Ask HN: Suggest Some Websites Related to Internet Privacy and Net Neutrality - <AUTHOR> Looking for some good blogs and website to follow to keep myself updated with recent news in internet privacy and internet freedom. <comment><USER2> > Looking for some good blogs and website to follow to keep myself updated > with recent news in internet privacy and internet freedom.

[https://www.privacyrights.org](https://www.privacyrights.org) and [https://www.epic.org](https://www.epic.org) you'll find many informations in both sites.

Two blogs I follow are [https://paulbernal.wordpress.com](https://paulbernal.wordpress.com) and [http://theprivacyblog.com](http://theprivacyblog.com)

</comment><comment><USER3> If you can speak/read french,

La quadrature du Net are amazing, it's a non profit fighting for net neutrality. They're pretty huge and very active

[https://www.laquadrature.net/fr](https://www.laquadrature.net/fr)

EDIT : I actually just discovered that the website is also translated in english :

[https://www.laquadrature.net/en](https://www.laquadrature.net/en)

</comment><comment><USER4> EFF comes to mind: [https://www.eff.org/](https://www.eff.org/)

</comment><comment><USER5> RMS's website: [https://stallman.org/](https://stallman.org/)

There are a few links to his articles (Right side of the 3-column thing + bottom of the 3-column thing).

</comment><comment><USER6> Techdirt does a good job of covering both along with copyright and similar issues: [https://www.techdirt.com/](https://www.techdirt.com/)

</comment><comment><USER7> [https://www.eff.org](https://www.eff.org)</comment>


Palm announces Palm Pre at CES - <AUTHOR> http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2009/01/08/palm-announces-palm-pre/ <comment><USER2> I've been waiting for the magic bullet phone, and this is looking like it could be it.

I've been (and still am) a long-time Palm user - most lately the 700p, then the 755p all with Verizon, and though the OS is clunky and old, it works well for what I like in a phone.

But this new one looks like it'll satisfy exactly what I'm looking for.

I've considered the iPhone, but I dismiss it because of its shady AppStore policies.

I've considered the Blackberry Storm, but its on-screen keyboard doesn't really allow enough space for a reasonable SSH session with vim.

I'd also like to at least try the G1 for a week, but T-Mobile's network is weak at best.

I tried a Samsung HTC phone with Windows Mobile with a slide-out horizontal keyboard early 2008 and found it practically unusable.

This phone looks like it's going to satisfy every major requirement I have, especially if it comes to Verizon. It's absolutely imperative that my phone be SSHable, and Vimmable, and doable out "in the sticks" when I'm on vacation.

And the slide-down keyboard looks amazing. You shouldn't have to use two hands to type on a phone's keyboard.

</comment><comment><USER3> As a long-time Treo 700p user that switched to an iPhone at the beginning of 2008... I'm seriously impressed.

Palm seems to have actually looked at the iPhone interface, taken what it does right to heart and attempted to improve upon Apple's rough edges. The fact that it's not just another "mini desktop OS" ala Android or Windows Mobile, but is actually built for mobile usage from the ground up is fantastic, and few other players in the mobile market seem to have understood this.

That being said - I have no idea how you compete against the iPhone. Palm used to have brand-recognition and goodwill, but I don't know how much of that is left after grinding out chunky Treos and above-average Windows Mobile smartphones for years. My gut feeling is at best, it's going to be a distant second or third under the iPhone - but it seems equally likely it will have middling sales and do nothing to rescue Palm as a company.

Time will tell, I suppose.

</comment><comment><USER4> I'm a bit biased, but I think the platform is the thing that will have the most impact. JavaScript/HTML/CSS makes porting web apps ridiculously easy, and most of the apps I use these days are web apps.

<comment><USER5> That approach didn't play so well on the iPhone, pre-SDK.

<comment><USER4> That's because they were loaded off the internet and didn't have any access to system services.

<comment><USER5> Good point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Wireless charging seems to be a pretty innovative feature of this phone.

<comment><USER7> A nonugly smartphone with a keyboard and replaceable battery. I love palm.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Just Wow.

I don't even care that much if it will run traditional PalmOS software...

</comment><comment><USER9> It seems that Palm wants to charge a lot more than the iPhone price point. It had better be better than the iPhone to justify a higher price.

</comment><comment><USER10> So is this the new palm software based on the BeOS?

<comment><USER11> No, it's a separate development effort.

The BeOS stuff became PalmOS 6, aka PalmOS Cobalt, which debuted in 2004 but never made it onto a shipping device. That IP is owned by <http://www.access- company.com/>, who purchased PalmSource (the OS company which Palm spun off five years ago).

<comment><USER10> Wow, thanks! I wondered what'd actually happened with that.</comment></comment></comment>


How the NSA and GCHQ Spied on OPEC - <AUTHOR> http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/how-the-nsa-and-gchq-spied-on-opec-a-932777.html#ref=rss <comment><USER2> Well then, that makes OPEC terrorists. What are they going to say about that?</comment>


Making what people want isn't enough, you have to share it - <AUTHOR> https://blog.oldgeekjobs.com/be-a-prolific-sharer-31bfdfb50a40 <comment><USER2> If the problem is worth solving, from a monetary standpoint, then sharing is actually more important than building.

I know that's heresy here on hacker news but I am an internet marketer and I have not seen the "if you build it they will come" mentality work very often.

In most cases it's "if they want it you should build it."

<comment><USER3> Doesn't "If they want it you should build it" already assume "if you build it they will come"?

If you don't think they will come, why are you doing it?

<comment><USER4> The key point here is that you need to have contact/communication with the "they" (either they already contacted you, or you need to put a lot of work into marketing to them). Otherwise "they" are going to ignore you.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> When you do share it try not to get discouraged if no one looks at it, is dismissive of it or even becomes inflammatory of you sharing your own creation.

Kind of like an extension of the quote: "Don't worry about people stealing an idea. If it's original, you will have to ram it down their throats."

<comment><USER6> > _" Don't worry about people stealing an idea. If it's original, you will > have to ram it down their throats."_

Personally I believe that if you have something original and the idea gets "stolen", you should be proud of yourself. You've just done something good for the world[0]. What really matters for humanity is that something was done, not _who_ did it, and especially not who did it _first_.

[0] - assuming the idea itself isn't evil.

<comment><USER7> This sounds nice in theory, and perhaps if we lived in a different type of society that would even be true. We don't though, we live in the world where our rewards are tied to our accomplishments. those rewards are the incentives for us to do the work, it might not be 100% of the incentive, but it's a large part. Of course, if someone steals your idea, but wins the race, they're probably executing better. That's capitalism, that's the beauty of competition. First mover advantage is often a disadvantage. You have to pay for all the mistakes. If you're an established player, you can afford it. If you're brand new though, you might not be able to.

<comment><USER8> That's not just capitalism; that's _all_ systems.

If you had a great new idea in the Soviet Union, for example, do you suppose you would be just _given_ the resources necessary to execute it well? Of course not, and moreover the incumbent solutions were a lot better positioned to crush your novel way of doing things in order to protect their own positions than the incumbents are under capitalism.

<comment><USER9> The Soviet Union was a variation of capitalism, called state capitalism. I hope you weren't implying that they were socialists or communists in any way. We have not seen socialism, only small forms of democratic socialism. We have definitely never seen communism, only dictatorships and their one-party systems.

<comment><USER8> Let me state it explicitly: that "state capitalist" theory is false (and so absurd it makes me suspect you are part of some sort of Russian troll farm.) The USSR was both socialist and communist in character, and not at all capitalist.

<comment><USER9> I concede, my friend. They do have the character.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Sharing is so hard. Fear of criticism is so high. Being open and even looking up for critical criticism is important for a product to evolve. Even the iPhone opened up to apps on feedback at launch.

Posts like these are very crucial to help people like me get over that bump.

I have to say also that I am in love with the website oldgeekjobs. Its so well done.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you! I'm trying to keep it loading under 300ms--speed and simplicity as features.

I love that you say you're in love with it.

<comment><USER11> This client asked me to build a job board. I was thinking of using a theme. BUT dang when i saw the UI for OGJ i was curious, would you opensource the Front end? They are in the UK niche market. Figured i'd ask. ;-)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> People are already sharing a lot, we need more curation. HN is great for that, but still a lot of crap emerges and awesome stuff is ignored, so people have to post multiple times and so on.

There are also a lot of paid sharing sites, which means something is very wrong.

<comment><USER13> Yes, I think there is definitely value in hand-curated lists. Just look at the popularity of the awesome-XYZ repos on github

<comment><USER12> Despite some of the famoust ones being of great utility, most Awesome-XYZ lists are just "everything that mentions this topic slightly", and so there needs to be better curation there too. Or perhaps a curation of Awesome-XYZ lists.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I take the opposite approach. If I share my idea and people say "that's a great idea", I get a feeling of accomplishment even I haven't done anything. It can be tough to actually do the hard work now instead of just coming up with another "great idea" again and being praised for it.

[https://sivers.org/zipit](https://sivers.org/zipit)

<comment><USER15> Care to share some of these great ideas?

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> > If your posts don't get traction, HackerNews allows a small number of > reposts spaced out over time — you're not spamming (so long as you're not > spamming).

Interesting to watch. This article has been posted by the same user twice already in the last week, with a different title, and got no traction either time. It's hard sometimes to figure out when what you're offering isn't wanted, and when you just hit the perfect storm that stopped you from getting the attention you deserve.

I'm not calling johnwheeler out on this, clearly he's eventually hit the right nerve. But, well, it's a line to walk: taking the hint that some content doesn't resonate with an audience vs. needing the effort to make them realize it should resonate.

<comment><USER17> I posted it also and it went nowhere. Not being in the US, I find timezones can work against stories I think are interesting and post.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> While I don't mind people sharing their work, I would argue quite the opposite. Make what you want and don't actively share it. Don't waste your time sharing and documenting only to waste even more time maintaining your project if "it becomes successful".

>Any programmer worth their salt has a collection of repos

Repos are cool but don't be a programmer. Programmers make programs. You should probably make money. If something is not worth selling, probably is not worth actively sharing & supporting either. Bill Gates is not known for his collection of repos.

> Factor in the extra time needed on your projects to tune your work and make > it resonate with your audience. Be a prolific sharer.

Yeah, and don't forget to whip yourself regularly.

<comment><USER19> That's a bit like saying "carpenters make furniture. You should probably make money."

Our craft is programming. In order to create unique value where others haven't out of programs, you should probably be good at programming. If the unique value we would create were out of design, we'd be designers. If it were out of reports, we'd be statisticians. Know your craft and be good at it.

<comment><USER18> I bet there are a lot less carpenters "worth their salt" giving away their designs and "sharing" furniture for free than programmers. Still, if you want and afford to profess for fame and good will, do it..

<comment><USER19> I think you would be very surprised to see the insides of many periodicals focused on carpentry. Open source and information sharing wasn't invented by a bunch of programmers at Stanford in the 70s.

<comment><USER18> >periodicals focused on carpentry

Are those periodicals distributed for free ? ad free ? written and printed by carpenters ? Do they give free samples of furniture too ?

Your counter analogy just does not stand..

<comment><USER6> Before the Internet, publishing and distributing was expensive. But in about every craft, you have people hosting their knowledge and designs for free from the earliest days of the Internet. First self-publishing (webpages) and mail groups, later also on-line forums.

<comment><USER18> I have barely shared an opinion and I'm already forced to offer countless minutes of free "support" because someone on the internet misunderstood it or has surplus minutes for arguing. Now imagine if I had posted a github link to some fancy router, brand new web framework for Golang or whatever. Sorry but I really don't have time to explain you that I don't have time for "free support" even if the hosting is cheap now.

<comment><USER6> You're not forced to do anything. You can share stuff and then not reply to people's comments. I think most people understand that others too are busy.

<comment><USER18> >You can share stuff and then not reply to people's comments.

Good. That's what I meant in the original comment: "Make what you want and don't actively share it". Share if you want but don't waste time sharing/commenting/documenting/crowd pleasing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I actually have the philosophy: "Build it for yourself, share with others." Everything I have done, I have always just built it because I have needed it and found use for it. I have then shared it with others. In a way, it is totally selfish, but I'm not disappointed if no one uses it because I use it! Why waste my time developing something I would never use? If other people use it, great! If not, I still find it useful! My first PHP project showed me this philosophy was true and fortunately, hundreds of people are actually using it. [https://mypost.io/](https://mypost.io/)

</comment><comment><USER21> > Sharing takes extra effort.

its more than a little extra effort though. If some library you use yourself takes X effort, cleaning API, making good documentation is 3x, promotion probably means 4x, support brings it to more like 8x especially if popular. Are you sure its worth it?

<comment><USER6> But doing that 8x work is a difference between an obscure Github repo and next fad in the JS world.

(You could probably skip making good documentation, everybody does that and it doesn't seem to stop popularity.)

I'd also question making good documentation is 3x the effort - not if your product is really doing anything interesting. For interesting stuff, most work is in the internals and not at the edges that will be documented.

<comment><USER22> Documentation is not about functionality, but about maintenance and the Bus Factor.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> If you "liberate yourself from giving a shit" how would you give shit about "making what people want"?

<comment><USER24> I think he's referring specifically to giving a shit about people's criticism or even lack of interest, not about the product itself.

Just about anyone who has publicly launched a product or idea knows what it's like to have your ego crushed by people who take one look and dismiss work that you've likely spent a lot of time and enthusiasm on. That can hurt a lot, and you really do have to develop a thick skin to a point where you don't get discouraged by criticism and dismissive attitudes (which frankly seem to be the default on this forum).

<comment><USER25> I thought there was something wrong with my projects, with the code or with myself when people did that. And probably, there is :).

But as I get older I try to give less of a shit about what others say.

I've also noticed that people troll more when they are unhappy about something in their life - I know it because I do it too - I'm more negative or dismissive when things aren't going quite as I'd like them or when I have an argument with my wife or something...

<comment><USER6> > _I 've also noticed that people troll more when they are unhappy about > something in their life_

Right. Good thing to remember. I also realize that I have days of cynical mood, in which I tend to click "Reply" instead of "Close tab" and some poor randomly selected commenter now gets to read my rant...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I don't get it. Reddit explicitly forbids self-promotion. [https://www.reddit.com/wiki/selfpromotion](https://www.reddit.com/wiki/selfpromotion)

I understand their policies, but I'm running a business. I have time enough to share my work on Reddit, but I don't have time to be an active contributor to Reddit, submitting links from a variety of sources, _just_ so I can occasionally post my own links and get no clicks on them.

The only self-promomtion alternative is posting a sponsored headline. Doing that every time I want to share my own stuff is just throwing away money.

<comment><USER27> Reddit is owned by a mass media conglomerate. A significant portion of everything on the site is native advertising. Self promotion would interfere with what they are really pushing and undermine their influence. The smaller communities exist as goodwill to make the high traffic portions seem more authentic.

Using sponsored headlines makes you look even worse than posting unfortunately. You have to be an insider to get the native placement I guess.

Just watch for the next big hollywood movie to come out and random disguised content x to magically bubble up and plaster the front page.

<comment><USER28> > The smaller communities exist as goodwill to make the high traffic portions > seem more authentic.

What makes you think smaller communities exist out of goodwill? People are allowed to create subreddits, and whoever is interested joins the subreddit and engages (or just lurks). It has nothing to do with goodwill. It's fascinating how you spun your narrative to make it seem like "Reddit is owned by a mass media conglomerate" is an evil thing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> This is something I struggled with. I built something that I wanted, but I haven't shared it with anyone yet. I wanted a REST client that would not only allow me to get some data, but then do some simple graphing with it, right in the tool. It's not really packaged up well at this time, but the screen shot gets the idea across.

[https://github.com/beamatronic/JsonAnalysisTool](https://github.com/beamatronic/JsonAnalysisTool)

</comment><comment><USER30> I share quite a bit of what I make or think. It almost always is rewarded with indifference or mild to extreme hostility. The best I can hope for if I am lucky is a tepid level of upvotes (perhaps one or two dozen) and maybe one comment.

But I continue to post links and comments on reddit and Hacker News no matter how much hate or indifference I receive. Sometimes I doubt that I should bother. But I do anyway.

</comment><comment><USER31> This is a good point, especially about getting over your own ego and fear of rejection. I've shared your post on my twitter. And, btw, if your looking to find others to share with on Twitter, try out [http://www.find70.com/?t=ha](http://www.find70.com/?t=ha) It's the most advanced Twitter Profile Search.

</comment><comment><USER32> > _If you're a big picture person unwilling to grind out the gritty details on > your project, you might as well just forget the whole damn thing — no one is > going to stick around if you don't._

yes. in a corporate context, i've see this same thing happen in a research group which was very "vision driven."

the prevailing belief (at the top) was that the group could just implement a bare bones, buggy, semi-documented version of the visionary's idea and simply "hand off" the whole project to another group which could then "realize value" from it.

but it never worked out that way.

the receiving groups didn't want to spend the time learning about it, setting it up, working around bugs and deficiencies and asking the research group questions about their vision-implementation.

in short, the receiving groups never believed in the vision group's implementation enough to invest their time and attention.

</comment><comment><USER33> What subreddits are good places to share on Reddit? I'd love to get feedback on small projects, but things that are definitely not polished/planned out enough to warrant posting on Product Hunt. I find that feedback is most helpful in the "simple little tool" phase.

<comment><USER34> Click on that little 'Show' link at the top of your screen.

<comment><USER33> Hah thanks! I've never noticed that before.

<comment><USER34> You're welcome! People are much more helpful here than on Reddit in my experience.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> Very true - building a great product is only half the story. You also have to market it, something us geeks are normally not that good at.

Part of the reason for Linux's failure on the desktop is that is lacks salesmen to push it.

</comment><comment><USER36> It seems what the author is actually recommding goes beyond just sharing and is actually open sourcing a project's code.

Not saying that's necessarily a bad idea, but on the other hand I'm not sure it's always guaranteed to be the best course of action either.

I do endorse the viewpoint of sharing updates on a project's progress with the intended audience as often as possible, including when those updates could sometimes be rather minor.

</comment><comment><USER37> It makes a lot of sense. However, being a proficient software engineer is correlated with being introverted, and for an introvert it's much easier and more enjoyable to tinker and build something in solitude than sharing it with others. So, even while sharing itself would take only five minutes vs a few hours to implement another feature, it often requires much more effort and energy.

</comment><comment><USER38> This was a well timed reading for me. Been battling with showing an idea in the last 2 months and the interest has been minimal. People will say it's great and won't even sign up. I guess everyone is too busy with their life.

Is at this point where you keep reconsidering if this project is worth the time you've put in it, and you might have to put in it. So, don't concede.

<comment><USER22> I'm in a similar position, working on an app idea that I've decided to open- source. If it catches on I can create a hosting service for it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> In short: "Do things, tell people"

[http://carl.flax.ie/dothingstellpeople.html](http://carl.flax.ie/dothingstellpeople.html)

</comment><comment><USER40> What happens if you share it, but haven't built it, and don't have very much time to build it, but someone else does, and they like the idea and build it first?

<comment><USER41> This rarely happens. It's a moot point. Potential customers are 99.9% of the time too busy or don't have the resources to execute on a solution.

</comment></comment><comment> happy-go-lucky @johnwheeler, good to see you again. How is it coming along?

<comment><AUTHOR> My latest progress report: [https://www.sitepoint.com/how-i- made-2000-in-1-5-months-star...](https://www.sitepoint.com/how-i- made-2000-in-1-5-months-starting-with-a-google-form-based-mvp/)

Trying to get the word out any and every way. Having a blast doing it.

Thanks for asking!

<comment> happy-go-lucky Looks like sharing it all has worked its magic. Keep up the good work :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Where do you share? I'm not on facebook, reddits..... bad now, and all the hacker messageboards I used to frequent are gone (benheck, bacmods, etc).

<comment><USER43> HN, Reddit, Product Hunt. Why is Reddit "bad now", because someone wrote that and now it's your new world view? Reddit is stronger than ever.

<comment><USER42> Stronger isn't what I'm looking for. If it was, I'd be on facebook. I just want a smaller community with closer interests. More like benheck and bacmods were and less general interest. HN is all business now so it's no good either (for my hacks).

<comment><USER44> > I just want a smaller community with closer interests.

Whatever you are making I am sure there is a subreddit that is small and closely aligned with your interests.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> I noticed it is free to post a job now. Is this part of the sharing ethos, and has your business model changed?</comment>


"Mirrors in Your Brain": Does This Do for Psychology What DNA Did for Biology? - <AUTHOR> http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2010/11/mirrors-in-your-brain-they-do-for-psychology-what-dna-did-for-biology.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+TheDailyGalaxyNewsFromPlanetEarthBeyond+(The+Daily+Galaxy:+News+from+Planet+Earth+%26+Beyond) <comment><USER2> <http://www.ted.com/search?q=Ramachandran>

my favorit:

[http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/vilayanur_ramachandran_on_...](http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/vilayanur_ramachandran_on_your_mind.html)</comment>


Memoirs of a Poker Bot Developer - <AUTHOR> http://www.mattmazur.com/category/poker-bot/

<comment><USER2> Matt, this is great stuff, I hope you continue this series of posts. This topic loosely breaks into two domains--the technical details of programming and running the bot and the theory that drives the bot's AI. Personally I think there's already been a lot written about the former, so I'm more interested in the latter. Would love to know how went about developing the bot's decision algorithm.

</comment><comment><USER3> An interesting juxtaposition against the series being written at Coding the Wheel.

Both are very clear about the difficulties involved - my suspicion is they push the "eating glass" type analogies primarily so that they don't appear to be encouraging further development. After all, the challenges involved appear to be what motivates them (and many Hackers) in the first place.

<comment><AUTHOR> Somehow I never read Coding the Wheel until tonight.

My initial impression is that he made some things way more complicated than they had to be and other things way simpler than they needed to be.

But who knows--there's definitely more than one way to do it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> _Once you've agreed on a time period and a way to count the results, how can you be sure that the results weren't a product of luck and variance instead of skill?_

That should only matter if your motivation for developing a poker bot was to develop a program that could demonstrate "skill" rather than one that could produce the highest profits (such as if you were a computer scientist). If you wanted to produce the highest profits, then your metric for comparing implementations would be net profit over the long run.

It is okay to come up with some set of metrics to attempt to measure "skill" in the short term while developing your algorithm, perhaps, but that's when you're in "computer scientist" mode. Ultimately skill is irrelevant if your goal is to make a profit over time, and if it were not, I suspect you would not be working on such a project in the first place.

<comment><USER5> Net profit is a factor of many things that have nothing to do with the bot. How good of a system you have for getting new accounts/ip addresses, how well you can funnel money from one dummy account back to you, how well you avoid detection, etc.

Still, you can easily determine the mathematical certainty for a given win rate and sample size.

<comment><AUTHOR> Matt you hit the nail on the head.

People like to think that if you can build a winning bot you can easily run it on a dozen computers and rake in millions of dollars. In reality, the logistics of running such an operation are prohibitively difficult--at least if you want to stay within the bounds of the law.

<comment><USER5> Yeah, I've gone through much of the rest of the process before between bonus abusing casinos, running a rakeback site, and my own poker play.

Once upon a time Party Poker offered a guaranteed 10% APR on all balances up to $10k, paid out monthly given a certain relatively small level of pay. I imagine their multiple account detection process back then was relatively crude compared to what Stars has now, but it caused me some pain. And I know Full Tilt is very good at it now.

<comment><AUTHOR> Honestly I didn't even bother trying setting up multiple accounts.

The money was a nice, but it really wasn't the primary goal. Plus, in order to maximize profits I would have had to tread in a lot of murky waters that I didn't want to be near.

For example, say you have a roommate run the bot. How do you get the profits from his poker account into your bank account? Not as easy as it might seem.

<comment><USER5> Pro-tip: the legal solution to the roommate dilemma is limited power of attorney :)

<comment><USER6> But since online poker winnings are technically illegal in the US, doesn't that invalidate any legal standing over them, similar to how gambling debts are unenforceable?

<comment><USER5> Online poker winnings are not illegal in the US. Playing online poker (or any form of gambling other than sports betting) is provably illegal only in a few states.

But in those states, perhaps. I never had to pay an attorney to review that :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Reminds me of [http://www.codingthewheel.com/archives/how-i-built-a- working...](http://www.codingthewheel.com/archives/how-i-built-a-working- poker-bot)

</comment><comment><USER8> I noticed in the article that PokerStars ensured screenshots were being blocked? How is this possible?

<comment><AUTHOR> Great observation. I assume you mean because of the Screen Shot button on the bot software. I had to do that because when I tried taking screen shots of the few CAPTCHAs I saw, I wasn't able to paste it into MS Paint, so I built my own screen shot procedure. Not sure how they did it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Everything casino related should be considered spam, unless there is absolutely no mention of a real casino website.

They are masters of deception and even if the post is tech related it should be watched closely.

I know them for I've been inside the beast.

<comment><USER10> How you managed to amass 500+ karma points, I'll never know. I routinely see your comments voted down into oblivion. Kudos for persistence, I guess.

<comment><USER11> Oblivion used to be much deeper than -8. It must help.</comment></comment></comment>


Something Secret This Way Comes - <AUTHOR> https://llogiq.github.io/2016/04/24/nsa.html <comment><USER2> This a total tangent but I always thought it might be interesting if an IDE pulled data from source control (and presented it inline somehow).

How "hot" a function is - has it reiceved a lot of edits in the recent past? Or is cold and old (and therefore you'd imagine reasonably bug-free for most use cases).

I think the number of unqiue people editing a portion of code would also be interesting to know. As you might expect multiple authors to have different beliefs about the point of the code and therefore the code is probably going to be more muddy and less clear.

<comment><USER3> Visual Studio does this:

[https://i-msdn.sec.s-msft.com/dynimg/IC805614.jpeg](https://i-msdn.sec.s-msft.com/dynimg/IC805614.jpeg)

(For C# at least)

<comment><USER4> Is it for Team Foundation only or can other VCS be integrated into this?

<comment><USER5> It works with git out of the box.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This is something that I'm actually writing for my own programming language, coincidentally also written in Rust.

My idea was to label each expression with these flags, i.e. is the expression constant?, tail recursive?, etc., and then make that information available for the text editor and other tooling, so the user can instantly see certain things about their program, and see the type of optimizations the compiler will do for them.

<comment><USER7> Thats a great idea. Do you have it available somewhere?

<comment><USER6> Currently there's only a tokenizer/parser implementation publicly available. I'm currently working on the type system.

Progress has been a bit slow, but I will be posting here on HN if I end up making something worthwhile.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Sounds like it could be a basis for a security oriented scanner. Rust has less to worry about regarding memory security, but performing taint analysis for logical security flaws could be mighty interesting.

</comment><comment><USER9> Reminds me of LLVM's EfficiencySanitizer that will probably land in 3.9: [http://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm- dev/2016-April/098355.h...](http://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm- dev/2016-April/098355.html)

<comment><USER10> I'm personally very interested in "non-optimizing optimizers", essentially lint passes which point out places where you may optimize something without actually making that optimization. The advantage to this is that you get access to a lot of optimizations which would otherwise require you to make a lot of things undefined behavior to make work.

An example of this is the escape analysis lint in rust-clippy, which can detect if an allocation via Box/Vec/String is unnecessary (though right now it only supports one of those and I need to work on it more) and tell you how to remove it.

<comment><AUTHOR> By the way, I recently tried to get rid of some `vec!`s in the benchmarksgame entries (well, to see if I could), but got into trouble with IntoIterator implementations, so an extension of EscapeAnalysis would be great!

<comment><USER10> I suspect that the escape analysis lint will never be as powerful as a human looking in a reasonably small region of code to remove specific allocations, so it wouldn't be able to help here. Probably. Its power is in that it can find unnecessary allocations in a large codebase.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Maybe I'm missing something but this sounds less like a linter and more like an optimization pass?

<comment><USER10> It's half a lint. It collects metadata about the code, making it easier to do whole-program analysis. Most of the lints we have so far do at most whole- function analysis. The other half, to be written, would use the metadata to lint things. "Can never panic" is one such lint that could be written with this for example.

As an optimization pass it would have to actually change the generated code. It doesn't affect that (nor does Rust's plugin lint functionality; which it uses; let you do that)

<comment><USER12> This sounds like a component of the type of tool normally called a static analysis engine. "Lint" to me implies more of a lightweight tool that complains about tabs vs spaces and things like that.

<comment><AUTHOR> I just call it a lint because it uses the rustic::lint API. And I posited that such analysis belongs in the compiler.

However, lints no longer need to be lightweight; I've seen full-program analysis passes called lints. And in rust, lints usually don't complain about tabs/spaces (though we could write one), but rather certain idioms which are exacerbating readability, flexibility, performance or any combination of the above.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


North Italian town of 3,300 tested everybody, stopping COVID-19 transmission - <AUTHOR> https://promarket.org/why-mass-testing-is-crucial-the-us-should-study-the-veneto-model-to-fight-covid-19/ <comment><USER2> We need to keep testing as an element in mind folks.</comment>


FBI lets you submit your fingerprints for an identity history summary check - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/FBI/status/1203056637944180737 <comment><USER2> I mean if you build it, they will come. They really have nothing to lose asking gullible trusting people to willingly forfeit fingerprints to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.</comment>


Show HN: glassList, my weekend project/first iOS app - <AUTHOR> http://www.glasslistapp.com/

<comment><USER2> I really like the name. The site is minimalistic, though. You're wasting an important resource, tons of people from HN will go there to have a look and they will not see much. You have to list the advantages, why the this is the _best_ to do list ever.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the feedback, and I think you're right.

I updated the site to focus a little more on the specific benefits/advantages of the app. I guess it's a little difficult to market something like this that has deliberately few features. The main reason that I love it is because of how fast and easy it is to use, as I don't even have to think when adding something to a list. Unfortunately, it's hard to communicate that via the web...

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Why would someone pay $1.99 for this app?

<comment><AUTHOR> Excellent question, and I think it's something that I didn't address very well in the site/app description. The main problem I was trying to solve when designing the app was to make something that was really easy to use, while still having the features that are missing from many free apps (drag-and-drop reordering, lack of iAds). In my experience, I haven't really found any other apps out there that can say this.

That said, I think you may be right that $1.99 is more than most people are willing to pay for it just because it's easy to use, so I lowered the price to $.99 through iTunes Connect. It doesn't look like the change has been reflected in the App Store yet, though. The $1.99 was a bit of an experiment, since this is my first app.

Also, thank you very much for the feedback.

<comment><USER3> Much better feature list. I think it is a good idea to drop the price to $0.99.

Why not have a video demo instead of the screenshots? That will give a much better sense of the user experience and that it is really fast and easy.

Good luck with the app. I have my first app waiting for review in the App Store :)</comment></comment></comment>


The Concepts Get Harder (Python in 30 Days - Day 12) - <AUTHOR> http://rodriguezcommaj.com/python-in-30-days-day-12/

<comment><USER2> I can't wait to see the part where you get to meta classes. That's when the real fun shall begin :D Still, an inspiring series for python beginners. Keep it up!

<comment><AUTHOR> Ha, I don't know if that's a threat or a friendly challenge! I will take the latter. I am looking forward to harder programming concepts, I just need to keep practicing to drill them into my head.

Thanks for the words of encouragement, I will definitely keep working away at it.

<comment><USER3> Can't tell if he was serious or not, but metaclasses have no place in a 30 day quest to learn Python.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's the feeling that I am getting. I like being introduced to concepts early on, even if I don't fully grasp them. Somewhere down the line though, I will see something more advanced and go, "OH! Meta classes. I kind of know about those!" and it is pretty helpful. It works kind of like that learning by immersion (especially for languages), where you are just in the thick of it and sooner or later things start to make more sense.

I agree that it's an advanced concept, but it helps when people post stuff like that here and explain it so that I am at least familiar with it existing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is a very helpful post. I teach beginners and one of my theories has been: you "just" need to understand for-loops, if-statements, and of course, how to invoke methods...and then you're going to finally understand why programming is worth it.

But those fundamental concepts are not at all "just" easy to grasp for some reason. I don't know if it is just the particular syntax or what. So it's very helpful to have a learner explain the difficulty.</comment>


GAGA-2 - <AUTHOR> http://blog.jgc.org/2012/01/gaga-2.html

<comment><USER2> In your experiments with spray polyurethane foam, did you use open or closed- cell foam? I ask because you said that in your experiments it didn't insulate that well. AFAIK, open cell foam has a lower R-value than standard Styrofoam polystyrene (~3.5 vs. ~5.0). Closed-cell polyurethane foam on the other hand has an R-value of about ~6.5. The problem with closed cell foam is the weight (2.0 per cubic foot vs. 0.5 for open-cell.

Even if it were too messy to use for the outer construction, it might be interesting to use it only for those components that are most temperature sensitive, such as the battery. This would also solve the battery dislodging problems you had with your first flight.

I'm wondering if anyone is creating a stereolithography machine capable of printing structures using materials designed for insulation such as polyurethane/polystyrene foams and silica aerogels (R-value ~10.0.

I'm also curious if using stereolithography to print honeycomb structures in a vacuum would be a good way to produce vacuum insulated structures (AFAIK R-values of 30 to 50 should be possible.)

</comment><comment><USER3> Theoretically, will the balloon be able to escape the atmosphere if it is provided with a valve to control the pressure based on altitude ? does it always have to burst at some point ?

<comment><USER4> The balloon will never escape the atmosphere. It simply drifts higher until it either reaches neutral buoyancy, or pops. As the balloon rises, air pressure decreases. The result is that the gas inside the balloon is compressed less as the balloon rises, causing the balloon to expand.

In a flight like jgc's, the latex balloon expands until it pops. There are other balloons which can float at a steady altitude. One of these is called a "Zero-pressure Balloon." This balloon operates with a valve on the bottom. The helium will expand until it reaches this valve, then spill out. When the balloon loses helium, it loses lift. The valve will tend to dump helium until the balloon reaches neutral buoyancy. These balloons are so named because the pressure at the valve is the same as the ambient atmospheric pressure.

Another type of balloon is called a "Superpressure Balloon." These balloons maintain altitude by pressurizing internally. Unlike latex, these balloons stop stretching at a certain altitude. As soon as the balloon stops expanding, it maintains a constant volume. Buoyancy is based on the volume of fluid displace, so a pressurized balloon maintains the same altitude.

I work with a group of hackers attempting to cross the Atlantic Ocean using a Zero-pressure balloon. (<http://www.whitestarballoon.com>). A group of radio amateurs actually beat us to the punch ([http://www.arrl.org/news/amateur- radio-balloon-flight-crosse...](http://www.arrl.org/news/amateur-radio- balloon-flight-crosses-atlantic-sets-records)), their crossing was involved a large quantity of luck. We seek to develop systems and methods for engineering balloons capable of traversing large distances safely and reliably.

<comment><USER2> Very interesting, but why won't it ever leave the atmosphere or at least rise far enough that it could reach the Kármán Line (~100km). The record according to jgc is ~40km. Why is it so difficult to go from 40km to 100km if these zero-pressure valves exist?

(PS: I am aware the Kármán line actually has to do with aerodynamic lift (and therefore may not really be applicable to lighter than aircraft). It just chose it because it's the commonly accepted "edge of space")

<comment><USER4> In order to go higher, you must enclose a larger volume of lifting gas. Eventually, the weight of your envelope will exceed the amount of lift you're able to generate with the enclosed volume.

The Japanese currently hold the world altitude record (among all professional and amateur balloons), IIRC. Their balloon was 3.4 micrometers thick, 60,000 m^3 of helium. They reached 53 km.

<comment><USER2> Out of curiosity, why use helium instead of hydrogen? It's not like human lives are at risk in these experiments.

I imagine you'd get more lift with hydrogen.

<comment><USER5> People do use hydrogen, but most balloons still use helium because it does provide a slight safety advantage when launching. (It's also sometimes an insurance requirement.)

I expect to see an increase in the number of hydrogen-filled balloons as helium prices rise in the next few years.

<comment><USER2> That makes sense. Helium seems to be too precious a natural resource to be using in applications where hydrogen can be used safely.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Looks like great fun. I'm always tempted to have a go at things like this myself when I see reports like this. One day...

One question. Did you choose the video cameras based on size or are did you assess the quality too? I've seen some pathetic 'HD' videos from cheap cameras before but things seem to have progressed a lot over the last couple of years.

<comment><AUTHOR> I spent a lot of time investigating small cameras and these ones were the ones that looked best. You can read more than you want to know here: <http://www.chucklohr.com/808/>

The ones I am using are what he called #16: <http://www.chucklohr.com/808/C16/index.html>

<comment><USER7> I have a source for #3s if you want it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I see you've gone to great lengths to make it lighter this time. Any idea what the relationship is between payload weight and balloon burst altitude?

<comment><AUTHOR> I think the burst altitude is far more related to how full the balloon was. Fill the balloon a lot and you get a fast ascent but a lower burst, underfill and you'll get higher for the same payload weight, but of course you get blown further.

<comment><USER9> You could design a two balloon system with a secondary balloon that is nearly initially empty that will take over lift after the first bursts.

<comment><USER8> Or an automated valve controlled by a manometer. The people who build these awesome contraptions seem to put a lot of effort into the payload and comparatively a lot less into the balloon.

<comment><USER10> The design goal isn't usually to maximize time at altitude. If you do that, your balloon lands 10,000km away and is difficult to retrieve.

<comment><USER8> But a common design goal is to maximize altitude, and an automated valve would help with that. You can also have it wired to open if the balloon stops ascending, or strays too far.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


A Puzzle Book That Drove England to Madness - <AUTHOR> http://hazlitt.net/feature/goes-all-way-queen-puzzle-book-drove-england-madness <comment><USER2> For some reason this reminds me of the Eternity II puzzle[1]. The creator of the puzzle had mathematicians confirm how difficult it would be to solve due to the number of permutations and yet a vast number of people bought it thinking they would be the ones to solve it (usually by hand)! There was a $2 million prize and it was never solved.

1.[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternity_II_puzzle](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternity_II_puzzle)

<comment><USER3> That's kind of a cruel thing to do to people if there's no way to solve it other than brute force.

<comment><USER4> Yeah, the original Eternity puzzle ([https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternity_puzzle](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternity_puzzle)) was a lot better in that regard - it spiked a whole online community focused on finding clever ways to find a solution, and was in fact solved within a year.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Images with analysis: [http://bunnyears.net/kitwilliams/](http://bunnyears.net/kitwilliams/)

<comment><USER6> Weird, as far as I can tell the website here is looking at understanding references in the text. For example the poems round the images on page 2 are "one of six of eight" which might refer to Henry VIII's wives.

Yet in the public domain the solution is known - a brief google lead me to "draw a line from left eye to left foot and extend to a letter, the letters forming an anagram of the location.

Really the site seems a historical oddity.

<comment><USER7> According to Wikipedia the solution is along those lines but more complicated.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masquerade_%28book%29#Solution](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masquerade_%28book%29#Solution)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Kit Williams is highly collectable in darkest Gloucestershire. The thing is that you have to know him, have his work already and know him to be allowed to buy his work.

Some documentaries made by the BBC:

From back in the day:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-iU- qoG9Upg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-iU-qoG9Upg)

Retrospective, recent:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEIFm0UHtoo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEIFm0UHtoo)

</comment><comment><USER9> Game designer Brian Moriarty's 2002 Game Developers Conference talk discusses Masquerade quite a bit and I think does a good job of viscerally conveying its appeal. The text of the talk is here: [http://ludix.com/moriarty/psalm46.html](http://ludix.com/moriarty/psalm46.html) , but I think it's worth listening to the original recording, which you can get here: [http://number-none.com/blow/media/psalm_46.mp3](http://number- none.com/blow/media/psalm_46.mp3)

<comment><USER10> The backtrack on the original recording is really distracting, anyone got a source without this?

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> The human brain has mastered pretty much one skill -- pattern recognition -- and it will apply this skill wherever it can, finding answers even where none exist.

<comment><USER12> Can't help but to think about Google Machine Learning 'Art' they showed not long ago.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I owned a translation of this book as a kid and had no luck (there was no way of knowing, pre-Internet, that the riddle had already been solved). Many years later I got the 1982 paperback English edition, which contained the solution as described by the author. It turns out that the crucial clue had been mangled by the translators.

</comment><comment><USER14> If anyone wants to do something like this but a bit less quixotic, and you live in Boston, try the annual MIT Mystery Hunt! It only takes a weekend, and it's in January, so there's not long to wait. Just don't do it alone. Either form a team or contact them and get assigned to one. It's a great time!

</comment><comment><USER15> This reminds me of the treasure supposedly hidden in the American Southwest by Forrest Fenn. He says it's still out there and has not yet been found. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenn_treasure](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenn_treasure)

<comment><USER16> Hmm, I think this clue is new since I last read about this: In January 2015, Fenn revealed in a new interview: "I know the treasure chest is wet." Maybe this means he recently visited the treasure site? Maybe it's worth it to surveil him in case he goes again.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> There is an hour-long documentary on the book and its author entitled _The Man Behind the Masquerade_ :

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEIFm0UHtoo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEIFm0UHtoo)

</comment><comment><USER18> See also The Ultimate Alphabet which I pored over for years as a teenager - e.g. this is "S" which apparently has 1234 words illustrated (the complete book had 7777 total) - [http://www.codex99.com/illustration/56.html](http://www.codex99.com/illustration/56.html)

It came with a £10,000 prize for the best effort but I can't find any info about the winner.

<comment><USER19> [http://ken-jennings.com/blog/archives/99](http://ken- jennings.com/blog/archives/99)

There was a winner.

"MW: Again, I can't recall who won. Interestingly the winner was the one who identified the least number of false words. I think there was some scoring system where an incorrectly identified word attracted a minus penalty. I seem to remember that the contest was expanded with the paperback edition to include extra prizes for a younger age group."

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I owned a copy. It was beautiful. I got as far as finding the rabbit in every picture, that was it.

<comment><USER21> Same here. Fantastic book though - made up for the disappointment of never working it out (hey, I was 11.. ;) )

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> My sister got that book for her b'day because she's into puzzles.

It didn't come with plane tickets to England so wasn't the best gift idea.

<comment><USER23> According to Wikipedia, Williams would have accepted remote answers to the puzzle too:

"To ensure that readers from further afield had an equal chance of winning, Williams also announced that he would confirm the first precisely correct answer sent to him by post."

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

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> It reminds me of the modern Web you look at a news article see something you don't understand maybe a word so you search for the word, then that leads to the etymology of it and ten hours later you're still going into the rabbit hole.

</comment><comment><USER25> If anyone is interested in similar things, check out DASH [0] and Geocaching (for a puzzle based narrative, check out Geocaching's WherIGo) [1,2]

[0]: [http://playdash.org/](http://playdash.org/) [1]: [https://www.geocaching.com/play](https://www.geocaching.com/play) [2]: [http://www.wherigo.com](http://www.wherigo.com)

</comment><comment><USER26> There's something similar going on now called Endgame. See [http://www.endgamegold.com/](http://www.endgamegold.com/)</comment>


Show HN: new dating advice app – Crowdsource advice from the opposite sex - <AUTHOR> My partner and I are developing an app at the moment which gives people the opportunity to crowdsource dating advice exclusively from people of the opposite sex. That is, women seek advice from men, and vice versa. The fundamental concept is to break down the barriers of communication between men and women and give people a more reliable source of advice than the usual channels such as friends - who can either be notoriously unreliable or sadly may not have the best intentions.
People would post information anonymously about their situation by way of a short message and would also have the option of uploading a text msg feed (between them and their partner). People would then respond to that situation over a limited period (of 24-hours), with the most popular piece of advice being sent exclusively to the person who posted.
We have a launch page below.
https://www.readbetweenapp.com
We have a prototype developed are seeking interested users to be the first to test it out. If you are interested, please email us at:
email@example.com
Any other feedback would be very welcome below! <comment><USER2> And why would I as a user choose to respond to other people's questions?

</comment><comment><USER3> App version of r/AskMen and r/AskWomen?</comment>


Ask HN: How might we create a more United America? - <AUTHOR> Is a more United America with less us vs them political conflict too ambitious a goal?<p>How might we achieve a more United America? <comment><USER2> Seeing the other side as having the same problems?

For example, take the case of the Christian baker who wouldn't do a wedding cake for a gay couple. This has gone all the way to the Supreme Court; it's being heard next week.

But the problem is, a hard-core Christian group (let's call them Christians Against Homosexuality, just for instance) could have a convention. It's small, so it's maybe 20 or 30 people. But they want to eat. So they order a sheet cake, with the name of their organization written on it, and four Bible references. And the baker that they order the cake from turns out to be gay. And if the gay baker refuses the order, now it's religious discrimination.

Once you realize that the problem is symmetric - it can happen to _your_ side - things can get more reasonable. You realize that you can pick an evangelical Christian baker, and a gay baker, tell them that that whatever rules they come up with are going to apply to _both_ of them, stick them in a room for two hours, and expect that they'll figure out something reasonable.

But how do you make people see the other side as having the same problem? Especially, you have some extremists (on all sides) who don't _want_ to see the other side as having any shred of a valid point. How do you fix that?

</comment><comment><USER3> I don't want this comment to be construed as a partisan hack, which is the last thing in the world that will bring about any real unity in the country. Anyways, you might be interested in Senator Ben Sasse's book, "The Vanishing American Adult", or other of his writings (his twitter account is often amusing.)

[https://www.amazon.com/Vanishing-American-Adult-Coming- Crisi...](https://www.amazon.com/Vanishing-American-Adult-Coming- Crisis/dp/1250114403)

From a review on The Atlantic: "He believes Americans have lost their sense of personal integrity and discipline. For the country to deal with the troubles ahead—including automation, political disengagement, and the rise of nativist, huckster politicians, he says—people must recover their sense of virtue. The republic depends on it."

[https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/05/ben- sas...](https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/05/ben-sasse-virtue- politics/528015/)

Or have a read of his extensive comments on Charlottesville:

[https://www.facebook.com/SenatorSasse/posts/1356425404455401](https://www.facebook.com/SenatorSasse/posts/1356425404455401)

<comment><AUTHOR> Looks great, thank you

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I'm living with a mix of Trump and Clinton supporters. People seem divided now, as they have been for a while.

Is it possible to create a more united America, where it doesn't feel like Trump and Clinton supporters mostly cannot get along and see eye to eye?

Here's how I see it. I don't know if this is accurate.

Say there's 5 groups:

\- Mainstream liberal, ~29%

\- Extreme liberal, ~0.1%

\- Mainstream conservative, ~34%

\- Extreme conservative, ~0.1%

\- Unaffiliated, ~36%

It seems to me like the unaffiliated and mainstream right and mainstream left have a lot in common, and collectively oppose much of the extreme right and left on each side. This is probably an oversimplification.

I wish there were more mainstream candidates on both sides. I wonder if the two party system encourages more extreme candidates, though.

</comment><comment><USER4> Step 1: stop believing that intelligence + facts = your opinion.

To put it another way, someone is not either stupid or under-informed just because they disagree with you.

<comment><USER2> I read a rule once, I forget where, that said that you can only express disagreement with someone once you can re-state their position to their satisfaction. Then, you can disagree as much as you please. But at least you're disagreeing with their real position, not a strawman.

I think that a lot of the "you're stupid to even think that" can often come from strawman versions of peoples' real positions. It's easy to decide that a strawman is a stupid position; that's kind of the point of the strawman.

<comment><USER5> >But at least you're disagreeing with their real position, not a strawman.

A troll would understand your position, prefixed with "So, you believe..." Throw it out once you acknowledged they understood it, and replace it with their straw-man. Then they'll tell you that you're too stupid to understand their position so you don't get to refute it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Find intelligent life in space.</comment>


Getting to the bottom of line height (2019) - <AUTHOR> https://www.figma.com/blog/line-height-changes/ <comment><USER2> Having line height change from "half-leading" on the first line to "leading" seems a little bizarre to me... why mix the two systems?

It seems the last line also has "half-leading" below, and I can't see a way to compensate, so that eg aligning the bottom of two text boxes will line up the bottom baselines.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is an interesting article, and the result seems like a reasonable compromise. One thing I don't understand: is the font-designer's chosen line- height (consider the example of Zapfino in this article) completely ignored, on the web (and in this system)? Or is it available somehow, e.g. is this what "line-height: normal" (as opposed to "line-height: 100%" or "line-height: 1.0") means? I guess not, because the MDN docs for line-height (linked from this article) says only:

> Depends on the user agent. Desktop browsers (including Firefox) use a > default value of roughly 1.2, depending on the element's font-family.

</comment><comment> chupa-chups Could you provide a TLDR which audience should consume the linked content?

<comment><USER4> The article is a good read from a design perspective (how typefaces look and behave), from a history perspective (where do these conventions come from) and from an engineering perspective (how does this affect our users?)</comment></comment>


Popular People Live Longer - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/01/opinion/sunday/popular-people-live-longer.html <comment><USER2> I've found human lives to consist in significant part of feedback loops. Positive feedback loops, and negative feedback loops.

A person receiving positive feedback tends to feel better, be more socially comfortable and engaging, and to receive resources that help them on their journey.

This response and that assistance actually helps them become better. Better nutrition, more attentive and patient instruction. Etc. It's not just that things are done for them; it's that the feedback loops can improve their own performance.

A person receiving negative feedback tends to feel worse, to be socially uncomfortable and isolated, and the be denied helpful resources and assistance.

The negative feedback loop can result in that person withdrawing more and more. I've been there: Most people _do not_ want to be where they are not welcome. It is one of the worst feelings.

Negative feedback loops tend to spill over into one's physical health, and that unhealthiness furthers the rejection.

It is not just the "big things." People with a popular appearance routinely get bigger servings, more engaged and attentive care. More respect.

It's pervasive. Pay attention. You'll see it all around you, every day, everywhere.

I've been burned a few times by "attractive" people who deliberately used this to their advantage. And I've been slowly figuring out, at an emotional, "feel it" level -- as opposed to intellectual -- why some people outright pre- emptively reject attractive people.

They've learned a life lesson: Interacting with those people too often places them on the losing side. Whether they are being deliberately used by those people, or just because of the comparative way they are treated by surrounding people.

<comment><USER3> > feedback loops

That's the basis of social-belonging and other mindset interventions.[1]

For example, when you encounters difficulty as a freshman in college, do you think "I don't belong here", or "everyone has difficulties - I can get help, work hard, and succeed, like I've done in the past". Students who feel like they belong, build stronger support networks, more readily get help, feel better, and so. Both narratives then do feedback, and outcomes diverge. So surprisingly small interventions, to nudge the initial interpretation, like an hour in high school, or an essay at the beginning of a course, can have a surprisingly large impact.

I wonder if the future will look back our current lack of mental hygiene interventions, the way we now look back at the 1800's lack of physical hygiene interventions. Something like, well, it took a couple of decades, but NYC finally stopped politically-connected brewers from killing hundreds of children with adulterated milk from sick cows.[2]

[1] [http://gregorywalton- stanford.weebly.com/papers.html](http://gregorywalton- stanford.weebly.com/papers.html) [2] [https://www.google.com/#q=swill+milk](https://www.google.com/#q=swill+milk)

<comment><USER4> It's quite interesting to me that you can find homeostasis in physiological systems, but not in social systems, where runaway effects prevail. And seemingly a more robust social system would create a tendency for people to reach a more stable social state rather then continue to descend in a downward spiral.

(BTW the "negative feedback" loop mentioned in this topic is technically still a positive feedback, because the effects of the cause produces more of the cause. True negative feedback creates a counteractive force that promotes equilibrium- it has nothing to do with emotional negativity)

<comment><USER2> That's a good point. I guess I might have more accurately stated them as "positive psychological/physiological feedback loop" and "negative psychological/physiological feedback loop.

You're right, as I describe them, both are "positive" in terms of reinforcing amplification.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> It's true. Most of my popularity comes from outliving my enemies.

But in all seriousness, I am intrigued with the idea that merely by being popular, it will affect your DNA and turn on genes that correlate good health.

<comment><USER6> Causality is likely backwards. People who are damaged by their environment or by getting unfortunate genetics end up both becoming unpopular and lowering their life expectancy. IQ is likely also correlated for the same reason to both.

<comment><USER7> I would say stress, anxiety, depression

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Relationships stemming from likability have more health benefits than status:

"Yet this same research reveals that there is more than one type of popularity, and most of us may be investing in the wrong kind. Likability reflects kindness, benevolent leadership and selfless, prosocial behavior. Research suggests that this form of popularity offers lifelong advantages, and leads to relationships that confer the greatest health benefits.

Likability is markedly different from status — an ultimately less satisfying form of popularity that reflects visibility, influence, power and prestige. Status can be quantified by social media followers; likability cannot."

</comment><comment><USER9> I find it problematic that the only controls consistently accounted for are age, sex, and race.

I think they are making too big a claim, and they would've generated a more useful insight if they were controlling for pathological behaviors as well.

Are popular alcoholics likely to live longer? How about popular obese people? Is there, perhaps, a causal relation between being isolated/unpopular and pathological behaviors?

The study itself (the pnas source--and by the way, thanks to the NY Times for linking to the source) smacks of p-value fishing combined with making the most grandiose claim you can based on those p-values.

I'm not saying the paper is wrong in a mathematically provable way or that it couldn't be replicated. I'm saying that it isn't science that is meaningful or useful. It strikes me as resume-driven science.

Scientific click-bait.

<comment><USER10> It's a meta study. That means the authors themselves haven't gathered any data but used data from other studies and done some number crunching on it. There have already been hundreds of studies which have found links between loneliness factors and mortality. This study's authors contribution to the science is estimating the size, or strength, of that link.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Popular people are more affluent, affluent people have greater resources to expending on their quality of life, people with better QOLs live longer, thus popular people live longer?

Misinterpreting cause and correlation, am I doing this correctly?

</comment><comment><USER12> Do people who are popular live longer? Or do people who think are popular live longer?

In other words, is it enough to think you are popular to affect your DNA?

</comment><comment><USER13> Status vs likability: "it's nice to be important, but it's more important to be nice".

</comment><comment><USER14> Or at least it feels that way.

</comment><comment><USER15> I have considered suicide for the past 30 years. I tried very hard to build a life in the confines of whatever limitations I've been given and/or created for myself. I determine that the nature of humanity is to seek power. This study reminds me of why this world is total bullshit. I've notified to be part of this world anymore. I'm connected into this universe more than I ever have been. There is a black hole awaiting me

<comment><USER16> Back when I was depressed modal realism cured me of any suicidality. How can one possibly think the suffering, loneliness and utter pointlessness of life can be preferable to the sweet oblivion of non-existence? My answer is non- existence may indeed be preferable to life but it's not at all clear that non- existence exists. What the Everett interpretation, Egan's Dust theory, the mere fact that the mind is finite and the universe is infinite (and finite patters recur in infinity an infinite amount of times) forces me to consider is the prospect that any attempt to commit suicide, no matter how thorough, could result in a subjective experience of the consequences of a failed suicide attempt in which "I" am unable to escape, even through suicide. The idea that the universe owes you nothing, not even nonexistence, was what killed any suicidality in me. Odd that a depressing thought would work so well when appeals to optimism did not, but makes a sort of sense considering how depressed people think.

<comment><USER17> I am not sure if this helps, but we don't actually know if the universe is infinite or finite. It is an unknown.

<comment><USER16> Sure. But we have to accord it a pretty high probability, at least 50%. So this uncertainty doesn't really effect much.

<comment><USER18> I've always assigned it pretty low probability on the basis that we have no examples of infinite objects existing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> TL;DR: all you need is love.

<comment><USER20> This is the same conclusion from the Grant Study, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grant_Study](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grant_Study) . The lead researcher George Vaillant put it as: "Happiness is love. Full stop."

<comment><USER21> Which begs the question, "What is love?".

<comment><USER22> Baby don't hurt me.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> "Popularity" correlates with wealth, wealth correlates with health?

<comment><USER24> Why don't you read the article?

<comment><USER25> The article distinguishes between likability and status, sure but the survival statistics come from a huge meta-analysis and the status versus likability distinction comes another set of studies (so it's combining two measurement processes, inherently harder than just using one). Given the overall reproduction crisis in psychology, that it turns out rather few studies are actually reliable, it seems entirely plausible that the average of the survival studies didn't control well for wealth and ended up with sociological factors and the status versus likability question is kind of an irrelevant extra.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Unpopular live longer too, I believe the more hatred you have, the longer you live, and no this is not a post SW binge comment.

<comment><USER27> Suicide bombers don't seem to have a long life expectancy.

<comment><USER28> But their leaders live longer. Which exposes OP's fallacy - haters live long if their hatred makes them popular.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> > _Even some adults appear obsessed with social media, tracking the number of > retweets on their Twitter profiles or likes on Facebook_

"Some"? Where does the writer lives, on Mars?

<comment><USER30> Yes, some.

I have no social media presence, nor do I care to.

<comment><USER29> That just proves that you don't care -- not that those who care are few (which is a different assertion).

<comment><USER31> Let me just remind you... since you sound like you care a lot/spend a lot of time on those services: if you're on those services you're encouraged to interact with other people who also care a lot/spend a lot of time on those services.

You're self selecting for a group that re-enforces your opinion.

As of 2016, only ~70 percent of adults in the US use facebook. Of those 70%, ~25% use it once a week or less.

Those who don't care are MANY (probably most).

<comment><USER29> > _As of 2016, only ~70 percent of adults in the US use facebook. Of those > 70%, ~25% use it once a week or less._

That leaves a 75% that use it more than once a week. Let's be charitable and make it only a 25% (1/3 of them) that use it multiple times per week or daily and care about their standing there.

That's still a whooping 40-50 million people, in the US alone, and of those lots of people do care and are influenced by their social media status.

It's not like "even some adults" as if it is as rare as butterfly collectors or septagenarias that are into Eminem or something -- it's a huge social phenomenon.

A 50% of the adult population (70% * ~0.75) that use it more than once a week is already impressive. And 'adults' is the wrong metric, since it includes anyone 18-100. So "70% of adults in the US use FB" doesn't reveal the whole picture, as a lot of them are not even in the relevant demographic (e.g. people that were already 50 or so when FB hit the scene in the mid-late 2000s).</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


The Reason Air Travel Is Terrible and So Few Airlines Are Profitable (2016) - <AUTHOR> https://hbr.org/2016/05/the-reason-air-travel-is-terrible-and-so-few-airlines-are-profitable <comment><USER2> He makes some good points, but the "few airlines are profitable" claim seems a bit dated. Pretty much all the big US airlines (Delta, American, United, etc.) are enjoying healthy profits these past couple of years. Falling oil prices, consolidation, robust demand, and cost discipline have all played a part.

<comment><USER3> Yes they might be profitable, but only because they have a captive market and they're squeezing the passengers to make that profit (literally ... legroom!).

Basically Airlines suck, they all pretty much do. Even the "better" ones such as JetBlue/Southwest still are only marginally less sucky.

When was the last time you purchased the "least suckiest" laptop? or which Tesla model is the least suckiest? You didn't, you bought something that you had a choice in and you were probably psyched to buy it! (which is not a feeling I ever had booking a flight).</comment></comment>