with a theory without sound mechanistic proof - for there are too many confounding factors out there to deceive us.</comment>


Ask HN: How do you deal with depression? - <AUTHOR> Please I will like to read your opinions on how to deal with depression. <comment><USER2> The most important thing to know about depression is that it is an illness. It has no moral dimension. Get treatment. People telling you to buck up and get hold of yourself are much, much worse than useless.

The second most important thing to know is that "depression" is a label for at least a half-dozen, probably more, unrelated illnesses. What helps with one does nothing for another.

The third is that no matter what else you do, getting enough (but not too much) sleep, and enough exercise, are essential. Lack of either makes all varieties worse. But if you can't, do whatever you can. Sometimes just getting up is a triumph. Savor each.

Psychiatrists have no other way to determine which kind you have than to try various meds and see if any work. For some varieties no med works. Often a med does no good below a certain dosage level, or until you have been taking it for a month. Some work immediately. Most have annoying side effects that may gradually fade.

Many people have more than one kind, and need to treat both or all. It may be combined with other problems like anxiety.

Exercising, sleeping, and eating right can be hard, even prohibitively hard, when you are ill. Don't beat yourself up over being ill. Do whatever you can, now, and plan to do more when you can.

<comment><USER3> I hear the "depression is an illness" trope repeated over and over but I still fail to understand what it means.

I'm sure for some definition of the word illness it's true. But it's certainly not an illness in the way a cold or malaria or shingles or cystic fibrosis are illnesses. Those things can be objectively diagnosed. They entail physical measurable changes to a person's body.

Depression is a set of guidelines in a book that ask vague subjective questions about how someone perceives the world. And then if the person decides you have it you have it. If they don't you dont. This has very little to do with the first scenario.

I'm not trying to trivialize depression. I think it is very real and very serious. But I think the "illness" rehtoric is at best innacurate and at worst seriously misleading and distracting to people who have serious issues to deal with.

<comment><USER4> > I'm not trying to trivialize depression.

As someone who has been catatonically depressed for a couple years now, I'm not so sure about this! People with chronic pain also often can't identify any physical source, but obviously you would never start posting "is this really an illness though?" or "aren't we distracting and misleading people??" in a thread about that.

The undercurrent of your post is that depressed people need to snap out of it, and falling back on the "illness" label reduces personal responsibility. Trust me, many people feel like imposters claiming they have depression, despite being completely non-functional. Thanks but no thanks to this proposed contribution to the discourse.

Are you really here to understand, or is it just to judge? Want some MRIs and EKGs of depressed brains?

<comment><USER3> > undercurrent of your post is that depressed people need to snap out of it,

Please point to where I say that. I explicitly do not say that. That's not an undercurrent because I don't believe it.

I do also believe that people don't have zero agency in this problem. There is SOME ability and necessity for people to work on these types of problems. That's what therapy with a therapist is right?

And that does differentiate depression from tuberculosis which cannot ever be improved by sitting down and talking about it.

<comment><USER4> Okay, my mistake for getting dragged into the archetypal HN argument. It's clear you cannot be convinced. Your original point - that depression has no biomarkers and is extremely subjective - has been proven wrong by a couple others and you've shown no gratitude or interest in this information. Only replying where you think there's an argument to be won.

Maybe you, some random person on Hacker News, are not in fact smarter than the medical consensus?

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

<comment><USER3> And again, I didn't say there are no biomarkers. I belive there are biomarkers.

The idea that I'm not coddling your victimhood/ helpless mentality is offensive to you, not any specific argument I'm making.

<comment><USER4> Uh no, sorry, it's the argument. You've been on this site for four years now - be honest, have you ever seen someone with a lazy armchair opinion enter a debate, receive strong pushback including scientific citations, and then refuse to change their opinion? It's literally every fifth thread here. Though imo, more fun when it's idiots telling tptacek he's wrong about security than when it's someone a dick to someone with depression (my victim mentality!!)

But sure, let me actually respond to you:

* At no point have you acknowledged or shown any awareness that depression is not "one thing". Like how people discuss "curing cancer" as if that's any sort of meaningful statement. How complex do you think depression is? What point of complexity does something need to reach before you defer to experts? Depression is still more or less a black box (watch the Sapolsky video I linked or look up some starslatecodex articles on ketamine.) Again, no sign of awareness of this on your part, which suggests you haven't done the most basic research.

* Yep, you never said there are no biomarkers. You said:

> Depression is a set of guidelines in a book that ask vague subjective > questions about how someone perceives the world. And then if the person > decides you have it you have it. If they don't you dont. This has very > little to do with the first scenario."

This was your reason for stating that depression wasn't an illness. That it was based on a list of subjective questions. Sadly you didn't respond to the person saying that this was equally true for schizophrenia. Is schizophrenia an illness?

* I said it was an undercurrent, meaning subtext. Do you understand why subtext can't be quoted, and why that's work that you need to do for yourself? (If you somehow can quote subtext, though, immediately switch careers to political journalism, you'll be a wonder.)

* The only really offensive part was when you said "I do also believe that people don't have zero agency in this problem." Like, cool, a few sentences in and you've also added in a complete strawman to make yourself look reasonable. So this was just debate club to you.

The last point, combined with the fact that you're only responding when it might let you feel superior, leads me to believe you're not here in any sort of attempt to learn. How's your own mental health? You're clearly get some need fulfilled by arguing on the internet, which generally isn't the best sign. Watch that video, it's good, and absolutely full of things you do not know.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> General advice for a general question: The story often goes, if you're depressed, you need to shape up, grit your teeth and take it in strides, just brush it off. This is of course nonsense as a solitary advice.

What people often neglect is that circumstances in your life, sometimes beyond your control, can in fact trap you into "a life you don't want" or the sort of life where you're just existing, not really living. And if circumstances are that powerful, the problems can both seem invisible and insurmountable. Sometimes, we sort of get trained into living in a box! And then keep on living like that even though circumstances may change!

So I believe it's important to reflect on what you really want, what interests you, and pursue that. If that is a big fear to do in practice, no wonder. Everybody would feel stuck if living on false premises, according to others' specifications or avoidance of such. Ultimately, people need to feel in control in their lives, even if just an illusion, when we do what we can we at least feel better about trying. Failing is then part of learning.

Watching movies, playing games, gaming social media, don't really count, as those activities become just a proxy for life if you don't pursue and utilize yourself in some other way that truly count in your heart. And it's a life- long road, where we often don't see the small steps we take into a bold new direction leads.

</comment><comment><USER6> The question is why are you depressed before the question is how to deal with being depressed.

For me, I was socially isolated, failed out of school, bullied at school, home and work, unsuccessful with friends or women and kept getting laid off, fighting with my coworkers and managers.

It wasn't until I learned about Aspergers and did a detailed study on all the problems people with Aspergers have that I understood all of my problems stemmed from me likely being on the spectrum. Once I learned that, I was able to understand why I was being targeted and why most people seemed to hate me immediately within one conversation despite me thinking I did nothing wrong. Then I was able to make adaptations for how to structure my life around the fact that I was different.

If your problem is a minor chemical imbalance and you just need some vitamins, a jog and rest - To me this isn't really depression, as someone who was on and off suicidally depressed for a decade.

For me: I was depressed because my life sucked. I could make the depression go away temporarily but it always came back. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy really Helped me.

After being told by teachers, my family, coworkers, people at school that I was stupid, unlikeable and ugly etc it took me a long time to undo that because I really believed it. CBT is about arguing with invasive negative thinking and changing your filters into better ones.

When I get depressed now, I write down a plan to stop being depressed and go through all the steps sequentially from simple to hard. Usually works, but only if I start with easy things first.

<comment><AUTHOR> Honestly, I'm sorry people treated you that way. I actually know the cause of my depression and it's something I can't really solve at the moment unless a miracle happens (that is if miracles exist). Thanks for your response

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> If you're able (you have insurance/can afford to), the single best thing you can do here is to see a professional. I've dealt with mild to moderate depression on and off for most of my adult life; four years ago my wife finally pushed me into seeing a professional, and I wish I'd done it 15 years ago. Working with him gave me some of the tools I needed to re-frame my thinking and break out of the sense of learned helplessness I was dealing with.

Meditation, diet, sleep, and exercise can all help, but ultimately it was talking to a professional that made the most difference; all those other things have helped to sustain it since then.

</comment><comment><USER8> I found these articles incredibly helpful in learning to help myself. I have no idea if they are factually correct, but the writer's way of reframing depression as a process or system was a great way to get some distance from my personal feelings in the moment, and allowed me to bring to bear familiar mental tools to help get a feel for the complexity.

[https://web.archive.org/web/20050527074357/http://www.kuro5h...](https://web.archive.org/web/20050527074357/http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2005/5/9/83936/58483)

[https://web.archive.org/web/20050601015240/http://www.kuro5h...](https://web.archive.org/web/20050601015240/http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2005/5/16/81428/8007)

The ASCII graphs on the 'stress system' are fantastic, the rest IDK. Caveat emptor.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, I will do well to read and digest those articles.

<comment><USER8> I hope they help. For me the main take-away was that your brain needs rest, which is not the same as recreation. Be kind to your brain and digest in manageable chunks :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> See a psychologist/psychiatrist.

Some advice here, such as exercising is good for the overall health of a human being, but depression isn't simple as this. Other advice is quite sad, such as "I eat a good stake" to avoid having a "dark mood". Depression is a serious mental issue that needs proper treatment, it isn't a joke.

A professional will be able to give you better guidance about this, with therapy and medicine.

</comment><comment><USER10> Sorted out my sleep first. I started putting on free audiobooks at bedtime to drown out "busy brain."

Once I was getting enough sleep, I could sort out my eating/weight and had energy to exercise, which were big contributing factors.

Then meditation, to learn "you are not the voices in your head" and a touch of stoicism to put your feelings in perspective.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I would recommend reading Michael Pollan's book, "How to Change Your Mind" [https://michaelpollan.com/books/how-to-change-your- mind/](https://michaelpollan.com/books/how-to-change-your-mind/)

He explores the new and old science behind Psychedelics and their ability to cure depression, addiction and other aliments of the mind.

Another active study in this field; Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS) [https://maps.org/](https://maps.org/)

</comment><comment><USER12> I examined the rhythms of my depression and left Seattle for a much less expensive, and much sunnier city. The number of times I have to take that little inner voice who thinks suicide is a valid solution to my problems, pat her on the head, and say "thank you for your lovely contribution, I will treat it with the same seriousness I treat all your other suggestions"* has dropped from one or more times a day to... I think maybe once or twice in the entire half a year since I left Seattle?

A sun lamp helped some. So did lots of vitamin D. So did exercise. Pole dance, to be precise, I need to get back into that now that I'm settled. But it helped less and less every year, to the point where I felt like I only had a few years left before I'd be at serious risk of acting on that voice's suggestions.

Previously I also dealt with depression by staring my gender dysphoria in the face and taking a lot of hormones to persuade my body to get to the point where nobody thinks twice about giving me my preferred pronouns. Things were pretty good until I moved to places where there was Real Winter.

Dissect your depression. Analyze it. Listen to it - maybe even name it, that suicidal urge had a name borrowed from an old RPG character who did a lot of self-harm stuff. When you come to the conclusion that a lot of your depression comes from trying to deal with a particular Horrible Thing, then work on changing your life so that Horrible Thing is not part of it any more.

Oh yeah. Meditation can be valuable too. Just sit and watch your thoughts pass through you, if you catch one running away with you then just shrug, remind yourself "silence!" and get back to trying to empty your mind. Do it every day, or as close to every day as possible. This will give you a lot of training in recognizing different parts of your brain, detaching from unwanted trains of thought, and otherwise managing your brain. You will probably suck at first. Allow yourself to do this, celebrate getting better.

* which is to say "dismiss it and get on with my life as best I can despite being pretty miserable"; this little mental exercise of treating that urge as a separate personality and telling her that I did, indeed, hear her idea helped me dismiss it when it came up instead of spending ages going around in a mopey rut.

</comment><comment><USER13> For me, exercise and trying to re-frame my situation helps. I believe even if your exercise is just a 30min walk, it's better than sitting at home ruminating about things.

By re-framing I mean trying to rethink my situation from a third party or what I'd say if a friend told me about their life and how they feel. I think for a lot people, they can be their own worst critic.

I have used meditation in the past with Headspace. It helped me a lot during some really low points. I started therapy a few weeks after meditation and my therapist was very supportive of it. I'm not going to claim mediation is a cure-all but it definitely helps the "re-framing" and rumination.

Also if you have some friends or family to hang out with, try do it. Even if you have to force yourself to go and you don't interact with them much, I believe it's better than being alone in your darker times.

</comment><comment><USER14> Don't self-medicate. Not with pills, not with CBD, not with weed, not with anything.

Talk to a mental health professional.

Take care of yourself.

<comment><AUTHOR> I just tried looking myself in the mirror and giving myself reasons to live.

<comment><USER15> Talk to a professional and ask them the same question. Find a professional that operates under this branch: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_psychology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_psychology)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Cardio helps a lot for me personally. I'm a firm believer that most people (myself included) don't get enough exercise when compared to hundreds of years ago. It gives me a dedicated hour or two block of time to listen to podcasts, and exercise in general is healthy anyways so its a win-win.

<comment><USER17> What style of cardio do people like? Some people have knee issues for example, or long winters. What do they do?

<comment><USER18> I skip rope. I like these muay thai-style jump ropes[0] with thick pvc-tube because I find it annoying when a slim rope gets tangled and I have to stop and start jumping again.

Maybe not the best style if you have knee issues though...

[0] [https://www.amazon.com/Fairtex-Thai-Style-Jump- Rope/dp/B009Q...](https://www.amazon.com/Fairtex-Thai-Style-Jump- Rope/dp/B009QYOWZK)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> This is from my personal experience, I have no qualification or experience that would allow me to help someone else.

First what depression was for me was a lack of positive emotion. Not that I felt sad all the time or that I was always down. It was just nothing felt good. I could eat something nice, do something for someone, watch a great movie and I felt nothing.

This was not so bad at first but as the months rolled past it got very hard to live with. Nothing motivated me. I didn't want to get up and do anything. Why do anything there was no positive feedback to do anything.

But I did. For some reason I kept my routine. I worked as hard as I could. Probably about 70% of my normal. But I just kept going. There was something in me that said this can't last forever. I was getting suicidal and was struggling to keep going but I just kept one foot in front of the other. Not thinking about much other than the day ahead.

Relationships were hard, I didn't have much patience for others. But I lived in close quarters with people, kept my job and maintained church commitments. I just kept going.

My hope was that one day things would get better and I didn't want to wake up one day finding I'd walked away from everything just to find things had gotten better. You know what they did! They got so much better. It took a year or so and little things started to feel good again. I was so happy when they did that things just spiraled upwards.

I've learnt a thing or two about my emotions and thoughts. Trying to keep from becoming fed up and down seems to stop me rolling back to that depressed state.

Looking back I think it was the routine that pulled me out. It was the keeping on going that gave me something to think about, instead of the negative thoughts. I couldn't create positive feedback but I could stop the negative (a little bit).

Other people have it way harder than I ever did and I don't want to say they could do the same thing but I do think that there is reason to have hope. Hope wont make you feel better but it can keep you going 'till you do.

</comment><comment><USER20> My depression ended when i found a fullfilling, well paid job.

Then i remembered a wise one said that opposite of depression = expression.

So when you express yourself fully - depression falls off.

That is exactly what happened to me after ~10 yrs of depression.

<comment><USER21> Beware of expressing built-up anger. Contrary to mainstream thought, it can be a really big problem in various areas of your life, especially your interpersonal relations.

Usually, the real cause of the anger evades us (that's why we've so much of it built up), and we can't express it constructively (if that's possible at all). A big realization for me was that even though I feet somewhat better letting my lid blow off and unloading on a person, it's very destructive (before I persistently ignored that, justifying my anger as righteous), and it's not a treatment for what caused it.

I guess if I had to summarize my realization in one sentence, I'd say that I realized that there were things I didn't want to acknowledge and feelings about myself and others that I wanted to push out of myself, and that this resistance was what caused the inner turmoil and anger. When I started consciously trying to stay with the "bad" feelings, instead of reject them, things started to change.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Ok,so the answer is simple but difficult:hope.

I won't tell you what to hope in or how but hope cures depression. And by that I mean psychological depression,as I understand clinical depression has more to do with neurological and biochemical imbalance (for which you should seek out a legitimate psychiatrist).

I was actually thinking of submitting a similar question but about mental health in general(will do that another time).

But yeah,what I've learned is that hope is easy to come by but it carries with it risk where you hope but what you hoped for does not turn out well. If you can accept that risk,it will resolve what most people call depression at it's root where most other medication and therapy address symptoms first and maybe get to the root cause later.

I think educated and technical people are more susceptible to depression because they rationalize and analyze away hope much more readily than less educated people.

Other people mentioned getting enough sleep,excercise,hydration,good diet. And I'd also like to add on that a healthy relationship with your ownself and others. These all help but as someone who has struggled most of my adult life with depression and having desparately tried all these things my opinion is to prioritize hope.

A few years ago I had so much hope and as a result I lost a lot of weight,ate healthy all the time,slept better and relationships with people started to improve. I had a goal,something to look forward to,something I needed to get ready for and improve myself.

It was amazing,I may have had been sad once in a while but the horrible crippling depression went away.

I am not an expert,I just know I spent years isolated,not wanting to clean up after myself or even maintain basic hygeine at some point. It was unreal how this mental issue was causing physical pain and so many other side-effects. And I also saw what helped me,and it turns out actual psychologists also support my hope theory. Even if the hope is irrational ,is rational depression better? Of course everyone has a different story. I hope sharing my experience will help you and do let me know if you have any questions,this sickness stole most of my life,I hope you fight hard so you will never be in my shoes.

</comment><comment><USER23> Here is what has worked for me. But beware, I am not a psychiatrist so take my suggestion with a grain of salt.

First, let me tell you about my living situation and environment. I believe those two are very important in making these kinds of decisions. I live in a very tightly neat society. I meet my parents, and friends most often. But I was really good at hiding my situation. That made my problem worse. Why? Because, no one knew what I was dealing with. Everyone would realize I'm missing for a couple of days but they all figured I was busy. But I was going through hell.

I have tried various ways of threatening myself. Seeking professional advice is out of the question for me as I live an average life in a developing country.

So I gave up. But one day I decided to take a walk. It gave me a breather. So I did it again, this time longer. By the time I came up from my long walks I would be tired so I would eat and fall asleep.

This continued for months and years. Each time making my walks longer and longer, untill I would get so tired that all I wanted to do was eat and sleep.

I have been doing that for more than 3 years now. I feel active now and I have added Taekwando to my exercise too. At the same time period, I got the courage to marry my girl friend. Now we are having a baby.

I don't believe that I don't get depressed any more. Or may be I was never depressed in the first place as bad as other people. But I don't lock myself in my room for days thinking about death anymore.

</comment><comment><USER24> Hey tokstesla, I've helped people overcome depression.

It depends on how depressed you are and also evaluating whether it's clinical. A combination of medicine and extracurricular activities will get your life back on track!

I know you mentioned that you were looking for non$$ solutions but hear me out:

An overly simplified analogy to depression is like diabetes. Your body does not produce the right chemicals to process things. In the case of diabetes, it's insulin. For depression, there's some imbalance of serotonin or dopamine.

With diabetes, you must control your sugar intake via exercise, eating fewer carbs, fewer desserts, etc. With depression, a lot of same applies such as more exercise, meditation, journaling, etc.

If you had diabetes and all you did was limiting your sugar intake, then most doctors will say that's not enough. You must take insulin. Depression is similar. If it's clinical, behavioral therapy will definitely help, but you need to balance your chemicals.

If you need to chat more, let me know! I don't see a chat feature here, but we can find a way.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for your concern. I think my cause of depression is just my inability to meet up with my financial responsibility. My Skype ID is okehdom

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Very broad question. Go to therapy or call a hotline and see if it helps you.

What worked for me is letting go of therapy and focusing instead on what matters to me, or my self/character/personality/whatever you want to call it. There are some things in the world you can't control so focus on what you can control. Win your own small battles one at a time, they build up.

</comment><comment><USER26> I used acetylcysteine. [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3044191/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3044191/)

This stuff helped very well.

Depression is a biochemical problem in your brain. It needs a biochemical solution. It is impossible to rationalize your way out of a depression. You cannot cure a depression by choosing behaviour.

Thinking about gyroscopes will not enable you to walk a straight line when drunk! Trying to cure a depression by choosing thoughts or behaviour is futile.

Also have a look at Amber O'Hearn: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhxeVU- vT3Q](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhxeVU-vT3Q) Her mood disorder went away when she changed her diet.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> This is for those saying depression is not an illness.

[https://news.stanford.edu/news/2009/november9/videos/653.htm...](https://news.stanford.edu/news/2009/november9/videos/653.html)

<comment><USER2> Robert Sapolsky wrote the most astonishing book I ever read. It had a dumb title, something about zebras, but it was a tour of endocrinology. Endocrinologists have thd hardest problem in all biology.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Assuming you've tried conventional anti-depressants and you're in the US, have a look into ketamine treatments. Studies show dramatic results for a good percentage of people and a good safety profile (shorter term at least). They are expensive.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for your contribution! It's just that I will be more appreciative if the solution doesn't involve spending money.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> I would for sure talk to your doctor about it. Normally your doctor can recommend medicine and services such as a psychologist(more talk therapy) or psychiatrist(more prescription based) that will work with them and be in your insurance network if that's a thing you need to worry about.

That said, I would do a lot of research before going in, but do see your doctor for sure. I say do research because depression can be a symptom of other things such as Bipolar type II or Cyclothymic disorder. Hypomania is the main hallmark that you would look into with those. I would also read and be prepared to talk to your doctor about anxiety symptoms as well as panic attack or ptsd symptoms. You may not have them but knowing the signs can help as depression can easily present with those, and you may need treatment for more than one thing to feel better.

Knowledge is power in this case. Jobs in IT and doctors are similar in some regards. Someone comes to us with a problem and we need to fix it. The more they know(symptom identification) and the better they can articulate why they think they may have some condition the easier it is to diagnose and fix a problem. Also both professions start with 'safe' treatments. We reboot the computer first, they try for pills or treatments with few to no side effects. We also go for the most obvious diagnoses first before getting into the esoteric,(the power is unplugged rather than the cable to supply power to the motherboard being bad) just like a doctor would go for depression rather than bipolar II for instance as that's the more common path.

I ran across this when I was suffering from some depression and was trying to see how other devs deal with it. It outlines some emotions and feelings about it, but also talks about bipolar type II and adhd. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFIa- Mc2KSk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFIa-Mc2KSk)

I hope this helps and feel free to reach out if you have questions. I'm still dealing with it myself so I get how hard it can be. It's not a failing of character or anything like that. It's a medical condition and should be monitored and treated as such by your doctor.

Hope you feel better soon!

</comment><comment><USER30> Lots of exercise. Gets a whole bunch of chemicals in your brain to flow again. Some of those chemicals cause depression. But they need to come out of the system (eventually).

Lots of water. Drink water when you are tired. When angry. When sad. When bored. When excited. When energetic. Removes toxic chemicals in the body.

Good thoughts. Great thoughts. Speak to a psychologist. Read a book. I did.

Arrogance hides away anger. Anger hides away sadness. Sadness hides away attitude of helplessness. Helplessness is lack of resourcefulness. So be resourceful.

Forgive. Forget. Move on.

Lower expectations of yourself.

Increase appreciation of others, and of yourself.

Lots of sleep. Depressed people sleep a lot. But your sleep needs to be strictly regulated.

<comment><USER31> I think that this kind of advice is based in stuff that's actually helpful (like taking care of your body) but is ultimately useless to anyone who is actually struggling with depression.

> Good thoughts. Great thoughts. ...

> Arrogance hides away anger. Anger hides away sadness. Sadness hides away > attitude of helplessness. Helplessness is lack of resourcefulness. So be > resourceful.

This reads like Trump and Yoda merged into one.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Here's some preventative ideas (that are still worth doing when you have depression) — [http://wiki.secretgeek.net/protective-factors-for-mental- hea...](http://wiki.secretgeek.net/protective-factors-for-mental-health)

Also CBT/ACT are worth studying. (Cognitive behavioral therapy/ Acceptance and commitment therapy). I've written a little bit about them here: [http://wiki.secretgeek.net/cognitive-behavioral- therapy](http://wiki.secretgeek.net/cognitive-behavioral-therapy)

</comment><comment><USER33> I found David Burns' 'The Feeling Good Handbook' an invaluable resource while coping with depression and probably the factor that helped the most. Others probably were removing stress (changed from a job which was just not working for me), getting longer sleep hours, regular exercise, getting more sunlight, 5-10 minutes meditation and reading books encouraging a positive outlook and gratitude such as 'Search Inside Yourself'.

</comment><comment><USER18> There are many ways to depression, and my depression seems to stem from my constant nagging feeling of existential meaninglessness. This has been going on for varying intensity for something like a decade now, but I feel like I'm finally coming to grips with it.

For all my adult life I feel like I haven't got a clue why I'm here on this planet, and as a result been just slowly drifting to places in life where I don't want to be. The resulting depressed mood certainly seems to make the world look a lot more bleak than it really is, and making changes to my life has felt like an impossible task. However, these past few years I feel like I've been getting some real progress. I've been trying to follow all the usual advice to a tee, and in my case they have helped:

      * precise sleep patterns, 8h of sleep same time every day
      * stretching, regular exercise (both cardio and lifting)
      * fixing diet: removing sugar, grains, excess carbs, all the common "bad" stuff. Basically something like a vegetarian-mediterranean diet.
      * daily 20 min meditation
      * daily journaling
      * very little alcohol, only couple of drinks now and then and preferably in a social setting
      * no smartphone
      * no social media
      * no porn
      * trying to avoid reading news
      * spending time in nature when possible
      * no cannabis (I tried to use this as a crutch but for me it didn't help, only makes things worse)
      * no other drugs[0]

I haven't sought professional help, but watching Jordan Petersons lectures have given me some ideas and tools what to try out (he is a clinical psychologist, after all?). Specifically, right now my goal is to figure out a clear plan for a life that I would like to live, which would hopefully end this existential dread and give my existence a clear sense of purpose.

[0] Only exception to drugs has been psilocybin mushrooms, which I microdose when I feel like I'm especially deep in the hole. This really helps for a little while, but I hold no delusions that I could just continue living my life like this and endure it with drugs.

</comment><comment><USER34> I suffer from depression and anxiety.

I have never sought professional help, mainly because of the cost, time, and shame. If you can, of course, get professional help, but since you asked me how I treat it, here it is.

First, one of the main reasons why I felt that depression was not meeting my parents' expectations. There is always someone better than me and my parents always compared our successes, directly or indirectly.

Then I had a great religious crisis when I learned about truly evil and disgusting human behaviors. It simply made me lose my faith in God and in humans.

And finally I was never good with the opposite sex. Although I had many friends, I still slept alone.

At one point, in my life I simply didn't see any point in it. I realized that I can never make my parents proud, there is no God and humans are evil, and I will never find love.

I exercised regularly and ate decent. There was no need to add more exercise to fight depression.

I had some thoughts about suicide but nothing serious. It scared me though and I began to enter Buddhism and meditation. But Eastern philosophy did not work for my logical mind. The meditation was too boring for me.

That's when I discovered stoicism, it seemed to click better with me. Almost at the same time, I also found an online CBT software that also helped my anxiety.

Then, after trial and error, I developed an external observer mentality. I think of life as a boring video game. I think of money as points of video games. And I only focus on getting the maximum scores. I know this sounds superficial, but it helps me on difficult days.

Before this mentality, I was changing jobs without thinking about career change in general. Now I am very strategic and I progressed a lot in my career.

I really don't care about my parents' approval anymore and they seem to respect me more. When I stopped chasing the opposite sex, I started to attract them and now I am happily married. I still see the world as a dark place and this is something I still struggle with.

But I have to play this video game, control my character, and try to get a high score. My character needs sleep and exercise to keep its mind sharp for work. My character must do chores and do nice things for spouse or spouse will leave it.

Life is just a video game.

</comment><comment><USER35> In my work life: Shove that shit down deep and keep going. I used to let my emotions ruin my consistency but I learned to ignore my emotions at work.

In my personal life: A combination of medication(light dose Adderall and depakote), exercise, and appropriate sleep. See a therapist weekly.

I'm diagnosed bipolar and spend almost all my time in depression.

</comment><comment><USER36> Exercise. Therapy. Medication.

There are other ways to cope with depression (alcohol, for instance), but these are the healthy ones.

</comment><comment><USER37> Best thing I did was give up coffee.

edit: Eases up the mood swings (TBH, I'm probably just in a stable phase (which gave me the will to stop coffee in the first place), but stopping wild upswings in mood with coffee cessation seems to have greatly muffled the back swings. touch wood touch wood touch wood.)

<comment><USER38> What do you drink now instead?

I'm also in the process of quitting coffee, I used to drink coffee very heavily (3-4 cups per day) and lots of soda, but it was affecting my mood too much.

<comment><USER37> Cocoa in hot water with stevia. I still need something black in the morning. Cocoa does have caffeine, but it's really not that much, even compared to tea.

I'll also have a tea in the middle of the day if I start feeling super dopey. The problem, as far as I can tell, isn't the caffeine, it's the amount in single+closely followed consecutive doses... I guess.

Other than that, Camomile and mint. There are a bunch of other fancy herbal alternatives but, those three are a good enough variety for me.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Best general advice I've heard:

Get professional help if possible: Get meds and find a good counselor

Get the Big Three in order (Food, Sleep, Exercise): Eat healthy (e.g., DASH diet), get 8-9h sleep, get daily aerobic exercise (with a little anaerobic) and at least weekly strength training.

<comment><AUTHOR> I will really appreciate an advice that won't come with spending money. Thanks for your response.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> I have a portfolio of things that I've found work for me. Provided I do any 2 each day, I'm in good shape.

\- Regular long distance runs (5-10miles), \- morning pages, \- meditation, \- zinc, magnesium, fish oil, \- professional help.

</comment><comment><USER41> Cannabis. It helps me forget thoughts of loneliness, failure, and suicide.

</comment><comment><USER15> There's just one way of dealing with depression: speaking with a psychologist or - if the psychologist suggests it - going to a psychiatrist.

</comment><comment><USER17> Make your bed nicely every day. Whatever else happens, you'll have a made up bed whenever you glance at the room and at the end of the day

<comment><AUTHOR> Have always made my bed properly. Thanks for your contribution.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> I eat a good steak. I'm not kidding or trivializing. But if I get busy and I'm always stressed out maybe trying to cut calories, after I while my mood gets dark. Sometimes, I have found its not just stress. I just need a good steak or burger. My metabolism does NOT liking going more than a few weeks without a serious protein hit. And it needn't be an unhealthy frequency or amount.

So YMMV, but sometimes a big part of metal health can be adjusting what you eat and drink.

<comment><AUTHOR> I usually use the "eating therapy", but I can't really afford eating what I want and stuff. Thanks for your response.

<comment><USER42> Just to be clear, I'm not say comfort eating. It's that I need protein. If I couldn't afford a steak, the cheap option is liver and onions.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ok

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> Just think about different things, but if you still don't, you'll be depressed. Someday time will be solved.

</comment><comment><USER44> Inflammation has a lot to do with depression. The most anti-inflammatory diet you can follow is a whole food vegan diet.

</comment><comment><USER45> since i decide to end my life, mi thoughs are more paceful and less disturbing. im planning in december take a lethal dose of nembutal. all in my life is shit, and i get tired of.

</comment><comment><USER46> Exercise is pretty much the number one thing.

</comment><comment><USER47> the most effective thing I have tried is leaving social network, focusing on personal growth.

drawing is also therapeutic.

<comment><AUTHOR> I recently cut off from social media to try focusing on fixing my life. Thanks for the response. Will try drawing

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> Not very well.

<comment><USER49> Similar here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER50> 1\. Listen to Van Halen 2\. Regular Positive Affirmation aka Cognitive Behavioural Therapy 3\. Exercise / Sports 4\. Practice Stoicism

<comment><USER51> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwYN7mTi6HM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwYN7mTi6HM)

It's hard to be depressed when you are doubled over with laughter?

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> One thing that's helped me is journaling. I used to write by hand, but find doing so too slow, even when I type.. so in recent years I've taken to recording my thoughts in on a voice recorder (though a smart phone with a voice recording app would probably serve just as well). What I say is completely private, and meant for no one's consumption but my own, though I very rarely even review what I said. I talk about what's been happening in my life, my concerns, and my thoughts on various subjects.

It's much like therapy, though of course without a therapist's comments or insights, so it's not quite as good, but I still find it very helpful to talk through what's been going on with me.. and sometimes I even come to novel conclusions and insights through this process.. thoughts and perspectives I did not have before I started.

Othre things that help are listening to positive, energetic music, going outside on bright, sunny days, spending time in nature, eating a healthy diet (including supplements like D3 and B12 that I don't get enough of in my life otherwise), and exercise. Talking to interesting, friendly people helps, as does having a fulfilling job that pays enough to pay for the basic necessities and keep me from living on the streets. Occasional treats that make me feel better afterwards (as opposed to ones that feel good in the moment but awful or guilty afterwards).

I like to visit libraries a lot (particularly academic libraries), and often feel at peace there, lost among the greatest minds the world has ever seen, all at my beck and call, willing to share their experience and wisdom as I become ready to learn what they have to teach.

Computer games can also be de-stressing and distracting, thought when they're really good it's too easy to slip in to addiction, which could have adverse consequences if one plays them to the neglect of other important aspects of one's life.

Something else that helps is meditation (of the simply focusing on one's breath type). Avoiding toxic people who try to drag you down with them helps. Learning to enjoy your own company and like yourself instead of loathing yourself helps.

Sometimes talking to someone at a crisis hotline helps (if you're lucky enough to get someone good on the phone). Finding a good therapist you like, respect, and trust, and to whom you can do the hard work of opening up to is of course wonderful as well.

That said, some days nothing helps (or you are just too depressed to do any of those things that help, or forget about them), and you just have to ride out the feelings and try to take comfort in the recognition that those feelings are not permanent, and you will feel better sometime in the future. Having ridden out many such days in the past helps. As the saying goes, time heals all wounds.

</comment><comment><USER53> here's a thorough blog post "Things That Sometimes Help If You Have Depression" from a (pseudonymous) psychiatrist: [https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/06/16/things-that- sometimes-...](https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/06/16/things-that-sometimes- help-if-youre-depressed/)

(The less medical-system dependent stuff is in the last section, not that you should avoid the medical system but if you're asking here on HN and not in a doctor's office that seems like what you might be looking for)

</comment><comment><USER54> Depression can be divided into two categories: with cause and without cause.

If you're depressed with cause, because you're unemployed, in a difficult position, you broke up, a loved one died, you fought with your friend, etc. then the usual advice does actually work. This depression makes sense and is totally normal. First, give your grief time, and second, actually force yourself to smile, go for a walk, or get a puppy. This depression is inherently temporary and you can speed the recovery along.

The thing is about depression with cause is that the cause may be ongoing. If you feel unfulfilled, if you're anxious, if you're suffering from addiction or illness, if people are abusing you, then of course you're depressed. Depression is a symptom. You don't need antidepressants you need to remove the cause.

Depression without cause is completely different which is why most people's advice is bad. They really did overcome depression, but a different kind. If your depression happens for no reason, even when things are going well, just randomly, or on a cycle, then you have to think about depression management. There is no total recovery but you can minimize it until its interference with your life is minimal.

The biology and psychology of depression including the two types above are discussed in Stanford's Sapolsky on depression (50 min lecture on YouTube).

Here's my personal ongoing experience with depression:

medicine worked for others but not for me. The side effects were worse than the depression. Things like sleep, exercise, time with friends, and nutrition seem to shorten the depressive episodes but they do not eliminate them. I plan around my inevitable next episode.

I have leave days set up, an understanding doctor's phone number, and my boss's understanding that I may suddenly take a couple of days sick leave for medical reasons. I call my friends and cancel way ahead of time. I have at- home hobbies to keep me busy. I eliminate my obligations because I wouldn't be able to keep them anyway and failing all my obligations every episode makes it worse every time. If I get depressed on vacation at least I don't feel guilty on top.

Speaking of which I get more depressed during vacations and weekends. Routine and commitments at work generally work against depression. So when I have nothing planned to do and I was expecting to myself to motivate myself to do something fun this is when depressive episodes happen most commonly. So even when I have nothing to do I keep a routine and I create commitments. I know this is in contrast to cancelling all my commitments when I'm depressed but it's true. When I'm not depressed my commitments keep me going so I make sure I'm always committed and I never have to rely on self-drive in the moment. I make plans with friends and book events and schedule things.

Anyway it's an ongoing thing and I've accepted it's never going away. I'm going to try a course of ketamine soon and I'll see how it goes but I'm not very hopeful. Even though I'm not depressed any less, more and more I am learning how to live my life despite depression.

</comment><comment><USER55> Keep up on Fish Oil Supplements. I forget where I read it, but there was a publication which attributed depression to living far from the coast. From there the idea circulated that a fish based diet would be beneficial. Omega3 fats are generally beneficial, but have as I have experienced acted as a mild anti-depressant.

Also, exercise. Do something outside of work that requires physical exertion, even if it's just walking.</comment>


Play Angry Birds with a real USB slingshot - <AUTHOR> http://mbed.org/cookbook/Slingshot

<comment><USER2> I can't decide if this is one of the best things I've read/seen lately or if I think this person should spend his hours on something more useful.

edit: does anyone else think he should throw it on Kickstarter and see how far he can push this?

<comment><USER3> I say both. An impressive waste of time is still a waste of time and the output is still impressive in some way. If you had fun (and/or learned something) "wasting" that time then, on a personal level at least, it is not time wasted.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This just made my day...

... even not being a "player", as I do not play that much, this idea just made me say wow!</comment>


Richard Stallman is nuts. Here's why. - <AUTHOR>

1) He says that you should not own a mobile phone;
2) He criticizes Bill's charities, but have never done anything.
3) He believes in paper voting over machine voting
4) He doesn't use a browser; rather, he uses wget and reads the fetched pages from his e-mail mailbox;
How can someone hear him when he says something like this:
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3083349 <comment><USER2> I saw Richard speak recently and I have to say he doesn't come across as being crazy.

However, his world view is very much permeated by the importance of individual freedom and he is somewhat zealous in getting his message out there.

I like to think I have a more pragmatic approach to individual freedom than that - I'm happy to sacrifice freedoms in some areas if they grant me freedoms/abilities in other areas.

<comment><USER3> "They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin

<comment><USER4> I really like that quote too, but that doesn't make it true.

Being able to freely develop software on all the CPUs I own isn't an essential freedom.

<comment><USER5> How could it not be? As you said, _you own them_. We're talking basic property rights here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Oh noes, Stallman is nuts :(

1) So what ?

2) He did few things. He launched Free Software Movement, started Free Software Foundation, and GNU project. He is main author of GPL :)

3) So what ?

4) So what ?

"How can someone hear him when he says something like this: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3083349> "

Because he's not hypocrite.

<comment><USER7> _2) ... author of GPL_

Yes, imho the GPL (and the idea of viral copyleft that it inspired) deserves to be treated as one of the greatest legal inventions of our time. Given the ongoing reduction of just about _everything_ to information, the ascendancy of code and data among the human race, and the extent to which it will shape our future history, a viable, effective, encompassing legal framework to ensure its freedom is one of the most valuable contributions to computing that anyone has made.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I believe in paper voting over machine voting. (Actually, I believe in paper voting; I'm happy for machines to count the vote, but I want to make my vote on paper.)

The vote counting process has to be transparent, and closed source voting machines are not transparent.

Are you calling _me_ nuts as well?

</comment><comment><USER9> I thought nearly everyone with internet or web socialization was for paper voting and squarely against any kind of anonymous machine voting? That doesn't strike me as an unusual view at all, it seems like the most common view to me.

</comment><comment><USER10> 4) He doesn't use a browser; rather, he uses wget and reads the fetched pages from his e-mail mailbox;

Haha. AWESOME.

<comment><USER11> This is not true anymore.

He browses Internet from emacs.

<comment><USER10> Way cooler.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> >> _1) He says that you should not own a mobile phone;_

He shouldn't use a mobile phone, there are reasons why he would get tracked.

>> _4) He doesn't use a browser; rather, he uses wget and reads the fetched pages from his e-mail mailbox;_

He needs privacy more than anyone else.

You see as a political activist/famous person he should be more careful with these things.

</comment><comment><USER13> Are there people who understand computing and electronics who thinks electronic voting is good?

</comment><comment><USER14> _3) He believes in paper voting over machine voting_

For important elections, so do I and many others. Its much easier to steal an election based on an opaque computer systems.

</comment><comment><USER5> See my previous comment to you.... <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3084650>

</comment><comment><USER15> Yes, he's crazy (aren't we all?) but he knows how to dance: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pube5Aynsls>

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> This guy confuses software with religion. I wonder what search engine he might use, Google or Bing?

<comment><USER16> Not really. He might be defending his position with the same zeal that others defend their religion (it's difficult not to be zealous about something for which you have made important sacrifices), but there is a huge difference.

Religions have questionable basis and use: it is both impossible to prove they are objectively true (at least through the scientific method, the only way we currently have to discover what is true) and to claim that they offer something valuable, which could not exist otherwise, to a human society.

Software freedom (or lack thereof) on the other hand has objective, practical consequences. They might not be direct, or apparent, or significant for every user in every possible use-case, but it is rather easy for a semi computer- literate person to understand that they exist and that they can be pretty negative and serious in too many cases.</comment></comment>