FCC weakens net neutrality rule in a prelude to larger rollbacks - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2017/02/23/fcc-weakens-net-neutrality-rule-in-a-prelude-to-larger-rollbacks/ <comment><USER2> I hate these types of articles that provide extensive quotes and even a screenshot of part of the pdf, but refuse to link to the actual documents. It's probably an advertising thing where they don't want people to leave the site.

The actual statements are available here [https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc- addresses-unnecessary-accou...](https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-addresses- unnecessary-accounting-requirements-carriers)

<comment><USER3> You're quite right. Normally I'm pretty good about that. (At least, I remembered today: [https://techcrunch.com/2017/02/24/fcc-prepares-to-pull- broad...](https://techcrunch.com/2017/02/24/fcc-prepares-to-pull-broadband- privacy-rules-adopted-last-year/))

This article went through several revisions as I did research so the original opening couple paragraphs and links got lost in the shuffle. I've added the link back in.

<comment><USER4> Wow, thank you for this response. An author responding to a comment on their article seems rare in my eyes. Do you think this kind of commentary should happen on the TC website instead of a third party site? Do you think Facebook comments are conducive to constructive commentary on your articles?

<comment><USER3> Personally I see no sense in trying to contain discussion on-site rather than here, on Facebook, or reddit etc. People want to discuss things in the community of their choosing. Better to intelligently collate and sort those conversations. I wrote about it here if you're curious:

[http://techcrunch.com/2013/10/13/shouts-and- murmurations/](http://techcrunch.com/2013/10/13/shouts-and-murmurations/)

<comment><USER5> I actually believe exactly the opposite, it was chance that you saw this post on HN and had the good faith to update the article, and I believe fostering a nice community on your own sites increases the odds of these kinds of events, and in the end improves reporting accuracy and quality (among plenty of other benefits).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Undersandly, the conversation in here revolves around the technicalities and semantics of net neutrality. But this isn't an issue of technology. It's a political issue, or worse, an ideological issue. It's not about the empirical truths of net neutrality, or the collective intent of those who created, and those who continue to develop the technology that has woven itself into the fabric of humanity. It's about idealouges imposing their ideals on every facet of our lives, regardless of the facts.

The sad fact is, this is yet another grim attack on net neutrality by nefarious agents who see the web as something to be dominated and bent to their will exclusivley for political and economic gain.

Like it or not, the work we do is going to become highly politicised. Are we ready for this? Do we have the moral fortitude to resist the influence that fuzzy, sloppy, and emotive politics seeks to have on our discussions?

I think back to how we handled the Brendan Eich debacle. I (regretfully) came down on the punitive side of that argument. And I participated in that debate with a level of anger and vitriol that embarrasses me now. But whichever side you took, there's no doubt that for a brief moment we were deeply divided. The Brendan Eich story was a flash in the pan compared to what is about to happen.

Should we engage in political debate, or should we avoid it? Can we buck the trend and participate in political debate in way that doesn't tear us apart, or should we ignore it as it happens around us and impacts upon our lives and work? Or is there a path between the extremes, where we can be neither ignorant to our political leanings nor beholden to them?

I don't dare offer any advice on how we should prepare ourselves for what is about to come, I just hope we can all think about how we hope to respond before it happens.

One thing I will say though, being someone prone to highly emotional reactions in all aspects of my life; developing software in teams has taught me the value of "strong opinions, weakly held".

<comment><USER7> I think the tech industry and HN crowd are waking up too late, and this might be because of the previous HN cultural wave. Initially HN was like the slashdot crows, in that it was geeky and making money of being entrepreneurial was an ideal, and not a way of life.

Eventually that changed as the culture shifted to enabling and succeeding in startups. A lot of the meta culture and crowd is now many steps away from the old hacker roots and far closer to the entrepreneur /wanterpreneur group.

This latter group really isn't in it to get into a political battle, and it makes no sense to get involved in a waste of time. As a result achieving critical mass, or uniting people under political oriented architectures won't happen soon enough.

Maybe it's time to head back to /. ?

<comment><USER8> im ignorant here. What was HN like initially? I assumed since it was the discussion board of a startup accelerator that it was always pretty focused on that.

<comment><USER7> Hmmm.

Yes and no. The question/answer is of degrees.

I can't point to a categorical set of submissions/comments to provide you with some perfect bouquet of HN circa 2008 vs 2012 or such.

Essentially it started out more as hackers figuring out how to hack becoming entrepreneurs or making things work - to entrepreneurs or startup founder babies figuring out what to do. So HN was more geeky initially, and the techie perspective of what startups are doing.

Now it's slightly more towards the startup side looking at the tech perspective.

This is all relative. If you compared HN crowd to the WSJ and it's consumers, this site would be far and ahead a site of techies talking tech stuff.

I hope this helps, because this is making a risky argument since it's subjective.

\</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment>---

Part of this is covered by basic theory of websites - initially a site has a simple good or utility, (information, expertise) and attracts only people in the know. They come to discuss their field.

Eventually, if the knowledge allows people to get ahead, your culture shifts, as more people come to the site. Your experts to normal concentration shifts. PG has a good article on this, he identifies what he calls midbrow arguments.

<comment><USER9> My understanding is that it was originally just a place for people in YC- funded startups (or people otherwise affiliated with YC) to share useful/interesting links and information with each other. I don't associate HN (then or now) with any particular crowd, it's just an ever-evolving nexus of common interests that YC maintains as a public service more than anything else.

I bet it's more focused on geeky interests and less focused on entrepreneurial topics than it was originally. Longtime readers might sense that it's more dumbed down or diluted now, but I suspect that's really just those longtime readers themselves getting more knowledgeable over the years, and HN seeming less revelatory than it did in the past. :)

Example: it seems like everyone I know used to read Slashdot but stopped at some point when they realized how much the discussion quality had deteriorated. What's funny is how different people's timelines are. I thought Slashdot was a great resource in 1998 but felt like the quality of the comments had descended to mostly garbage by 2001. I know other people who are way smarter than me (but a few years younger) who will swear that Slashdot was awesome in 2003 when they started reading it, but lament its downfall circa 2008 or something. The biggest factor in an individual's Slashdot timeline seems to be, they loved it when they were younger, less mature, and less knowledgable, then as they got older and more experienced they started getting annoyed by it. But really, Slashdot's demographics didn't change nearly as much as they did.

<comment><USER7> No, I know what you mean - I'm accounting for that.

Forum history and human behavior on the web is my hobby subject.

In this case I'm not saying it's become smarter or less earth shattering. I'm saying that the average focus has shifted, as a cultural shift in the community which come so here.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I can see how a bit of outrage about this is how the NRA got to the place it is today. This by itself isn't that meaningful, but anything can be politicized, turn public opinion and gain momentum. That's why the NRA's position is to say NO to any kind of gun regulation, because they know that's how you ensure guns are made available and gun culture is for sure secure.

In the tech community I see people rising up against any kind of movement against net neutrality. And I do not want to see it erode. But I worry that by becoming averse to any reversal, any compromise, the communities stance will eventually be so politicized that it is just another part of the unreasonable and ultra biased political landscape that grinds progress to a halt.

<comment><USER11> There are pros and cons to gun ownership; it both contributes to and harms the public good. Net neutrality is a more lopsided issue—the arguments against net neutrality are all about legalizing extortion and promoting a tragedy of the commons, or else they're non-specific arguments against regulation of any kind.

Taken on its own and rationally, the net neutrality issue is much less amenable to producing a permanent stalemate than gun control. Existing political factions can incorporate positions on net neutrality into their existing political stalemate, but outside of such a context it's pretty easy to see that holes in net neutrality like the one here are absurd—why should smaller monopolies have more leeway to abuse their customers than large monopolies?

<comment><USER12> To be fair, your "arguments against net neutrality are all about legalizing extortion" already sounds a bit "ultra biased".

What if someone wants to start an ISP, and charge less for a lower QoS band? Is that legalized extortion?

(Not to say it would be a good idea, I agree that it is a slippery slope)

<comment><USER11> What do you mean "charge less for a lower QoS band"? Net neutrality has nothing to say about an ISP that wants to offer both 10Mbps and 100Mbps plans, or business-class plans that offer an SLA for a higher price than ordinary residential plans.

<comment><USER12> This hypothetical company wants to drop packets from lower tier customers first, when congested, and oversubscribe their fiber to reduce costs.

<comment><USER13> That still doesn't sound like it would violate net neutrality. NN is about not discriminating based on content. In this case all content is still treated the same. Now, if they throttled everything except a few 'vital' resources, then you'd have an issue.

<comment><USER12> Continuing the hypothetical :)

Let's say we need to drop packets from my lower tier. We'd prefer to keep a good experience for those customers if possible, so it would arguably be preferable to drop lower utility packets rather than grind everyone in that tier to a halt.

If 90% of the packets were coming from streaming video, the ISP could drop them all without affecting that tier's ability to access their bank accounts.

That is really the crux of the issue, because it is very close to reality.

<comment><USER11> I think you've taken the hypothetical far beyond plausibility. If you think you need to drop 90% of a customer's traffic because of congestion internal to your network, something has already gone badly wrong. I don't think it's realistic to hypothesize that you have a functioning and profitable ISP that enforces strict priority of higher-paying customer traffic over lower tiers rather than proportional or equal allocation of available bandwidth.

But setting aside the question of whether anybody would sign up for such a shitty ISP, you don't suddenly need to throw out 90% of a customer's traffic unless you're suddenly hit by a DDoS that you can't mitigate in any saner fashion. Congestion that bad will build gradually, and you'll have plenty of RTTs to send congestion signals to your customers. If a customer is running an application that is so unresponsive to congestion signals that they end up using 10x the bandwidth your backhaul has available for them, then that customer can have no reasonable expectation that any other applications remain usable. Any sane video streaming service would have lowered the resolution and then dropped the connection entirely as the congestion developed and packet loss increased.

Ignoring even that, you still haven't come up with a situation that requires non-neutral traffic management. AQMs like Stochastic Fair BLUE and Cake will automatically identify the unresponsive flow(s) and probabilistically drop those packets at whatever rate is necessary to alleviate the congestion, converging on 100% drop probability as the flow continues to behave like a DoS, while well-behaved TCP-like flows are minimally impacted (aside from a degree of congestion signalling necessary to keep their total bandwidth usage within the limit of what's available). SFB and Cake don't care about where the traffic is going other than to identify what flow it belongs to. They don't care what kind of traffic it is, they just care about how it behaves. They're neutral algorithms, and they provide a reasonable solution to the unreasonable challenge you've posed.

<comment><USER12> I think you slightly misunderstood the hypothetical (well, I stated it poorly). In this case, the network is congested and we need to drop packets from a low tier. In the low tier, 90% of the packets are (hypothetically) video streaming. It doesn't need to drop 90% of the packets, I'm just characterizing the traffic in that tier. This is also fairly representative of evening traffic in the US from a residential ISP.

The ISP cannot fully rely on all parties behaving well, unfortunately. The question is: Can the ISP drop packets from this low priced tier that it knows are likely video streaming, even well behaved video streaming, over other packets? Is that acceptable, or "legalized extortion"?

Obviously it would selectively drop DOS traffic first, as you mentioned, but we are past that point.

<comment><USER11> > The question is: Can the ISP drop packets from this low priced tier that it > knows are likely video streaming, even well behaved video streaming, over > other packets?

Such a policy is not necessary for the ISP to deliver good quality of service. Content-neutral traffic management is good enough, and often better than poorly-designed discriminatory traffic management policies. There's no real upside to permitting ISPs to engage in this kind of discrimination.

<comment><USER14> Are you claiming that, for any fraction _x_ of traffic that must be dropped, overall subscriber utility is completely independent of what type of traffic is dropped?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Does anyone with a strong understanding of internetworking, peering and transit contract negotiation actually believe that "net neutrality" is possible? traffic shaping of saturated links seems like a necessary outcome to not undermine the smaller users (i.e. low bandwidth communications) that are impacted by heavy users (i.e. video streaming) if two peering parties can't come to terms on cost sharing for link upgrades.

<comment><USER16> Does anyone actually believe we will "run out of bandwidth" to the point where traffic shaping will become essential?

Traffic shaping of saturated links sounds like a waste of time and resources when it's so much easier to just upgrade the hardware. It's cheaper too! It also happens to be _the fucking purpose of the ISP_ (to provide adequate bandwidth for their customers).

Think of how much it costs to pay people to manage an incredibly complicated traffic ruleset--not to mention the massively increased CPU overhead--versus a one-time hardware purchase.

What you're talking about is either an ISP that's dying and can't afford to upgrade their shit _or_ a greedy evil monster that simply wants to extract more profit from existing infrastructure in the most obtuse and invasive way possible.

<comment><USER17> > Traffic shaping of saturated links sounds like a waste of time and resources > when it's so much easier to just upgrade the hardware. It's cheaper too! It > also happens to be the fucking purpose of the ISP (to provide adequate > bandwidth for their customers).

This is a very naive comment. For anything other than a dedicated "business class" circuit with hard performance guarantees, speculation and shaping is involved in delivering the end product.

<comment><USER11> > For anything other than a dedicated "business class" circuit with hard > performance guarantees, speculation and shaping is involved in delivering > the end product.

The alternative to a connection with a SLA guarantee is a _best effort_ connection, not discriminatory traffic shaping. Underprovisioning part of your network doesn't require you to show favoritism to certain traffic—the normal way to cope with larger than expected usage is to just start dropping packets where there's congestion. That doesn't imply or require traffic shaping.

<comment><USER17> > just start dropping packets where there's congestion

Aside from being normal, do you think this is preferable because it is fair?

I think of QoS as a way of allowing more types of SLA to exist. Maybe Youtube makes a deal with T-Mobile to keep videos playing longer (before packets start dropping) in exchange for money. This money might allow T-Mobile to invest in other parts of its infrastructure.

Isn't _any_ backbone link in a sense a way of shaping traffic? The old pattern (from point A to B, say) may have been less efficient than the new pattern (using the new link).

The link makes economic sense to install simply because there is demand for bandwidth from A to B. If there weren't, a link would have been installed elsewhere instead. The price of the new link is passed along to downstream and upstream providers.

Assuming that each ISP has a shaping model in place that is generally fair, is there really any difference between these three things:

\- the ISP shopping upstream providers based on SLA committments for traffic X

\- the ISP imposing QoS that addresses the quality experienced by customers using traffic X

\- the ISP investigating upgrading networking hardware to allow for superior handling of traffic X

I'd argue that in every case the ISP has a cost and a benefit. In the case of the QoS change, the cost is that some customers might be slightly worse off (those who used traffic Y but never used traffic X).

<comment><USER18> _Maybe Youtube makes a deal with T-Mobile to keep videos playing longer (before packets start dropping) in exchange for money. This money might allow T-Mobile to invest in other parts of its infrastructure._

Another possibility: as a major ISP nears network capacity, they can implicitly (or explicitly, depending on law) solicit revenue streams from Youtube and many others for "priority access" to their somewhat- or completely-captive customer base. Eventually, secondary tiers are created to efficiently segment the content market -- a priority plan conveniently sized for every budget. Those who can't or won't pay fall into an ever decreasing performance category as the priority slices are snatched up.

The ISP then starts selling premium bundles on the customer side -- Platinum Service will include Youtube, Netflix, Amazon, Apple (and get our bonus in- house streaming service at no extra charge!). Platinum-Plus, for another $14.95 per month plus fees, adds priority streams from your choice of up to three major sports content sources. And Platinum-Pro adds non-degraded VPN so you can work from home. Choice!

The ISP is monetizing the fact that they're NOT adding capacity. Eventually they can choose to take the hit to their numbers and make that investment, but they'll do so within the now-normal tiered framework -- offering new capacity and premium deals at the top of the stack, rather than letting the bottom free-ride into better service.

<comment><USER17> You are describing a content lock-in dystopia. Yes, this would be anticompetitive (and appropriately addressed by the FTC or DOJ, not the FCC) and it is among the more unlikely scenarios.

<comment><USER18> Sure, I'm painting a picture to illustrate the point. But reductio ad absurdum can be a useful way to explore the problem. I don't think there's anything in my scenario that's beyond the pale. We could get there by degrees in an aggressively unfettered market.

<comment><USER19> >We could get there by degrees in an aggressively unfettered market.

Don't you mean the heavily regulated market we have now that prevents new ISPs from easily servicing customers? The entire reason ISPs can behave like this is because customers realistically have no alternatives.

Look at how Comcast behaved in markets where Google Fiber showed up. They often increased bandwidth and reduced prices effective immediately to try to keep customers. An 'unfettered market' would be one where an ISP doesn't have to spend years negotiating with city councils just to get the privilege to put fiber in utility tunnels where local cable companies already have it.

<comment><USER11> Your "unfettered market" would still leave incumbents with the massive advantages conferred by their natural monopoly; it just lessens the artificial barriers to competition on top of that. Your "unfettered market" would not be a healthy competitive market. Government intervention akin to local loop unbundling would be necessary to create a freely competitive market where one will not naturally develop.

<comment><USER19> Google Fiber _gave up on silicon valley_ because of the regulatory burden of convincing local governments to let them install fiber. Let that sink in.

Google, who has enough cash to pay for nearly half of the entire Comcast company, was not able to rollout fiber to the area because of government regulations.

Why do you think they started in Kansas City of all places? It wasn't because they thought that was the strongest market for fiber in the country. It was because they actually convinced the government to let them bring fiber to peoples' homes.

>Government intervention akin to local loop unbundling would be necessary to create a freely competitive market where one will not naturally develop.

While this would make it even cheaper to get into the market, there is no proof that a market wouldn't develop if the government wasn't already intervening to make it so difficult to build networks.

<comment><USER11> > While this would make it even cheaper to get into the market, there is no > proof that a market wouldn't develop if the government wasn't already > intervening to make it so difficult to build networks.

Local governments aren't completely undemocratic. If the local government is hesitant to let corporations start digging up the streets and yards, it's likely that the residents are similarly hesitant to invite that sort of disruption. How many people are actually eager to have a second gigabit- capable cable buried through their yard? Whether or not the federal government intervenes, there will always be barriers to an upstart ISP. Yes, with all local restrictions usurped, a company as large as Google can certainly deploy new infrastructure to select markets where there's sufficient demand for a more reasonable alternative to the incumbent ISP. But that's still a far cry from a functioning competitive market. Who would fund construction of a _third_ set of cables, or the sixth? Even with local restrictions removed, how much capital does it take to build a competitive ISP from scratch (keeping in mind that Google wasn't quite starting from scratch)?

In the most pedantic sense, there's obviously no proof that a functioning competitive marketplace would develop, but we are talking about a real natural monopoly, and that means something. Building last-mile infrastructure is very expensive. Each new competitor faces much worse prospects for recouping their initial investment, much more resentment from their prospective customers, and the incumbent(s) can always undercut you at the drop of a hat. Given the choice, the customers would vastly prefer a local loop unbundling solution—it doesn't have the high costs of building redundant infrastructure, it doesn't make a mess of the town, and it leads to the same end result of diverse choices for services.

<comment><USER19> >how much capital does it take to build a competitive ISP from scratch (keeping in mind that Google wasn't quite starting from scratch)?

It's significant, but it's often done in cities that don't have this regulation problem (see most high-density cities around the world with sane access to cabling tunnels). Or, if you take it to the extreme the other direction, look at all of the municipal fiber projects that end up working out. If a municipality can pay for it, certainly a company would be able to as well.

Laying fiber requires labor, but many of the service tunnels already exist so the only digging required is the last bit from the street to the customer's house.

There is an entire industry designed to help finance capital-intensive projects. Just because you can't do something with a text editor and a compiler in your basement doesn't mean it can't be done.

>but we are talking about a real natural monopoly

No we aren't. Trying to build up an ISP is 95% lobbying local governments. It's only 'natural' in the sense that it's a government created monopoly.

>much more resentment from their prospective customers

You wouldn't be pulling fiber to peoples' homes if they weren't already signing up (see the google fiber rollout mechanism).

>Given the choice, the customers would vastly prefer a local loop unbundling solution

Not if it means the best they can get is 5 mbps over cables that were laid to homes 20 years ago. If your city is filled with a bunch of NIMBYS, they are just as likely to vote down a bond or whatever it takes to raise money to lay in new fiber.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I know several people who are highly involved with the FCC, telecom industry, and telecom law that think that "network neutrality" is just 2 words. Until 1970, and only because of lawsuits, it was illegal to connect anything to your phone line. You could get any phone you wanted from Ma Bell as long as it was black.[0] If you wanted a different color you had to pay extra. It took force to make Ma Bell and the FCC allow you to plug in your own phone, your own computer, etc. The FCC supports monopolies, if you want competition you should applaud the deregulation of telecom.

[0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model_500_telephone#Ownership_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model_500_telephone#Ownership_and_AT.26T_divestiture)

<comment><USER21> Telecoms are a classic example of a natural monopoly - which is to say it would be monopoly whether there's regulation or not.

How do you imagine there would be competition in, say, fibre? A bunch of companies all running their own last mile? That's incredibly inefficient.

<comment><USER22> The whole thing should be a public utility like water, electricity, and sewer.

<comment><USER23> Yes, just like sewers: [http://www.ajc.com/news/local-govt--politics/atlanta- area-st...](http://www.ajc.com/news/local-govt--politics/atlanta-area-still- trying-stop-sewage-spills/VqIGSuNOsCDJjXLZCJZ7ZN).

Also, nobody advocating for "treating telecom like a utility" is actually advocating for that. Try looking up the cost of a county water/sewer hookup sometime. It's not free, and your $50/month water bill doesn't pay for it. I'm paying off a $30,000 bill to get "public utility" water and sewer access. That's pretty typical.

If we required every house builder to pay thousands of dollars up front to install fiber people would be frothing at the mouth.

<comment><USER24> $30,000 seems like a lot unless you live in a very rural area. Where I live in Michigan it's $1,410 for a hookup within 500 feet of a road. Why is it so expensive where you are?

Also, fiber would probably be pretty cheap once the infrastructure was already in place. A single phase overhead power line is often provided for free to new homes and underground service runs about $3.50/foot so I imagine fiber would be similarly cheap.

<comment><USER23> Where in Michigan? Here's the fee schedule in my county: [http://www.aacounty.org/departments/inspections-and- permits/...](http://www.aacounty.org/departments/inspections-and- permits/permit-center/utility-and-impact-fees). Fairfax County, where my parents live is similarly expensive: about $25,000 for a smallish house.

<comment><USER24> Midland county. Here's a similar document for an area near me; the city doesn't seem to have a fee schedule online anywhere.

[http://www.lincoln- twp.org/forms%20policies/New%20Water%20Co...](http://www.lincoln- twp.org/forms%20policies/New%20Water%20Connection%20Procedures%20Rev%201-14.pdf)

$2,520 is what they charge for water; not sure what it is for wastewater - they may not have a public sewer system - but it's about $3,500 where I live. It used to be $150 (seriously, not a typo) and people got really upset when they raised it by a few thousand dollars all at once a few years ago.

I guess it's not a very densely-populated area and the state is surrounded by water so that might explain why it's so cheap.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> This raises the limit on the number of subscribers a provider can have before regulation kicks in. In other words, a larger number of smaller providers have one less regulation to worry about.

Isn't more competition among providers what we want? Shouldn't we be doing everything we can – even if it's saving 6.8 hours per year in regulatory compliance – to help these smaller guys be able to take on these horrible behemoths like AT&T and Comcast?

<comment><USER26> By the way, every time I've noticed the FCC has come up on HN in the recent past, an aged account has always posted a pro Trump's FCC comment with an argument tweaked for HN's biases, as seen above, and if that is the only comment you read in the thread, you'd falsely conclude that they're right and believe that Ajit Pai's version of the FCC will be better for business than Tom Wheeler's.

Ajit Pai's FCC _will_ be better for business, incumbent businesses like Comcast, AT&T, or Verizon, who'd rather not actually pay for network engineers, sysadmins, or software developers, and just sit there raking in cash, without owing anything to the communities they're in.

Reduced-cost access for people that can't afford it was the first thing on the chopping block, as well as for schools and libraries. Next up is net neutrality; this is undoubtedly the first move of many on this front.

In other news today, laws subjecting ISPs like Comcast and AT&T to get permission from you, before sharing browsing history, location, and other sensitive data. Don't be fooled, Ajit Pai's FCC is a friend to big business.

<comment><USER25> I'm certainly not sitting here agreeing with everything Pai's FCC has or will do, nor am I pro-Trump (not that it matters). My belief is their decisions will be a mixed bag in the long term.

What I've noticed is that almost every FCC decision since Pai took over has been spun as weakening net neutrality, which I think is incorrect and unfair.

<comment><USER27> In what way do you expect it to be a "mixed bag"? What are the positive parts? You seem to claim smaller ISPs will benefit, but we've already got a dearth of small ISPs in the US and I don't see the FCCs decisions likely leading to more of them, as other commenters have pointed out. So what, specifically, will be better? "Friendlier" to businesses is as much nonsense as words like "wellness" to people, so I'm looking for actual, real-world positive things.

<comment><USER25> Here's how I see it...

A positive decision is one that removes regulation or protects us from the government.

A negative decision is one that adds regulation or protects incumbents in the industry.

We can disagree on that, but we probably agree on the bigger issue: keeping a free and open internet. I want that as much as you probably do, I just don't believe government should play the role of guardian of the internet.

I see this specific decision as positive because it removes one more (albeit small) hurdle from competitors entering the market. Believe it or not, but all of this regulation protects the AT&Ts and Comcasts because they already have the infrastructure to comply. But a small, scrappy startup? It's hard enough building a quality service, but even harder when you have to devote a large chunk of time and money to even qualifying to play.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> I asked this in another thread a few days ago, but why are edge servers and CDNs not a violation of "net neutrality"? If you've got an edge server on an ISP, and are paying extra for a leased line from your main data center to that server, you are effectively paying the ISP an additional fee for priority over other traffic on their hardware.

<comment><USER17> To the end customer it's not priority, consider the two cases:

customer:

GET www.site.com/images/rounded_corner.gif

 _first hop to ISP, then n hops to www.site.com_

vs

GET cdn001.site.com/images/rounded_corner.gif

 _first hop to ISP, then second hop to cdn001_

The overhead takes place in the routing mechanism, not in the prioritization mechanism. In both cases, it costs the ISP the same amount to send the data back to the customer. The data is not prioritized, it just happens to be available in fewer hops, which is often (but is not necessarily) faster. A CDN could exist that imposed greater latency in exchange for an improvement elsewhere, such as reliability.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Article didn't load for me:

ERROR: TechCrunch is not part of your Internet Service Basic Web pack. For an extra $29.99 a month you can upgrade to Internet Service Extreme, offering access to over 50 more web sites!

</comment><comment><USER30> Let me put my hat in the ring here.

Deregulation of access to consumers will result in cheaper internet and most likely faster internet speeds. However, it will concentrate power to those who already have it. Large ISPs will charge heavy bandwidth companies and only the largest heavy bandwidth companies will be able to afford the fees.

Those heavy bandwidth companies paying the fees will recoup the money through advertising. Remember newspapers and large TV media companies make the majority of their money through advertising. When companies rely on advertising, the users are no longer the customers. They are the product.

Further protecting the companies which rely on advertising will allow those companies to focus less on the customers and more on the advertisers. Companies relying on the allegiance of advertising will naturally shape their political standing to views of the advertisers. Remember also that advertisers are not paying for just eyeballs, but they are all paying for control. If a company starts moving away from their advertisers' political ideology they will lose revenue. Net Neutrality will ultimately give more control to companies that already hold power.

Just my two cents...

<comment><USER31> I would amend that to say it may result in the illusion of cheaper internet. Your internet bill will go down, but services on the internet you use will either get more expensive, or degrade (as with adding advertisements).

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Google Fiber got to a couple of nearby communities before they put the brakes on.

I'm left hoping that's close enough to branch out wireless service in short order.

Otherwise, I'm left screwed, between an AT&T that refuses to upgrade its local network (and it's a dense, accessible, suburban neighborhood -- hardly the boonies), and a Comcast that has doubled its rates for basically the same service. Both with caps that will quickly look increasingly ridiculous in the face of the wider world of data transfer.

We'll be back to them insisting on big bucks for assymmetric streaming of big- brand content, with increasing pressure to make that _their_ content (a la data-cap exemptions, etc.)

</comment><comment><USER33> Why is the FCC against net neutrality?

<comment><USER34> The Republican Party is against net neutrality and now controls a majority of seats on the FCC, hence, the FCC now opposes net neutrality. Since the issue really became a big deal, the FCC has been split on party lines over it.

<comment><USER33> Then why are Republicans against net neutrality? I suspect the answer is "money" and that the wrong people are greasing the right palms to get this done. If that really is the truth then why aren't companies in tech doing more of the same to protect their interests? How the hell is it that companies like Comcast have the upper hand here?

<comment><USER35> Comcast is/should be willing to spend the net present value of their future revenue streams to defend their monopoly. Ditto AT&T, Verizon, etc. The combined market cap of these companies is a pretty big lobbying bill to pay even for Apple, let alone Netflix. Google tried just building a competitive network but apparently they didn't have the stomach to combine network construction with lobbying at the necessary scale.

<comment><USER36> Yeah, Google realized just how entrenched the established telecom companies are with local municipalities. To the pint where the muni says, "only AT&T" can use OR put a pole in this area. Straight up block everyone else because AT&T pays the city to do that. How do you govern and take that on at a national scale. Not only the money, but the ridiculously massive amount of lobbying.

I think wireless point to point is the answer, and what Google is working on now after buying WebPass. You only have to connect a neighborhood and have one pool with a p2p receiver that services the whole neighborhood. A mini ISP if you will.

Then we can tell the corrupt city/local council people to F OFF and stop F'ing over your citizens by taking bribe deals from the large ISPs. It's pretty bad, see AT&T in Dallas, where they are head quartered. The corruption in the city that AT&T buys is crazy. Even another large competitor such as Spectrum wanting to put fiber down is blocked by the city because AT&T has exclusive rights. So what speed is offered in that area by AT&T? 3-6 fucking mbps. And they make you a great deal and only charge $30/m for it. Seriously, F them and the city.

I now have a direct p2p internet access point on the roof of my house that gets about 80mbps up and down for less than $30/month. My only other option in a well developed, dense area is 3mbps from AT&T. A block away, Spectrum installed fiber and they get 1 gig speeds. I fought it for months, the corruption goes deep. Fuck AT&T.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> This is the end. If we think this guy's gonna listen to the people, we're completely wrong.

<comment><USER38> This is why getting _laws_ passed, instead of relying on executive orders and the whims of bureaucrats in power at the time, is so crucial.

<comment><USER34> The same faction that opposes net neutrality in the FCC also controls both Houses of Congress plus the White House, in fact, the change in the latter that completes that control is _why_ they control the FCC, not an unrelated independent event.

So laws would be no less vulnerable than FCC regulations.

<comment><USER39> But eight years ago, the opposing faction had even more control. They could have enshrined net neutrality in law then.

<comment><USER34> And then it could be repealed now. For the same reason the the FCC approach will be.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> I wish we had a slow, but high bandwith alternative to the web in public hands. The problem is the infrastructure.. if there was a way to create a gnu add-hoc wifi network between every home hotspot - at least within a city, the web neutrality could be restored.

</comment><comment><USER41> I'd like to add the only optimistic response I can think of. The only benefit of deregulation is the opportunity for disruption of monopolies. Especially so in a landscape of tech.

If provider A starts providing terrible bandwidth, incredibly high prices, and terrible service, it means that that provider X has a lucrative opportunity to provide better bandwidth, better prices, and great service.

I hope these rules aren't used to help entrenched monopolies, but provide an ripe opportunity for the space to innovate.

I hope these rules will be on the wrong side of history, but there is little stopping anyone from using the free market to their advantage.

</comment><comment> wav-part Is not net-neutrality better handled by IANA ? If you are going to call your router "internet", you must treat all IP packets equally. Seems like reasonable terms to me. Afterall this is the property that made Internet what it is today.

<comment><USER42> IANA has no enforcement authority. I also wouldn't be surprised to see ISPs respond by simply removing the word "Internet" from their advertising.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> I suppose one way to enforce net neutrality might be to route all traffic through TOR.. that might mess up the caching for a service like Netflix though. (Could someone who knows more than I do comment on that?)

<comment><USER44> Tor does not help against net neutrality violations. Tor only helps if you want some anonymity for your traffic.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> How long until access to the open internet costs extra?

<comment><USER11> If you want a publicly accessible IP address without an ISP-imposed firewall blocking incoming connections on at least some ports, then it already costs extra, and has for a long time. For the most part, we're already getting just WWW (client not server) access plus a handful of other approved services. What we're facing in the future is difficulty even getting unrestrained access to the whole WWW.

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> The FCC won't let me be

</comment><comment><USER47> Internet is plenty fast. Companies need to disclose what they are doing to customers, but government shouldn't regulate it

</comment><comment><USER48> Can't we just create our own local Intranets using Ethernet cables running around cul-de-sacs?

Mine connects to yours which connects to his which connects to hers. Eventually we'll have formed a network.

<comment><USER49> Yes. Then eventually someone will come along and say, "i'll do it for you for a fee" and they'll get a bunch of customers and they'll own the cables and then rename themselves Comcast.

<comment><USER48> How about we make it a rule that if anyone wants access to the network they are not allowed to charge for it. It must be done only to help grow the network for its own sake.

<comment><USER49> Someone will sue and then laws will be made. Whoever has the most money/best lawyers will win.

<comment><USER48> Because the network is grass-roots, we can ignore the laws.

<comment><USER50> No, we can't.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> This issue could well turn out to be Trump's Achilles heal. If they go too far, the engineers that actually make the Internet work can easily bring the whole shebang down in protest -- and the world is so addicted to the Internet at this point the outrage would be deafening. And if Trump is too proud to back down...

</comment><comment><USER47> Leave it alone. Stop demonizing the companies that give Internet.

</comment><comment><USER52> If Trump also continues with his plan to deregulate as well, I'm of the opinion that this is great news. This could make Google Fiber and other similar undertakings much more viable. It always gives me the hibby-jeebies when government takes strong control over an industry. This is especially true in the case of the FCC where their original mandate went from regulating airwaves, to regulating the content of said airwaves.

<comment><USER53> I'm not sure how federal deregulations would help cities install more fiber, are there any federal regulations that would impede them? I always thought the issue was more around infrastructure monopolies in each city. Its not like new fiber companies can just lay their own lines down, they need to work through the city to get permission to put new lines in or share existing lines.

<comment><USER52> Hmm, that's a good question. It's not clear to me at what level of government the most stifling regulations are. I had also read that they wanted to offer phone services for free, but they dropped those due to the incredibly high regulations in that field as well.

[https://www.cnet.com/news/google-to-government-let-us- build-...](https://www.cnet.com/news/google-to-government-let-us-build-a- faster-net/)

<comment><USER11> That article shows Google wanting new regulations imposed in some areas (forcing local governments and utilities to accommodate Google), but not wanting relief from net neutrality regulations.

<comment><USER52> > That article shows Google wanting new regulations imposed in some areas

Where did you get that? Kevin Lo from Google is quoted as saying "Regulations tied to physical infrastructure sometimes defer the investment altogether". Are you saying that in reference to something else?

<comment><USER11> Google's wanting federal regulations enacted to cut the local red tape, some of which is from local governments and some is from incumbent utilities.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Autoliker for Tinder, Bumble, Tantan and OkCupid on Android - <AUTHOR> https://app.swipetinder.me <comment><AUTHOR> Hello HN, We just made an autoliker for Tinder, Bumble, OkCpuid & Tantan on Android. Would love to have your feedback on the app.</comment>


United States Senate Committee Testimony of Twitter's Acting General Counsel - <AUTHOR> https://www.lgraham.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/4766f54d-d433-4055-9f3d-c94f97eeb1c0/testimony-of-sean-edgett-acting-general-counsel-twitter.pdf <comment><USER2> "Before the election, we also detected and took action on activity relating to hashtags that have since been reported as manifestations of efforts to interfere with the 2016 election. For example, our automated spam detection systems helped mitigate the impact of automated Tweets promoting the #PodestaEmails hashtag, which originated with Wikileaks' publication of thousands of emails from the Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta's Gmail account. The core of the hashtag was propagated by Wikileaks, whose account sent out a series of 118 original Tweets containing variants on the hashtag #PodestaEmails referencing the daily installments of the emails released on the Wikileaks website. In the two months preceding the election, around 57,000 users posted approximately 426,000 unique Tweets containing variations of the #PodestaEmails hashtag. Approximately one quarter (25%) of those Tweets received internal tags from our automation detection systems that hid them from searches. As described in greater detail below, our systems detected and hid just under half (48%) of the Tweets relating to variants of another notable hashtag, #DNCLeak, which concerned the disclosure of leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee. These steps were part of our general efforts at the time to fight automation and spam on our platform across all areas."

Relevant portion based on title. Part of an anti-spam effort.

<comment><USER3> I've never understood Twitter's "anti-spam" effort. The only "spam" I've ever seen on twitter is when someone I am following likes another tweet, or it tells me I should follow someone because someone I'm following follows them. I'm not interested in either of those suggestions. I'm only interested in what the exact account I'm following tweets or retweets, because I decided to follow it.

It seems to me that if the system worked as intended, I would see none of this mess because I'm not interested in following the bots. They can tweet away all they want, hundreds of thousand of them, to crickets.

I would venture to say that the "spam" is less of a problem for what users really want and more of a problem for their efforts that try to increase user retention/engagement and therefore ad rev.

<comment><USER4> I just recently learned you can hide retweets from your timeline for an individual user. I don't think you can turn off the likes, but that would be a good addition.

<comment><USER5> I believe the "don't show retweets for x user" feature is limited to the web interface and is not available in the mobile/desktop apps, which is basically the only way I consume Twitter. Which is disappointing. I may be wrong here (I hope).

<comment><USER6> You are wrong, it is available in the apps as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> As a Twitter lover, it's been a real letdown to see them sacrifice objectivity and fairness at the altar of political correctness. The platform is so seriously broken by their attempts to censor things they deem unpleasant. I have tried my best to turn off all of their content filtering features, but they still sometimes censor replies to my own replies. You can sometimes see the actual number of replies to a tweet next to the reply button, but can not actually see them at all.

At the same time, they have not done anything to reduce certain types of spam, such as the repeated reply chains under the President's tweets, which can so easily be identified as spam by the fact that they are unrelated to the parent, and appear in the same order under a number of parent tweets.

It's a total mess.

Added: I went back to find an example of the spam chains to reply to Srslyjosh, but I'm pleasantly surprised that they seem to have finally eliminated them. I withdraw that specific criticism I guess.

<comment><USER8> This isn't about the right-wing dogwhistle of "political correctness" at all. It's about not letting networks of fake users (bots and/or individuals claiming to be someone they aren't) spread false information with no input from real people. There are plenty of real, unrestricted "politically incorrect" people on Twitter right now. The difference - as it pertains to this discussion - is that they are real people, not robot armies paid for by foreign adversaries.

Yes, some of them have been banned, and sometimes the reasons for those bans are dubious because Twitter does not consistently enforce their policies. But that is a separate issue from what's under discussion here.

<comment><USER9> Never have I heard the expression "dog whistle" more than in the last two years, always regarding politics, and always from liberals chastising conservatives. It's like their "in group" slang.

<comment><USER8> Sure, I'm a liberal and I agree. What's your point?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I noticed this during that time and reported on my observations [1]. I'm glad to see there is a followup inquiry, even if it's over a year later.

The core issue I had back then still seems unclear. When I noticed the oddity, the #DNCLeak hashtag was being hidden / censored (at 3 tweets / sec), and during the same time the pro-democrat hashtag #RNCinCLE was trending strongly (at 12 tweets / min).

In this document, is twitter saying it was simply their spam detection and prevention efforts that caused the #DNCLeak to be hidden (and not any ulterior or political motives)?

[1] [http://scala.sh/twitter-censorship-20160724/](http://scala.sh/twitter- censorship-20160724/)

<comment><USER11> > pro-democrat hashtag #RNCinCLE

What? That was the official hashtag, being promoted by Twitter [1].

[1] [https://imgur.com/a/7SX7j](https://imgur.com/a/7SX7j)

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Note that, contrary to what the HN title implies, Twitter doesn't say it specifically targeted those hashtags or hid them entirely. The testimony mentions them as examples of tags that were associated with a significant number of bot/spam tweets.

<comment><USER13> Yes, we've updated the title from the submitted "Twitter testifies to hiding #DNCLeak and #PodestaEmails during election".

<comment><USER14> I hit "flag" and the title was already changed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> So Twitters explanation seems to be "Posts related to #PodestaEmails and #DNCLeak appeared to be being generated by automated systems and were therefore handled as spam"

> Before the election, we also detected and took action on activity relating > to hashtags that have since been reported as manifestations of efforts to > interfere with the 2016 election. For example, our automated spam detection > systems helped mitigate the impact of automated Tweets promoting the > #PodestaEmails hashtag, which originated with Wikileaks' publication of > thousands of emails from the Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta's Gmail > account. The core of the hashtag was propagated by Wikileaks, whose account > sent out a series of 118 original Tweets containing variants on the hashtag > #PodestaEmails referencing the daily installments of the emails released on > the Wikileaks website. In the two months preceding the election, around > 57,000 users posted approximately 426,000 unique Tweets containing > variations of the #PodestaEmails hashtag. Approximately one quarter (25%) of > those Tweets received internal tags from our automation detection systems > that hid them from searches. As described in greater detail below, our > systems detected and hid just under half (48%) of the Tweets relating to > variants of another notable hashtag, #DNCLeak, which concerned the > disclosure of leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee. These > steps were part of our general efforts at the time to fight automation and > spam on our platform across all areas.

</comment><comment><USER16> Can an admin/mod or whatever change the title? It's blatantly disingenuous if not out right dishonest.

<comment><USER17> "United States Senate Committee Testimony of Twitter's Acting General Counsel" seems accurate to me. Why do you think this is a dishonest title?

<comment><USER13> We changed it (see [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15613023](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15613023)).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> The consolation is that the internet probably has far less influence on voters than Twitter etc. would have you think.

<comment><USER19> I don't think you could be more wrong.

Edit: [http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v489/n7415/full/nature1...](http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v489/n7415/full/nature11421.html)

<comment><USER18> One reference only does not an argument make.

<comment><USER19> Well considering that you made the original claim, the burden of proof is on you. A simple Google search will also show you are wrong.

<comment><USER18> The article isn't accessible so I cannot examine the methodology. Have you read it in full?

<comment><USER20> [https://sci-hub.io/10.1038/nature11421](https://sci- hub.io/10.1038/nature11421)

<comment><USER18> Doesn't your link infringe copyright?

'Sci-Hub is a website with over 62 million academic papers and articles available for direct download.[2] It bypasses publisher paywalls by allowing access through educational institution proxies.'

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> If they had taken similar action against the provably bot-ridden tags of some of the pro-Hillary hashtags... they would have mentioned it in an effort to appear fair and balanced.

It's a case of "the dog that didn't bark" showing up their actions: Twitter has shown they are biased.

<comment><USER16> Or maybe, now hear me out, there wasn't a reason or motive to have bots propagate pro-Hillary hashtags. Almost seems too simple to be true.

<comment><USER21> More like "too simple to be believed"... and easily seen on Twitter, by examining tweeters of Hillary's tweets and noticing that for instance, 10 or more accounts that simultaneously retweeted all had precisely the same number of tweets, in the thousands, and less than 10 followers apiece.

More accessible, however, is simply to notice that the testimony was being given to a government where the House, Senate, and Presidency are all Republican. If Twitter could have shown their even headedness, they would have done so.

<comment><USER16> You're just making stuff up, which is far worse than anecdotal data by itself.

<comment><USER21> Wilful blindness doesn't suit you.

You can very easily find plenty of mainstream media news articles about Hillary's million plus fake followers, and you can look at election era tweets and retweets yourself.

<comment><USER16> Reports and stories are not the same as evidence. Go ahead and start providing credible sources and you might actually have a point.

<comment><USER21> 2015 (before election even got into high gear)

Hillary's fake followers: [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3038621/More-2-MILLI...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3038621/More-2-MILLION- Hillary-Clinton-s-Twitter-followers-fake-never-tweet.html) (many variations of this story on various sites)

early 2016: [http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2016/04/28/in-world-of- intern...](http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2016/04/28/in-world-of-internet- fame-social-media-followers-arent-always-what-they-seem/)

Obvious evidence of Hillary re-tweet fakery:

[http://sadbottrue.com/article/chapter-28-hillarys-junk- bot-r...](http://sadbottrue.com/article/chapter-28-hillarys-junk-bot- retweeters/)

[http://sadbottrue.com/article/chapter-27-order-followers- for...](http://sadbottrue.com/article/chapter-27-order-followers-for-hillary/)

PS: [https://www.twitteraudit.com/HillaryClinton](https://www.twitteraudit.com/HillaryClinton)

<comment><USER16> Yeah, I'm sorry, you must have been confused when I said reports and stories are not the same as evidence. And then you linked to the daily mail of all things. And the most credible report you linked to was just completely unhelpful to the point you're trying to make.

Don't bother me with your unmitigated stupidity again.

<comment><USER21> You want to be a sheep, it's your choice.

<comment><USER16> You are literally saying nothing of substance.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Javascript live poll tracker for Greek elections - <AUTHOR> http://www.igraphics.gr/en/multimedia/2012/06/elections2012b

<comment><USER2> So how does this work if the winner is unable to form a coalition? Do they just keep having new elections every month?

<comment><USER3> unfortunately its not a very clever system. sounds complicated for no apparent reason.

this is actually the 2nd time they're having elections because the previous time didn't manage to form a strong enough coalition.

what surprises me is the 37% abstaining in an election which from what i hear will decide the long-term future of Greece and the Eurozone. it must really mean greeks are fed up with their politics or lost hope that there's a solution to their crisis.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Well, it's quite nicely done, though I'm confused as to who it's for. It's in English, suggesting it's for foreigners; also, it explains who all the parties are. That's good for me, I know nothing about Greek politics.

But anyone who needs an explanation of who the parties are might also need an explanation of how the voting system works. From the map it looks like all constituencies were won by blue or purple, with the vast majority going to the blue. But the "distribution of seats" looks like a bunch of different parties are getting seats. On the third hand, it can't possibly just be a proportional representation thing either, because (for instance) the blue party got just over 30% of the vote but appears to be getting almost half the seats.

So am I right in guessing that the parliament is selected by some combination of first-past-the-post winners in constituencies and a bunch of other seats allocated by nationwide proportional representation?

<comment><USER5> In a few words:

250 of the 300 seats are allocated proportionally among the parties that got over 3% of the vote. The remaining 50 go to the first party.

<comment><USER4> So the "constituency" map has no actual electoral meaning?

<comment><USER5> Correct.

In fact, because the allocation of parliament seats is calculated on the basis of the total vote and because of the adjustments that this entails for the allocation of constituency seats, you can be the first party in a constituency and yet get fewer seats in that constituency than the second party.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Felicia, the Pipe-Cleaning Ferret of Fermilab (1971) - <AUTHOR> http://history.fnal.gov/felicia.html <comment><USER3> >The ferret is an animal filled with curiosity and seeks out holes and burrows. Its instinct is to find out what's at the other end of a burrow, or, for that matter, a tube or a pipe.

A true scientist at heart :) The ferret was among its peers.

</comment><comment><USER4> Just curious, isn't more "sterile" to use robot? I mean, a ferret can poo in the middle, it can leave fur and feet traces inside the tube.

<comment><USER5> > When she came out the other end, technicians tied a swab dipped in a > chemical cleanser to the string. They pulled the tight-fitting swab through > and when it came out it was covered with dust and steelspecks.

Poo would be unfortunate but look at the title. It's from 1971. People barely had colour TV back then, let alone pipe cleaning robots.

<comment><USER6> [http://history.fnal.gov/felicia.html#TheTrib](http://history.fnal.gov/felicia.html#TheTrib)

> This good life may soon end for Felicia. The laboratory scientists have > designed and built a mechanical ferret, a device activated by compressed air > and controlled by wires. They don't need Felicia anymore. This was always > the plan, with Felicia to be used only temporarily, while they built her > robot.

> Source: The Tribune, December 22, 1971

<comment><USER7> i wonder what has happened to her. I remember how in childhood it was frequently mentioned about the first dog in space, yet nobody mentioned (and i never even asked about) the ending of the story, nor planned, nor what really happened - the "Layka" dog succumbed pretty torturously to heat due to failed equipment instead of the planned "happy end" \- poisoned pill that should have been fed automatically to her. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laika](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laika)

<comment><USER6> I had a quick web search.

[http://imgur.com/POrxEqv](http://imgur.com/POrxEqv)

Google, Duck Duck Go, Bing, Blekko, etc etc: you really need to start delisting the fuckers who pollute search results with made up shit. How is this possibly useful to your users? Companies who want to cram their URL in front of me at every opportunity should pay to place it in ads.

(I don't use an ad blocker. I even click relevant ads, although I've never bought anything from one yet.)

<comment><USER8> This is Google themselves IIRC. If you don't turn it off they will show your ads next to terms which they deem "related" to the ones you've chosen supposedly via some deep Googly machine-learning analysis.

Said analysis seems to have worked because I don't see any ads at all for that search on either desktop or mobile - presumably everyone carrying out that search knew exactly what they were looking for & it wasn't any of the displayed ads so Google stopped displaying them.

<comment><USER6> Thanks for the information - I'm about to trawl through the google settings to find it and turn that off.

I can understand ebay turning up. I use ebay. I have no idea how a geneology site turns up - I have no interest in it and have no relevant searches and haven't, as far as I can tell, visited any pages or watched any videos that are relevant.

Also, just to be really clear: you're saying that Google is inserting paid ads into organic search results with no indication that they are paid ads?

Edit: if this is true, and if there is a setting to turn it off, where is that setting?

<comment><USER8> Assuming your image was of Google ads, not organic search results: eBay might be keying off Ferret (ie pet supplies) I'd guess, whilst the genealogy site would probably be keying off Felicia, on the principle that Felicia Ferret might be someone's name.

 _You 're saying that Google is inserting paid ads into organic search results with no indication that they are paid ads?_

No, definitely not - the ads I'm talking about are shown in the sections marked as such. It's just that Google can expand the keywords that the ads respond too in ways that can surprise ad buyers that aren't aware of it.

It wouldn't surprise me if large websites play SEO games as well, but Google will respond to the behaviour of searchers when shown these results and push unhelpful results down the search order - if no one ever clicks on the eBay Felicia Ferret link, even though it starts off being the first result, then it will receive a penalty that ought to push it off the first page of results quite quickly.

(I have no internal knowledge of Google's processes; this is all inferred from watching Google over the years.)

<comment><USER6> I am not sure how you could think I was talking about ads.

Look at the image - it is _clearly_ not ads. Look at the words I wrote - <USER2> talk about pollution of search results and offer the solution of putting these things into ads.

<comment><USER8> Mea culpa. You're right - Google marks ads with a yellow Ad icon on mobile.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Ferrets are awesome. I wish they were legal in California.

<comment><USER10> What, are ferrets not legal in CA? How can an animal be illegal?

<comment><USER11> Not sure if you are serious or not but there are many illegal animals in the US. Rhinos, Elephants, and Hyenas come to mind for family pets.

Here is a link for CA.

[http://blog.sfgate.com/stew/2012/02/29/pets-you-cant- legally...](http://blog.sfgate.com/stew/2012/02/29/pets-you-cant-legally-own- in-california/#3188101=0)

<comment><USER10> The question may have looked stupid, but it was an honest question. Thanks for answering.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> There is quite some build-up of residue in my warp drive's plasma conduits. Is there a ferret lending service somewhere? My EMH Mark 1 is offline.

</comment><comment><USER12> I am suprised that there was only one. I knew someone who kept ferrets (to catch rabbits for her hawk) and was told that, as social animals, being kept in isolation would send them crazy, while all-female groups didn't get along well. Was spaying Felicia not an option in 1971?

<comment><USER13> It's not exactly true that ferrets need other ferrets around to keep from going crazy; frequent, interesting interaction with humans easily suffices to satisfy their need for stimulation. Between the tunnel runs, and the fact that happy ferrets are endearing, friendly little creatures in general, I doubt she lacked for enough to keep her mind active.</comment></comment>


U.S. Navy swapping $38K periscope joysticks for Xbox controllers on subs (2017) - <AUTHOR> https://www.geekwire.com/2017/u-s-navy-swapping-38000-periscope-joysticks-30-xbox-controllers-high-tech-submarines/ <comment><USER2> All I have to say is that back in I worked for the Navy PEO IWS and every year they send out requests for individuals to submit concepts (i.e. needs) for warfighter capabilities for potential SBIR grants. I think it was about 2011 or so when the idea to work on changing out the common display system (CDS) with a COTS head up display and game controller (vuzix at the time, occulus hadn't really emerged yet) was proposed.

The idea was laughed off the screen.

</comment><comment><USER3> Mods: This is from September 19, 2017.

Old comment thread:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15281506](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15281506)

</comment><comment><USER4> If it's madcatz, expect all the sinking sub news articles to come.

</comment><comment><USER5> The XBox controller is surely designed to be durable. Getting handled by kids is a tough design requirements.

Whoever proposed this deserves an 'Anti-Golden Fleece Award'. Great suggestion.

</comment><comment><USER6> ↑↑↓↓←→←→BA _boom!_

</comment><comment><USER7> OP must be a QI fan.

</comment><comment><USER8> I hope the hardware is rigorously examined before use. a hostile controll device would not be good.

[https://www.instructables.com/id/Hacking-the-Xbox- CONTROLLER...](https://www.instructables.com/id/Hacking-the-Xbox-CONTROLLER/)

[https://pic-microcontroller.com/hacking-the-xbox-controller/](https://pic- microcontroller.com/hacking-the-xbox-controller/)

<comment><USER9> The $30 xbox controller will interface to the submarine via $37970 worth of secure hardware.

<comment><USER8> Im thinking all you need is one compromised element in a trusted hardware platform that is assumed to be secure. the near $40000 price tag doesnt immediately suggest the hardware is any more secure than two tin cans and a string. any idea what sort of security features are involved?

<comment><USER9> Indeed. I've actually purchased the components for rugged joysticks (e.g., as found on things like motorized wheelchairs and industrial equipment). The joystick unit itself, with rubber "boot" and knob, is about 200 bucks from a catalog supplier. Presumably it has some kind of enclosure. But still, either something's going into the joystick, that we don't know about, or somebody's padding the cost a bit. I wouldn't presume that there isn't some something that makes the xbox joystick cost more than 30 bucks when used in the same application.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> [http://techland.time.com/2013/12/05/u-s-navy-launches- aerial...](http://techland.time.com/2013/12/05/u-s-navy-launches-aerial-drone- from-a-submarine/)

this is another take as well that could be of interest, not only xbox controllers but, some multiple of pelagic drones supplementing or extending periscopy. they should of course look like sea birds like cormorants or albatross</comment>


Facebook Is the New Excel – Alex Muir - <AUTHOR> http://alexmuir.com/facebook-is-the-new-excel <comment><USER3> The bit about apartment searching made me shudder. Dedicated apartment search web sites already suck enough at providing relevant information in an easily searchable form, the idea of searching through unorganized text is just insane.

Unfortunately I know the author has a point. In the car community forums are losing traffic like crazy while Facebook groups have constant traffic. The Facebook groups are absolutely horrible to use but it's where the people are. With no ability to categorize or "sticky" threads the discussions are a disaster, but for some reason a lot of people are fine with that.

<comment> King-Aaron Completely agree with the car forums - and all enthusiast forums in general.

You get the same inane questions being asked daily - if not hourly - <USER2> people can't easily find information that had been asked previously.

Not to mention that facebook allows more "casual" enthusiasts to partake in conversations, than what I'd consider proper "enthusiasts". I feel that it dilutes the quality of a technical question's responses when you have one person replying with solid advice, and ten others who either shitpost, or offer plainly incorrect advise.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I think Facebook might be the new Excel now but in a couple of years wont be.

Facebook (the main website) has seen a slump in new user registrations in the pre-teen and teen groups and its main group is 25-34 year olds ([https://www.statista.com/statistics/187041/us-user-age- distr...](https://www.statista.com/statistics/187041/us-user-age-distribution- on-facebook/)) who will get older.

I've basically tried marketing on facebook before and realized that it's very hard to reach the teen groups if you're advertising for a product built for youth anymore whereas Facebook in the past could have not only reached the 25-34 years olds but also grabbed the 13 to 24 year old groups.

I definitely think the dominance of Facebook.com (main website) will start to subside in 5 years or so until we no longer interact with the website actively but rather just passively scroll through it now and then.

</comment><comment><USER5> This was 2016. Two years hence the feeling is different.</comment>


Bitwise Cyclic Tag - T-A https://esolangs.org/wiki/Bitwise_Cyclic_Tag <comment><AUTHOR> This looks good and I think the community might like it. Would you please post it again? You'll need to use a slightly different URL to bypass the dupe detector. (The dupe detector is left porous for precisely this reason, to give reposts of good stories a chance.)

Normally we ask people this via email. If you or anyone would like to get repost invitations when you submit something good and it gets overlooked, please make sure there's an email address in your profile!</comment>


Show HN: BountyHiring: Refer friends and earn money - <AUTHOR> http://bountyhiring.com <comment><AUTHOR> Please share any feedback or objections. :)

</comment><comment><USER2> I've got friends in LOW Places...

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, I don't understand :)</comment></comment>


A 3D/VR Bitcoin Blockchain Browser - <AUTHOR> http://blockchain3d.info <comment><USER2> Back in the early 2000s there was a "3D" browser where you got to surf the web as a little man in a space suit who navigates by running along a road with while pages fly by the sky. If I had a faster computer and connection at the time, it might have been fun, but the UI seemed fundamentally detrimental to navigating the internet. Similarly, this is fun, but I would love to see a detailed write up on how this is used and what we can do with this representation that we cannot with others. Also, any chance you remember the name of that browser?</comment>


Windows 10's first paid-for, Linux-based distro - <AUTHOR> https://www.techrepublic.com/article/windows-10s-first-paid-for-linux-based-distro-20-app-out-now-says-microsoft/ <comment><USER2> Not entirely sure why it's sold for 20$ knowing that the source code is freely available on GitHub [0]. What prevents anyone from building the distro themselves?

[0] [https://github.com/WhitewaterFoundry/WLinux](https://github.com/WhitewaterFoundry/WLinux)

<comment><USER3> Nothing, you pay for the easy updates and to support the development. Paint.net does it the same way and probably some others that do open source on Windows.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The end is nigh. One more nail in the Linux coffin. Truly we are lost.

<comment><USER5> I see we've reached the 'extend' phase.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguis...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguish)</comment></comment>


Warning: Do you protect your web statistics? - <AUTHOR> http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&as_qdr=all&q=%22dashboard%22+%22google+analytics%22+filetype%3Apdf

<comment><USER2> I secure mine but I don't think most people do. Here are some more stats

[http://www.google.com/search?q=inurl%3Awebalizer+%2Binurl%3A...](http://www.google.com/search?q=inurl%3Awebalizer+%2Binurl%3Ausage)

Of course it's not that big of a hole and some sites actually like showing it off.

</comment><comment><USER3> Why would you want to, exactly? It's not exactly a state secret.</comment>