New Twist in International Relations: Corporate Keep-My-Data-Out-of-U.S. Clause - <AUTHOR> http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-12-24/a-new-twist-in-international-relations-the-corporate-keep-my-data-out-of-the-u-s-clause.html <comment><USER2> Other HN readers are making some assumptions that I have to take issue with.

A1: Stories about this kind of thing are posted by people who want to take business away from the U.S..

This is possible, but there are a lot of people who value privacy too, and I suspect they are in the majority. Want to prove me wrong? Get polling.

A2: Everybody else is doing it, but only the NSA got caught.

First, this doesn't make it acceptable. Second, it's entirely possible not everybody else is doing it. Third, even if everybody is doing it, the U.S. has more money to pour into black-op projects than any other nation on Earth, so it's a safe bet that the NSA is, by far, the _worst_ offender.

A3: Countries like China spy for corporate gain, but the U.S. would never do such a thing.

Right, the U.S. has never staged a coup or conducted a war that benefited U.S. corporations, and certainly wouldn't need intelligence to help with that sort of thing in the future...

\-----

If you're okay with what the NSA has been doing, here's something to consider. Several years ago Sony got a lot of bad press for putting rootkits onto audio CD's. They wanted to stop piracy. Honest customers had nothing to fear from Sony! However, honest customers did have something to fear from viruses, malware, etc. that were subsequently written to exploit the security holes created by the root-kit.

The NSA is collecting data on _you_. You trust the NSA and your nation, so you're not worried about how they'll use that data. Fine. Do you trust everyone who works for them? You probably shouldn't. They certainly don't trust their own employees and they still got burned by Snowden! The NSA might not be looking at your data until you do something terroristy, but who else could have access to the NSA's data-stores? Would anyone know Snowden had stolen all those files if he kept quiet about them? Probably not. Odds are you're pretty boring and nobody is interested in what the NSA has on you. What if you were actually really interesting, and your enemies had a lot of money? Do you plan on becoming interesting at some point in the future, or are you firmly committed to being a bore until you die?

<comment><USER3> I am particularly annoyed at the "everyone is doing it" excuse. Everyone may want to be rolling with ten carrier battle groups in their navy, each equipped with an air wing capable of air-superiority, but only one country actually spends the kind of money to make that real.

Every government might have control freaks in it who WANT to implement pervasive surveillance. But most places don't have the budget for it.

<comment><USER4> That's right, but one of the corporations mentioned in the article is a UK grocery chain. The UK must be the most surveillance happy country in the world and we know that GCHQ cooperates closely with the NSA.

So I would love to hear an explanation from the people who put that clause in the contract. Maybe it's some kind of protest, but if it is meant seriously, it would be the most ridiculous thing I have heard in a long time.

Unless terrorism is actually just a cover for the NSA's true purpose of doing industrial espionage on behalf of US corporations. But if the meaning of the word "conspiracy theory" hadn't changed so dramatically recently, I could swear this is one ;-)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The customers of the Dutch cloud-services conpany I work for haven been demanding this for at least ten years. Snowden didn't change much there, it's been going on since the Patriot act. European Union privacy legislation demands that sensitive data is stored within the EU. Storing data in other countries is only permitted if a satisfactory level of protection can be offered. This was used in marketing by EU companies in order to promote their own services, effectively creating FUD around US-based services.

When the Amsterdam Internet Exchange (AMS-IX) recently opened up an office in NYC there was a big fuss about it, because it would make the entire Dutch internet traffic subject to the Patriot act, since it applies to any company with an office on American soil.

<comment> bjelkeman-again So what did AMS-IX say?

<comment><USER5> [http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=nl&tl=en&u=http%3A/...](http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=nl&tl=en&u=http%3A//tweakers.net/nieuws/92142/ams- ix-kiest-niet-voor-onafhankelijke-stichting-bij-amerikaanse-uitbreiding.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment> bjelkeman-again Everyone in Europe I talk to about online data agrees that this isn't empty talk. Practically it really isn't possible today to in a meaningful way avoid some of your data or data about your usage of the Internet to end up in the US.

But, I would argue that this is more of a change in mindset and awareness at this point, which eventually will force changes. Companies or local government will want their data to be stored in a jurisdiction where they at least have an influence over how it is protected. Balkanisation may be the result, or ineffectual laws and regulations, maybe even something useful. But I believe something will happen.

<comment><USER6> I'm surprised to see the focus on jurisdiction versus other more effective methods, like open-source encrypting locally prior to moving the data off- site. Key control and eliminating the need to trust third-parties is the way forward, not trusting that some government somewhere is going to follow the rules perfectly. This also has the added benefit of protecting against unauthorised third parties gaining access via back doors or hacking, etc.

These ineffectual laws and regulations you warn about are already in place. That's a dead end. It is time for people and corporations to take charge and make their data safe before it leaves their control. We've seen this happen on a big scale with Google now supposedly encrypting data between data centers, and on a (much) smaller scale with people like me using EncFS to encrypt before moving online backups to Dropbox.

<comment><USER7> I agree that encryption could mitigate the actual threat posed by government mass surveillance, but I also wonder how much of the new language in contracts is about consumer perception and boycotting.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> US companies would be lucky if all this did is reduce their international sales. That's just the tip of the iceberg.

By far the worst damage is all that lost capital is going to flow into helping to generate a vast supply of new and bigger competition overseas. So not only will the US companies lose sales in the immediate future, they'll face amplified competition that will hit sales even more so long term. Even if the US Government has cleaned up this mess by the end of the decade, it won't matter, the financial consequences will just keep rolling.

When it's all tallied up, I think the NSA and US Government abuses will cost the economy trillions of dollars in value over the course of a few decades. Something akin financially to a hundred September 11th attacks in damages. Oh the staggering brilliance of the DC machine.

<comment><USER9> _Something akin financially to a hundred September 11th attacks in damages_

not to mention the waste of resources that spurnrd this on...

<comment><USER10> Ye, the NSA information trawling takes some serious amount of money to work, and they don't exactly employ just a hand full of analysts, more like a an army of them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This has been around for a while under the guise of "data sovereignty".

If you look back at search results for that term, there are now laughable comments particularly by Microsoft that your data is safe in the US because even the Patriot Act requires warrants right? Little did they know...

<comment><USER12> Even more ironic are the "digital safe harbour" provisions that cloud providers have been operating under, telling their clients that the law requires the US government to treat servers put under those provisions as not located in the US.

The irony being that since the servers are "not located in the US", they are even more easily targeted by the NSA since the NSA considers the rest of the world to be sub-humans without any rights.

<comment><USER13> To nitpick somewhat, at least in the case of the US-EU safe harbor protection, it meant that certified providers were to provide the same protection to European data as it would have in the EU under the relevant EU directive, it doesn't have anything to do with location of the servers. The certification, however, is a complete joke since companies can self-assess and register themselves as safe harbor compliant.

<comment><USER14> _The certification, however, is a complete joke since companies can self- assess and register themselves as safe harbor compliant._

And this creates a genuine difficulty for EU businesses, because it's no longer credible to claim that you thought a US business was compliant because of safe harbour arrangements. It may therefore not actually be legal under European laws to export personal data to those US businesses any more. If any European company did so, and as a result there were negative consequences for the subject of the data, that could lead to a nasty lawsuit for the company that did it, even if their actions would have been considered reasonably diligent because of safe harbour a few years ago.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Seems to me that the reality is that big businesses hold the leash of the US government, so this is as much a repudiation of them as it is the NSA, the Obama admin et al.

Microsoft, Google, Facebook, RSA and the rest deserve the shame and scorn they are receiving right now. I'm sorry if my techie friends working at those places are hurt by this, but I feel very betrayed by these companies' complicity in and taking moneys for all the surveillance and backdooring, etc. So, shame on you, I hope your brands aren't totally ruined.

</comment><comment><USER16> This trend pre-dates the NSA scandal, at least from my European perspective. The US government has legally given it's intelligence and security agencies the right to secretly claim access to data stored by American companies _including data not physically stored in the US_.

As a result, it's not just a matter of non-US companies and citizens not wanting to store data with US companies, in many if not most cases it's not even legal for them to do so.

As a European company, I have to give certain guarantees about the protection and usages of privacy sensitive data. Storing it under the jurisdiction of a country that does not respect that is out of the question.

This has nothing to do with any illegal activities by the NSA or their non- American counterparts. This is the _existing_ legal regime of the US.

Of course the NSA scandal has highlighted the facts that any guarantees the US so far has given about not abusing this are null and void. From the US _can_ get use data, it has now become the US _will_ us your data. That will significantly and irreversibly speed up the process of taking data out of US companies.

But the process itself had already started, it is just a very slow process (no corporation or government can drastically alter their IT infrastructure within a short term). The real effects won't be felt until another five to ten years, if not more.

</comment><comment><USER17> I agree with most comments here. This was expected, these are not _empty threats_ and no one is over-reacting. Everyone is just re-acting as they were expected too. Except maybe the Obama administration, which has to do some hard decisions. Snowden is growing stronger by the day now.

The part that caught my eye though was this:

> _It 's not all doom and gloom, however. Thompson's comments show that some > U.S. firms stand to benefit from distrust of the U.S. government, and that a > new model may be in the offing for protecting sensitive data from the NSA's > prying eyes._

Apparently, Bloomberg sticks to the Liberal mantra that says more or less that _when a market dies a new one emerges_.

Maybe the 5% of affected population, in terms of companies, will build a new _business model_ but how this is _good news_ is beyond me. It's like when you listen people saying that _YOU can now create a startup_ in TV because they saw a Steve Jobs 2-minute video documentary on Apple. People apparently don't know that for every successful startup there are 1.000.000 failed for no apparent reason.

<comment><USER18> This is good news in the same way that a broken window is good news to the glazier. The broken windows fallacy is alive and well in the media. Journalists are also trained to show "both sides" of the story even if the other side of the story is complete nonsense.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> The inevitable backlash. Bullies only last so long.

</comment><comment><USER20> Spying is an age-old game and it's not just the US doing it ;) I'd love to see some leaks out of Russia and China. It doesn't matter where your data is stored if it's off-premises. If you were putting it in the cloud unencrypted, you were already at risk, Snowden or not. Intelligence agencies around the world recruit workers in tech companies, the company need not overtly cooperate to get screwed.

Countries around the world slurp up data over the wire, they just haven't been caught with their hand in the cookie jar yet. At least the NSA's massive data caches won't be easily hacked. Verint (just one of many companies in the surveillance space) has 75 countries as customers. There's a ton of sh*t going on under the radar. You may hate surveillance and want more transparency but nobody can pretend it's just the US doing this stuff.

<comment><USER20> On top of that, I suspect some of the anti-US stuff posted is for the express purpose of gaining customers away from the US. (this may get downvoted, people may disagree, but I have no doubt it's happening)

<comment><USER21> No, that is definitely a factor here: non-US companies are taking advantage of the recent growth in anti-US feeling to make themselves look more attractive to potential customers and investors. No one should really be surprised by this: it simply makes good business sense.

The politicians will be on the ball too, at at least those whose remit covers national/international business or who have a constituency with a large workforce that could benefit. You can see a push in the other direction too: the "buy American" campaigns state-side have grown in volume, more so than can be explained purely by economic factors (which have been the key driver for that sort of thing since 2008) and an interest in protecting manufacturing jobs. If the large (relatively affluent) American market can be discouraged from buying goods/services without a US connection, companies will be discouraged from distancing themselves from US interests.

Of course there has always been a certain amount of keeping business information in particular places. Some regulated industries _have_ to by law and have had to for a long time (you can't properly regulate something if you allow it to move out of your jurisdiction), and all businesses should be aware of the issue (though sadly many aren't) when dealing with personal data. In the UK the Data Protection Act has clauses covering information security which mean you need to be care careful not only _how_ you store personal data but _where_ , and I assume most countries have something equivalent. A little healthy paranoia always snook in to: if the data is more local to you there is less chance you will loose access due to either technical, political, or local issues.

The big difference right now compared to a-year-or-two ago is that the US has fallen off the secondary safe location list for many, and for EU based companies (and individuals) the balance in "I'd rather it be local, but if we can save a bit by hosting in the US, where market scale currently makes it cheaper, I might" has changed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> What will the alternative cloud solutions be? I assume that many will rush to fill the gap as clients vacate US providers, offering increased privacy as a specific selling point.

As a non-US startup, we're still using Heroku and AWS because we don't have the resources to make the jump to something more secure, even though we'd really like to. As soon as an accessible alternative appears we'd switch in a heartbeat.

</comment><comment><USER23> An interesting idea to conform to and one I am researching for a service I've been building. There is data in transit and data at rest. For many people I know, North America (I assume Canada and the US are one and the same, at this point) is the primary market/closest entry point. Do regulations require tracking data in transit thT may eventually be stored somewhere other than the US?

</comment><comment><USER24> As far as I know, similar data locality guarantees are now hot topic in Germany and are often mentioned during sales pitches of SaaS platforms. USA shot itself in the foot and it is competition's holy duty to its shareholders to exploit it.

</comment><comment><USER25> Just imagine ramifications of this on person level too. You use Facebook ? Google ? Dropbox ? SkyDrive ? you are already under NSA Scanner :)

I just hope corporates put pressure on US government to back out of NSA treachery.

</comment><comment><USER26> Well...if Americans cant get things changed with votes in their own democratic society, at least non-Americans can get things changed with their own wallets. (Debated using quotes around democratic...left 'em off after all...but it was close). Americans obviously _can_ change things with their wallets, but it's more difficult, and involves a lot more steps like encrypting before sending, etc.

</comment><comment><USER27> Predictable. This will make Silicon Valley into Detroit, and my job. Thank you corrupt congress w/ your 10% approval.

<comment><USER28> Actually the NSA's overreach is more a problem with the executive branch.

Congress tried to establish checks and balances over the intelligence community by establishing FISA after Watergate, but it wasn't enough. Judge Leon's ruling [1] actually discusses the shortcomings of the FISA court.

[1] [http://legaltimes.typepad.com/files/obamansa.pdf](http://legaltimes.typepad.com/files/obamansa.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> I've probably devoted more time on HN to discuss the reality of politics and government than to cover technology issues. At times I feel pretty bad about this. I've also been subject to a partial new post hell-ban which may still be in place (surprisingly enough, most of my new submissions are tech related). And, yes, I've felt bad about this from time to time, to the point of limiting myself to reading HN and not posting for weeks at a time.

As I have watched all of this NSA, IRS, ACA/Obamacare and big-broken- government nonsense has developed over the last, say, ten years or so, I can't help but think that the tech community needs to be shaken-up like this in order to finally abandon ship and start really using their brains politically rather than acting as mindless sheep following who knows what.

I'll issue a blanket statement and say that everyone reading HN is smart. About technology. Not necessarily about politics and the ways in which the world turns. And yes, I'll say it, there's a wide swath of HN'ers who have been indoctrinated by the left-leaning academia, media and the echo chamber of the circles they frequent and identify themselves with that they've stopped applying critical reasoning skills to their political life.

As I said here [0], you have to be smart about your politics if you want to succeed in business in general. If you are not, you run the risk of incompetent moronic government-originated factors affecting your playing field in small and major ways. And, by the way, it really doesn't matter if you are an employee or an entrepreneur, a union or non-unionized worker. When things like this start happening they affect EVERYONE and there's a chain reaction that will make things suck in a big way for all involved, at any layer and at every station in life.

What you want, in order to succeed, is as little meddling and interference as possible. No, I am not suggesting anarchy. That's bad. No, I am not suggesting no government. That's worst. What I am saying is that you want a small non- intrusive government at all levels, from local to federal. You want a government that truly has our long term best interests at heart and not one that is a partisan prostitute acting almost exclusively to keep their sick species and party alive at the expense of the opposition and, what's worst, you, me, our families and our very country. We might just be entering into a phase where we might just realize that terrorism can't even begin to match the level of destruction bad governments and their policies are capable of producing.

Yes, yes. Crazy talk. I really don't like talking this way. It's just that sometimes I feel like people need a collective slap on the face with a well timed "Snap out of it!" before they'll wake up and see what is really going on. Snap out of it! Get involved!

[0] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6961005](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6961005)

<comment><USER30> > rather than acting as mindless sheep following who knows what.

I'll tell you right now, that anyone who uses that phrase is more of a "mindless sheep" than those he criticizes.

> What I am saying is that you want a small non-intrusive government at all > levels, from local to federal.

Not particularly. There is no intrinsic reason to want a "small government" over a large one (or vice versa). What you want is an effective government, that best matches your interests. Of course, everyone has their own interests, so the best rough metric that we've come up for maximizing the effectiveness of the government across the whole population, and minimizing its harm, are democratic institutions with various protections in place to prevent various types of abuses.

Likewise, you don't necessarily want small corporations or large ones. A large corporation has more power and is able to abuse that power more; but it is also frequently more efficient than having lots of small actors, as lots of transactions between independent actors can add friction and cost.

Distributed systems have problems, as they can exhibit lots of complex behaviors that can cause destabilizing feedback, and they can be inefficient. Centralized systems have problems, because they provide single points of failure or points of corruption that can be exploited for gain. Some balance between the two of them is necessary, and it's also necessary to spend effort on simply fixing problems that come up rather than thinking that every problem can be solved by adhering to some philosophy of "big government" vs. "small government".

> mindless sheep ... wake up and see what is really going on.

Did you really just write a long winded "wake up sheeple" post? Are you trying to be a self-parody?

<comment><USER29> > I'll tell you right now, that anyone who uses that phrase is more of a > "mindless sheep" than those he criticizes.

Why?

> There is no intrinsic reason to want a "small government" over a large one > (or vice versa). What you want is an effective government, that best matches > your interests.

You would have a point there if "big government" was used to convey the literal meaning of the phrase by Libertarians. It is not. In proper context "big government" refers to size, reach, complexity, all of the above and sometimes even more. It is generally about government that has grown beyond some boundary.

This is just like saying "big brother is watching". This doesn't literally mean that your eldest brother or a some kind of a giant person is watching you.

You do get that, right?

Big government: wants to touch, manipulate and regulate everything and wants to have a say in everything in your life, from how much soda you can drink to which doctors you can see and more. It spends money inefficiently and with damaging results. It thinks it has power over people and that our rights are granted by government and their laws.

Small government: stays out of the way and lets market forces act. It enacts and enforces just enough regulations to create protections from extremes and to protect and support those in need. It certainly stays the hell out of your diet, home, sex life and medical choices. It operates within a strict balanced budget framework that ensures our financial stability and well being as a nation. It knows that they derive their ability to act from the will of the people and that our rights cannot be trampled.

In this context, yes, you do want small government.

<comment><USER31> LOL. Medical choices.

Medical care is not subject to normal market forces, nobody shops around in an emergency. And by the way, nobody tells you which practitioner you can see in the UK where we have had socialised medicine for decades. You're free to move between practitioners in the state system, and you're free to go private if you wish.

Your posts are just right wing and libertarian talking points, your description of 'Big government' hopelessly biased and 'Small government' a whitewash.

I also notice that in none of your posts are you in any way opposed to massive defence spending, only healthcare. And you call others 'sheep'!!

<comment><USER29> > Medical care is not subject to normal market forces, nobody shops around in > an emergency.

Oh, please! In an emergency you are going to go to the closest available hospital. As simple as that.

> nobody tells you which practitioner you can see in the UK where we have had > socialised medicine for decades.

Well, that's not how Obamacare works. What's the point of making the comparison of two approaches that are so different.

Let's just look at cost.

How much would a healthy family of four pay for the NHS? Is there a deductible?

Before Obamacare my family paid $600 per month with a $5,000 annual deductible. We got great care and got to choose where to go and which doctors we see. With Obamacare our monthly premium increases to $1,400 per month and our deductible to $10,000. Also, our choices at nearly every level in the process of receiving care have become limited. There are questions about which of the local hospitals we will, effectively, be "assigned" to by attrition and which doctors we might not be able to see. The premium + deductible structure pretty much means that we stand to spend over $26,000 per year on medical care. And, BTW, this isn't a catastrophic plan.

With Obamacare the government is effectively, at a minimum, taking an extra $800 per month from us and in the worst case an extra $14,600. And this is for worst care and choices than we had with our prior system.

Taking $15,000 a year from a family's budget, when multiplied by potentially millions of families across the nation will have serious consequences. That's a lot of money that will not be available for purchasing. That extra computer, uprgading the old car, intalling wood flooring in the house or taking a vacation simply will not happen. And this will be the case with millions of families and individuals across the nation.

You see, you can call me whaever you want. Extreme right wing libertarian moron. That's fine. Shoot the messenger until you are happy. Now let's discuss facts and numbers and real world effects. When we look at facts what i am saying isn't theatrics from a moron but rather a screams from someone saying "the emperor has no clothes!".

Besides, there's also this:

[http://articles.latimes.com/2012/aug/08/opinion/la-oe- dalrym...](http://articles.latimes.com/2012/aug/08/opinion/la-oe-dalrymple- british-health-system-20120808)

> none of your posts are you in any way opposed to massive defence spending, > only healthcare. And you call others 'sheep'!!

That is utterly false. I have not brought up the military in his thread but I have in the past. Our military spending is sickening. Our wars are disgusting. And a good deal of our foreign aid is simply wrong and ought to be discontinued. Not only do I want our government to leave us alone, i want them to leave everyone else alone.

Our military spending has distorted our economy in ways that are hard to describe and probably even quantify. This is why I love Obamacare as the example that pulled the curtains back to let everyone see how government really works. Pick a number for how much was spent on the website. It's ridiculous. And they are still spending untold millions to fix it. Now imagine all military spending being equally bloated, wasteful and inefficient and ineffective.

Add it all up and it is easy to conclude that our government is causing us damage at every level and at a monumental scale. And don't get me started on patents. Care to quantify how much damage just one government agency, the US Patent and Trademark Office, has done to our economy, industry and progress?

Call me a moron if you must. You still have to face the facts behind my arguments.

<comment><USER31> I didn't call you a moron, but "Obamacare is bad therefore socialised healthcare is wrong" seems a lot of a stretch.

And yes, people go to the nearest hospital in times of need. Need being the key word. Free markets don't really deal well here IMHO.

Obamacare may be a great example of why the US government doesn't work so well, but to an outside observer that seems to be because the market- worshippers seem to need to be placated at every turn, when their requirements are contrary to efficiency, fairness or good sense.

<comment><USER29> > I didn't call you a moron

You did not. The self-deprecating bit is more about the fact that liberal lore requires that anyone not on the left be characterized as a religious idiot missing one or more teeth. Well, I am not any of that. I am also trying to highlight the fact that someone can actually be a moron and his or her argument can still stand on its own merits (or fall because of the lack thereof).

If I must be a moron to be heard, fine. I'll be a moron. I am not, but that's OK. Believe it or not, I am trying to be constructive here. HN is dominated by younger people who are obviously indoctrinated to the left. The tech industry actually went out of their way to help Obama get elected. This is nothing less than religious, mindless indoctrination. All of these people are very smart. They simply didn't want to stop and do a little thinking. And, of course, the young ones simply don't have enough life and business experience to actually get it. It takes effort and the ability to see the world from a very different level to leave religious belief behind, political or theological.

> "Obamacare is bad therefore socialised healthcare is wrong"

Nursie, you are the only person saying that in this thread. Please do not read past what I actually say. I did not say that.

> Obamacare may be a great example of why the US government doesn't work so > well

It is. In fact, it is the best example money can buy. And it is fantastic because everyone now sees it and everyone cares because it touches them directly. Nothing sadder than talking on an extreme left-winger who just got the news that he and his family are going to have to pay through their teeth for healthcare that before Obamacare was pretty good and cost them less than half what it will with the new program. I have a number of ideologically leftist friends who work in Hollywood that simply don't want to talk about it. They got so royally screwed by Obamacare that it has rocked their entire belief system.

If we got any value out of this experiment is that we paid hundreds of millions of dollars to demonstrate what NOT to do.

> to an outside observer that seems to be because the market-worshipers seem > to need to be placated at every turn, when their requirements are contrary > to efficiency, fairness or good sense.

And that's the problem with being an outside observer. Although, in this day an age you have access to just about as much information as I do.

No, Obamacare isn't a failure because of the need to accomodate market- worshipers. To the contrary. Obamacare was brewed and passed into law with EVERYONE from the right and Libertarian parties either being explicitly excluded from the process and/or speaking and voting against it. Democrats used parliamentary twists and turns I couldn't possibly recite to get it through Congress. It is fair to say, if we assume our representatives, well, represent us, that half the country or more was against the entire thing.

Obamacare was passed with virtually nobody having read the law. It was passed with the President publicly committing fraud by making promises dozens of times, promises that are now well established to have been lies. It was also passed with Senators making such false promises. And, of course, who can forget our beloved Nancy Pelosi's "We have to pass the law to see what's in it". In other words, it was, for all intents and purposes shoved down our throats, falsely represented from the President on down and deemed into law by parliamentary force. There was no learned debate of the issues and the solutions. The thing is an ugly mess that was brewed behind closed doors. Now the doors are open and we can see they were brewing poison rather than a healthy concoction.

Perhaps that's what you missed as an outsider. Not because you didn't have access to the information, but, let's face it, we are all too busy to be concerned with the minutiae of things that, at the end of the day, don't affect us personally. I have no clue what's going on in France or Spain. The information is all out there. I'm just really busy with matters that concern me and my family to really have the time to understand about issues from far away that hardly touch me. In that sense, yes, you are absolutely correct, as an outsider you are only seeing one aspect of reality. And, frankly, if your information comes from liberal or right-wing outlets such as CNN and Fox you will only be exposed to the ideological extremes. The sad reality is that getting to the truth requires work and if it isn't going to affect you there really is no incentive to do the work and really understand what's going on.

I can't criticize you for not understanding what is really going on here. All I can say is that you should consider the possibility that you really don't get it because you are not personally and emotionally invested enough to expend the effort necessary to understand it.

Love the UK. Every time I go to Europe, London is my "base of operations". I keep it low key and stay at the Holiday Inn @ Kings Cross. Fantastic little Greek restaurant within walking distance.

Now, I'd really like to understand. What does a top-of-the-line plan through the NHS (if such a thing exists) cost a typical family of four with no major healthcare issues?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> This has been going on for at least a few years. Large financial institutions in Europe have contracts with vendors stating that servers cannot be hosted in the US because of all the warrantless snooping.

</comment><comment><USER33> Could this be a possible benefit of the Google Barge? Could they be trying to get data out of the jurisdiction of the US government?

</comment><comment><USER34> It's a bit laughable to presume that the NSA would be interested in a random company's laundry, or would divulge it to anyone else. Snowden's leaks do not contain any evidence of this, and yet it is well known that the Chinese, in fact, do spy for corporate gain.

<comment><USER5> There is not much evidence of commercial espionage indeed. But it's not about company's laundry. It's about the laundry of the users, stored by the company. If NSA access to that hits the press, a EU company will lose a lot of customers.

<comment><USER35> just because it was not aired particularly what kind of economic espionage was happening - it does not mean that it is not happening.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> Worst possible knee-jerk reaction.

Data outside the US is the _easiest_ for the NSA to access. It's only data that never _leaves_ the US which in theory you can argue is subject to warrants.

Of course, since it's so easy to redirect your traffic outside the US using BGP, it's not really a defense no matter where you are storing your data, but the clause is certainly pointless.

<comment><USER37> Wait, so the NSA can walk into a German hosting provider's office and force them to install a box and no we won't tell you what it does?

You're mistaken. The NSA might have more legal space to _hack into_ systems outside the US, but their main snooping appears to happen in (forced) cooperation with US companies.

So it's a pretty decent reaction.

<comment><USER38> The article is about US corporations. Doesn't matter where Cisco hosts the data, the NSA can knock on its door and ask for access.

Do you really think Cisco is going to reply: 'Nope can't do, this data is "on" Germany!'?, when the NSA spies on Merkel herself?

<comment><USER39> That's why EU and everyone else is waiting for US to pass strong laws that prohibit US gov doing that, and for them to acknowledge the EU laws for data protection, before they can trust US companies _at all_.

At least if US passes such laws, they know that instead of risking losing all of its foreign customers, Cisco would rather sue the US government next time, backed by those new laws. This is why this reaction is _such a good thing_. It's exactly what's supposed to happen to end forced backdoors by the NSA into products bought by foreigners.

<comment><USER40> > That's why EU and everyone else is waiting for US to pass strong laws that > prohibit US gov doing that

Thing is, neither the Constitution nor the law was respected, as we've learned. So why should anybody have trust in some politician or President who declares a new law? For agencies like the CIA and the NSA, there is no law.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Blibu.com Launch Party in NYC - <AUTHOR> http://www.blibu.com/page/party Blibu.com is officially launching this Friday to help bands and venues organize events, find the best people to work with and generate exposure for events through a public API offered to blogs and online publications.<p>Launch Party at Bar4 in Brooklyn. Bands who register before Friday can win a brand new Squire electric guitar. So come, it's free for all.... <comment><USER2> haha I just saw you posted this on HN. You know I'm there

</comment><comment><USER2> and ELC will be an amazing performance I'm sure</comment>


Zuckerberg Leaves Racial Justice Leader Frustrated After Call - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-02/zuckerberg-leaves-racial-justice-leader-frustrated-after-call <comment><AUTHOR> > In an interview with Bloomberg News immediately after the call, Robinson > said that "the problem with my ongoing conversations with Mark, is that I > feel like I spent a lot of time, and my colleagues spent a lot of time, > explaining to him why these things are a problem, and I think he just very > much lacks the ability to understand it."

<comment><USER2> > explaining to him why these things are a problem, and I think he just very > much lacks the ability to understand it

That's the problem with getting only one side of the story. Maybe he just has a different opinions - he understands them, but he disagrees that it's a problem (or _the biggest_ problem).

<comment><AUTHOR> > Maybe he just has a different opinions - he understands them, but he > disagrees that it's a problem (or the biggest problem).

Given the unique ability of his technology to magnify and control the distribution of information should we impose greater liabilities if their actions are demonstrably negative?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> So the President of the US says on social media "when the looting starts, the shooting starts" and people want Facebook to take this down and this is their issue with Zuckerberg, that he won't take this down or do anything about it.

People are idiots. Removing the post does nothing to prevent the President from ordering "the shooting" he has indicated he will order. Taking the post down amounts to denying people valuable information they may need to try to protect their lives in this mess.

There is a reason that democracy values a free press. There is a reason that humans have historically developed policies like "Don't shoot the messenger."

It's worse when you can't get the word out that someone with real and serious power to order this to happen is told "Shut up. We don't want to hear from you." It does nothing whatsoever to stop him from ordering in the troops. In fact, it makes it more likely he will do just that in part because it makes it less likely people will get the memo that "If you do x, the consequence is Y, so maybe don't do x."

This is a bullshit complaint. Silencing the President on Facebook isn't remotely the same as silencing some random asshole whose words might foment violence but who otherwise lacks the ability to literally command armies to come into your town and shoot people. Because one of the hats the President wears is Commander in Chief and his picture is on the wall of many a military barracks as the top guy in the chain of command, along with all the officers in that unit locally and all the officers between the local Captain (or whatever) and the Commander in Chief.

<comment><USER4> Disagree. Private channels have zero obligation to be propagate any political leader's inflammatory rhetoric. Indeed, I'd say the social media feedback loop does substantially more harm than good when tensions are high, since Trump feeds on attention and tends to double-down when pushed. He can publish a press release on an official government website if he wishes, just like any prior president.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Uhh. Bloomberg is falling apart in terms of reporting. Semi random person asks Zuckerberg to make changes and he politely dismisses them.. how is that even news? It is agitation for a desired outcome.

It is getting annoying and I am slowly starting to think that FB is on the right side of this issue.

Twitter can do what they want in terms of their platform. So can FB. Why do people find it so offensive?

<comment><USER6> > Semi random person asks Zuckerberg to make changes and he politely dismisses > them..

You're, for some reason, confusing the messenger with the message. The fact was that Zuckerberg met with civil rights leaders and, when faced with questions regarding the current racial justice problem, Zuckerberg's reaction was to do absolutely zero with regards to any possible solution or mitigation.

<comment><USER5> Is it possible that the civil rights leaders misunderstood meeting for something it was not. For Mark it was a potential PR opportunity to show he is doing something, while keeping business model intact ( it works, why I should I break it ). I suppose that means we are in agreement.

I am trying to think of an anology and it is hard to find something comparable. Imagine vegans going to a slaughter house asking the plant manager to turn off their most efficient lane and Bloomberg reporting the plant not doing enough to satisfy vegan lobby.

Just because people give you a floor, does automatically not mean your petition will be acted upon.

<comment><USER6> > For Mark it was a potential PR opportunity to show he is doing something, > while keeping business model intact

The whole point of the newspiece is that Zuckerberg is adamant in doing absolutely nothing, even when repeatedly and directly promoted by civil rights leaders.

> Bloomberg reporting the plant not doing enough to satisfy vegan lobby.

There is no "lobby" that requests, say, that racism is bad and that citizens of a specific ratial background should be repeatedly subjected to violence, or that racism should grow rampant in mass media. This is no special favour that a niche interest group seeks special privileges. Once we recognize that all men are created equally, racial violence ceases to be a debatable subject where it's reasonable to support it in any way or form.

<comment><USER7> > Once we recognize that all men are created equally, racial violence ceases > to be a debatable subject where it's reasonable to support it in any way or > form.

Except this assumes that's what both sides of the argument are actually about. Just checking but do you realise this is an artificial construct that exists entirely in your own head? Zuckerberg in this particular instance, and the free speech absolutist argument in general _does not_ imply acceptance that it's reasonable to support racial violence. Equating the two shows either an intent to deceive or quite intense confusion on the subject.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Of all the big tech CEOs Zuckerberg seems like the most removed from reality. Not just on this particular issue, but on every single one, he gives, without exception, the same pre-arranged PR department answer imaginable.

No matter if it's issues with AI, privacy, advertisement or now political or racially charged content, you can be sure you get the "we're trying to connect the world" stump speech

<comment><USER6> I'm not convinced he is that detached from reality. I do believe that the status quo is to his liking and thus he plays his hand to ensure it stays that way, but still plays it safe by pulling the plausible deniability card.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> If Zuckerberg were to make Facebook politically active, it would probably be his personal views that they pushed. Why would it be anything else?

<comment><USER10> Zuckerberg _is_ politically active, and his personal views _are_ being pushed. Their current policy of allowing incitement to violence and voter suppression in the name of free expression is the result.

<comment><USER9> Allowing something isn't pushing something. To see how, look at the following debate:

Liberal: "Stop trying to push your views on us, let people decide for themselves whether they want to be gay."

Conservative: "You are also pushing your views, and the fact that gay marriage is allowed is a result of that. By allowing gay marriage, you are forcing your views on everyone."

So, that's clearly wrong, because as smart as it sounds to say things like "the null policy is a policy," being permissive is actually possible to distinguish from any of the particular ways one could be restrictive.

<comment><USER11> > let people decide for themselves whether they want to be gay

> By allowing gay marriage, you are forcing your views on everyone

This is a straw man. People don't choose to be gay, and conservatives are depriving people of their rights for something they can't choose. Allowing individuals the right of self determination is nowhere near allowing a sitting president to incite violence against American citizens.

<comment><USER9> I think you're misusing the term "straw man." A straw man is an argument that nobody ever uses, brought forward purely to discredit. I am pretty sure I have heard that argument before, so it's not a straw man.

In any case, it doesn't even matter whether that example has happened in a debate before. It's simply meant to illustrate the error in failing to distinguish between liberality and restrictivism.

<comment><USER10> A straw man is misrepresenting an argument so that it's easier to counter. I don't think this is a straw man, I just think it's a poor analogy.

The difference between same–sex marriage and what Trump is doing is that same–sex marriage affects no one except for those getting married. No one is being forced to have a same–sex marriage or go to a same–sex wedding. "Forcing your views on us" means "we don't want to live in a society where this is permitted, even if I am never personally affected by it."

Trump, on the other hand, has posted propaganda about voter suppression and incited violence. This absolutely affects other people. It's not neutral to unaffiliated parties at all — how many protesters will be hurt because Trump has openly called for violence against them?

<comment><USER9> Going back to the original point, if Zuckerberg was in charge of deciding which policy positions were good and which ones were bad, it would be his personal opinions that mattered. So your or my opinion about whether Trump tweets or gay marriage are good or bad, are not very relevant.

<comment><USER10> Yes, I agree with you about that. The point at which we diverge is that I'm saying it's not hypothetical — Zuckerberg _is_ making political decisions which reflect his personal values.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it."

\--Upton Sinclair.

<comment><USER13> Well said, but about whom.

<comment><USER14> > Well said, but about whom.

The answer is clear...unless you think racism is a hoax and civil rights leaders are mainly in their line of work for the money.

<comment><USER13> I don't think facebook is a hoax!

A "Racial Justice Leader" which is an amazing title, is confounded about how the CEO of one of the largest media organizations in the world does not want to partake in spreading his message and thinks its because "he doesn't understand".

Please.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> It's frustrating to me how many people want platform companies to censor their customers/users. When and how did media censorship become popular?

I, for one, don't want any third party telling me what I am or am not allowed to read. If someone wants to put something on the internet, it's not the hosting platform's job to say that they shouldn't, provided that material is legal. If it's bad content, I won't read it. Maybe other people will; not my business, nor yours.

When did we go from "I don't want to read that" to "nobody should be able to read that"?

Would you tolerate arbitrary censorship of your own webpage by your web host?

Why are so many people demanding that Facebook play cop? Being wrong on the internet isn't illegal, nor should it be, and Facebook is correct for staying out of that, no matter how repugnant the stupid shit posted to Facebook becomes.

Ultimately, any platform used by billions is going to be filled with stupid, repugnant, _wrong_ shit, or filled with censorship. I'd prefer the former, because the latter is unacceptable.

<comment><USER16> This. The only justifiable things to censor are either direct threat/harm to life, or messages trying to disrupt the service itself. Everything else is just making bed for subjective censorship.

That said, FB is a private company that can show and hide whatever it pleases. It is the bad infrastructure of these walled content megalodons that results in this being a problem.

Truly distributed networks and darknets may be the only future for the internet we know.

<comment><USER15> > _The only justifiable things to censor are either direct threat /harm to > life_

It's not a stretch to point out that the post made by POTUS falls within that description. He was literally threatening protestors/looters with summary execution by the military.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> This article has zero content. Why were they frustrated? What did they propose? What did Zuckerberg say?

Bad journalism.

<comment><USER18> [https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/02/civil-rights-leaders- stunned...](https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/02/civil-rights-leaders-stunned- after-call-with-zuckerberg.html)

they want Trump's post to come down, simple as that. The story I linked has more substance but it all comes down to they don't like Trump or anything he says and so they want Facebook along with Twitter to both label or block it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I hate Trump but it's not facebook's job to censor the president.

<comment><USER20> It's also not their job to host everyone and everyone's content on their non- public non-government commercial platform.

<comment><USER21> Their job is to make money. Censoring world leaders from your platform is a sure fire way to lose a lot of users and money

<comment><USER20> I'm not sure there are metrics on that, I haven't seen any publication of such a precedent. I also wonder where those people might go, to the next-biggest platform perhaps? Or create a new one? And what about people that don't have a 1-to-1 relation to presence and consumption but a 1-to-many (i.e., friends, family). I suppose it's likely that someone might spend less total time on a platform if they have to divide their time between more than one platform.

<comment><USER21> FB has the metrics. The precedent is Cambridge Analytica.

<comment><USER20> That's great, but those metrics aren't available to us so speculating on that has little value.

<comment><USER21> We don't need the metrics ourselves to have common sense:

1\. Facebook's job as a corporation is to make money

2\. Making money for FB is largely based on MAU

3\. Playing politics and censoring the chosen world leaders of large portions of their user base is a probable way to lose those users, and thus, money

<comment><USER20> I don't know what MAU means but I do know that humans are terrible at predicting things, common sense has little to do with metrics and, yes, of course Facebook's job is to make money.

The assumption that people leave assumes that there is a different place to go to, which for most people, there isn't because social networks are exactly that: networks. Unless you have a small isolated network that can move all at the same time, it is not likely that people will single themselves out.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> So are social media companies a platform or are they editorialized?

Let's say we decide to go to war with China. Should Facebook censor anti- Chinese content? Should it censor anti-war content?

I think there are some things that are objectively censor worth (child pornography) and then there is a lot of gray area. My question to Facebook employees who oppose Mark's viewpoint is: "What is your solution and how do you prevent Facebook from censoring anything you don't agree with?"

<comment><USER23> >I think there are some things that are objectively censor worth (child pornography)

How about advocating violence or harm to others?

<comment><USER22> Wouldn't that be ok in war time?

What if I say "You should defend your property from criminals." That's advocating violence.

What about advocating for late-term abortions? A huge portion of the US feel like that is harming an unborn human being.

What about advocating for the death penalty in states where it is legal?

I don't see how you could objectively make censorship judgements on this kind of speech.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> One new problem I see on Facebook these days are lots of images shared of false claims of people coming to attack/riot in neighborhoods... like really poorly doctored snapchat screenshots that wouldn't fool anyone under 40 but get proliferated everywhere by boomers.

There's now a massive line outside my local Home Depot with people standing in 90 degree heat trying to return plywood and OSB for looting and imaginary "ANTIFA caravan riots" that never came. Absolutely corrosive stuff to social order in its own right.

<comment><USER25> So if you're born in 1980 or earlier you're a boomer? Oh my. Ageism shines through.

<comment><USER24> I'm not interested in getting into a PC slap-fight: Old people are more likely to spread disinformation online and there's studies that prove it. Facts don't care about your feelings: [https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/1/eaau4586#F1](https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/1/eaau4586#F1)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Zuck walked right into that trap.

<comment><USER27> I was at F8 when Zuck announced "the future is private".

It's entirely possible he's simply that lacking in self-awareness.

<comment><USER28> It wouldn't be his first time, if people remember the Puerto Rico incident 3 years ago.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> The attempts to work the refs and shape political discourse on FB leading up to the election are only going to get more and more intense. Hillary Clinton as far as I can tell still blames facebook primarily for her loss.

<comment><USER30> > Hillary Clinton as far as I can tell still blames facebook primarily for her > loss.

And I still blame her for the current state of the world. Her gross incompetence in regards to her campaign and underestimating her opponent has directly lead to human rights violations, the erosure of trust in America from its allies and countless unnecessary deaths in the handling of the pandemic.

She lost to who is likely the dumbest and most incompetent president in history, so what does that make her?

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Nothing he said could have satisfied them. Don't even know why he did this. People just don't understand this isn't a Facebook problem.

</comment><comment><USER32> This doesn't really seem newsworthy.

They should be happy Zuckerberg spoke to them and they got to share their different perspectives with him.

He runs one of the largest companies in the world, and they are just a single NGO with their own view point on racial ideas.

Why don't any companies ever work with non liberal NGO's?

I'd love to see more of Thomas Sowell type thinking.</comment>


Ask HN: How to choose between Scala and Node.js for a new project? - <AUTHOR> I am having confusion between technology stack for my next personal project. I have decided with React+redux for front end
and PostgreSQL as database
Now I have to decide the backend stack for rest apis My options are Playframework(Scala) or Hapi(node) I already completed projects using Playfarmework(java) and Hapi.
Which one is better if we need to refactor into micro services in future?
I read articles regarding pros and cons of static  vs dynamic typing and code refactoring
I never maintained any project for long time, are you seeing any advantage with scala over nodejs in back end in long time? <comment><USER2> Well you're right about discarding java out of the equation, PlayFramework 2 support for java devs is getting worse and worse since 2.4. Seems like Play Framework 2 went all in on scala instead. Go with the one you personally are more comfortable with.</comment>


React Native for Windows and Mac - <AUTHOR> https://microsoft.github.io/react-native-windows/ <comment><USER2> React Native scares me with its dependency webs:

[http://npm.anvaka.com/#/view/2d/react- native](http://npm.anvaka.com/#/view/2d/react-native)

From my experience, it's really great to work with and definitely saves a ton of work, but the depgraph above fills me with doubt for use in sensitive applications such as in finance or healthcare. For this reason, I've been trying out Flutter or even considering to go back to native apps. Perhaps there's some kind of middle ground where we can create a tight microkernel- like thing natively using secure enclaves and key managers, but expose an API to the "untrusted" parts of the program. This approach is not without its own downsides, such as dark patterns in a compromised UI. However, as one friend pointed out, a lot of those deps are indeed for build time only, which have different risk profiles.

The depgraph of reactjs is far simpler and easier for me to understand and therefore feel trust:

[http://npm.anvaka.com/#/view/2d/react](http://npm.anvaka.com/#/view/2d/react)

Does anyone know if there has been reliable research towards the security of the entire RN dependency tree? Seeing a stray dep there that has 1 maintainer on npm/GitHub who has been inactive for over a year makes me nervous. Any one of those JavaScript projects could do something nefarious deep under the hood, and this to me seems to expose a huge surface area for attackers.

Here's a classic throwback to keep us on our toes :)

[https://www.win.tue.nl/~aeb/linux/hh/thompson/trust.html](https://www.win.tue.nl/~aeb/linux/hh/thompson/trust.html)

<comment><USER3> Speaking of trusting trust, I think I'd love for Node¹ to support something like OpenBSD pledge (2) and unveil (2) for imports, where once you enter into a particular package certain capabilities are disabled. I would like to be able to assert that when I import some package, it and all of the packages it recursively includes do not perform network requests, do not use the filesystem outside of some folder, and so on.

A fine grained capability system for packages would dramatically improve the safety profile, and if this were built into package.json and the lockfile we could do the following:

1\. Packages advertise what their default capabilities should be limited to 2\. Changes in those capabilities are encoded in the package lock file, and can't be changed without the user explicitly affirming them

¹ and other langs with extensive use of package managers and micro-packages

<comment><USER4> > A fine grained capability system for packages would dramatically improve the > safety profile

I think Deno does that (the new project by Node's original creator):

[https://blog.logrocket.com/what-is-deno/](https://blog.logrocket.com/what-is- deno/)

<comment><USER5> Deno gives all packages the same permissions of the main app. So if your app can make network requests, so can every dependency you use. It's not a great situation. I've brought this up to them and their response is that per-package permissions would be too difficult to implement.

<comment><USER6> Yes, checking everyone at the main door is indeed easier than checking everyone at every single point of contact. It needs a vast architectural change compared to current implementation as you need to enforce those rules at runtime!

<comment><USER5> Well yeah, but I thought the whole point of deno was to make vast architectural changes to allow for increased security. Seems odd to stop half way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I tried using this a few months ago, as well as React Native for mobile and React Native Web for web, and I felt like they were all just hacks glued together to get cross-platform support, and RN isn't even native, it still includes a Javascript bridge. Build dependencies and packages were a nightmare, things continuously broke. I tried Flutter afterwards and it just felt like a breath of fresh air. Everything "just worked", on all the platforms I tested it on: web, iOS, Android, Windows, Mac, and Linux. Updates on one are hot reloaded to another. In contrast, Expo sometimes just broke. This was all wrapped up in one package instead of needing to use separate build chains for each platform.

I wonder if React Native can do all of this officially, but I suppose that's not their prerogative, given that RN is mostly used by Facebook for apps and these other platform efforts are by third parties, like Microsoft here.

<comment><USER8> I had the same experience.

Expo is wonderful for prototyping and quick iteration. The ability to use Snacks online and see them working on the phone is great.

But beyond that everything in RN feels hacky and unfinished. While working with it I had some silly issues with Metro, and found some subtle bugs in Text and Button components.

About the "Native" part. I think that a lot of people have the expectation that doing RN apps will be the same as building a iOS or Android native app. But RN+Expo is not that different from frameworks like Ionic. Is really hard to do an app that follows the Apple HIG or Material Guidelines, you end with something in the middle that doesn't look or feels truly native (at least not without tons of extra work to imitate things that you get for free in the native UI kit) .

RN without Expo is not so nice, lots of rough edges and sooner or later you'll need to write interop code in Objective-C or Android Java to take advantage of the native platform.

<comment><USER9> Expo has one small issue... if you are in an organization that isn't capable of keeping it up to date and it becomes deprecated, your app will stop working.

If this happens over a weekend, expect your phone to blow up every three hours until it gets republished and fixed.

<comment><USER10> Unless you are referring to another issue, using `expo build:android` will create an apk file so you don't have to rely on staying up to date with the Expo app.

<comment><USER9> Yeah, but if you are using their native extensions and they deprecate your version, their repo will become unavailable and your app will fail to start.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Those JavaScript cross-platform solutions are opaque boxes that run basically their own operating system within an operating system. This comes at a penalty of a non-standard UX and higher than usual CPU usage and memory usage. But after they tackled that hurdle (like Visual Studio Code, excellent work), they still lack a lot of platform standard goodies like Accessibility and AppleScript.

I prefer solutions like Xamarin / Mono where you can have a Cocoa UI coupled with C# or F# based dll's. Let's be honest, as long as you have a good way of maintaining a good state in your app for example by already using ViewModels that did most of the heavy lifting like formatting strings, having the state in a state machine and so on, getting the UI to work as required is just an exercise of filling in the colors between the lines.

Barely anyone would notice they were using a Xamarin based solution on a Mac, while the JS based applications are immediately really obvious to the trained eye.

<comment><USER12> It's almost like people want a new markup language for defining interfaces that isn't based on JavaScript.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Flutter seems to be gaining ground on React Native. And they also have web and desktop ports. Recently flutter overtook react native on Google trends.

<comment><USER14> Flutter on the web is absolutely insane. For those who don't know, it basically strips away everything and wraps it in a big terrifyingly complex mess of code and renders everything in a canvas. Flutter advocates like to claim that that's "only a fallback" for when things get complex but as far as I can tell the vast majority of things (including the simplest examples from Flutter itself) force the entire thing into canvas: it's basically Flash 2.0, but worse.

I seriously hope that Flutter fades. It's very dangerous in many ways. Even ignoring the huge downsides of basically having a new Flash, consider this: the massive Flutter layer is, surprise surprise, yet another Google project that is magically _significantly_ slower in Firefox. I don't mean a small difference here, I mean that on a brand new fancy flagship I tested on, Flutter in Chrome is buttery smooth and Flutter in Firefox is a miserable, laggy experience. If it gets popular, this will become yet another reason pushing people off Firefox and cementing Google's dominance of the web.

Flutter is a very, very dangerous thing.

<comment><USER15> Adobe Flex was my most productive client development experience over the past 20 years. I transitioned to Android _but_ there were many hideous things with that (e.g. ghastly emulator, legacy Java support etc.).

My personal hope is that Flutter gains traction and the web can move beyond current web/native technology. Postscript / PDFs aren't suitable for game experiences...and to my mind web standards have been shoehorned into supporting web apps, where there is a mismatch with native technologies. I'd like to think that Flutter can help bridge that gap.

This is not to say that accessibility etc. should be ignored...nor better support in Firefox...but even Brendan Eich is using Blink/V8 with Brave.

Anyhow, thoughts of one.

<comment><USER16> Ahhhh Adobe Flex with MXML and ActionScript3. Before Typescript and React with JSX got popular that was the cool kids club. RIAs yo! Rich internet applications.

I loved what Flex brought to the table. Too bad Adobe didn't open source flash and let it die.

<comment><USER17> It lives on in web APIs

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I'd love to abandon my C/C++ UI frameworks for React, but I need

\- consistent rendering/support across multiple platforms and versions

\- multiple windows

\- rendering to a window that isn't owned by the UI being rendered or created by the framework

Can I do that all in React native? Edit: don't need to bring up electron.

<comment><USER19> what the heck is that third one about?

<comment><USER18> I work with applications that generate windows and manage their lifetimes independently of whatever is inside the window. afaict, most web/mobile UI frameworks assume they're the only thing in the universe, whereas on desktop there's a complex application managing zero or more rendering surfaces and portions of the code only know about the one that they're supposed to target.

It's a hairier problem than you'd expect it to be. I'm not an expert but my understanding is that it's tricky to deal with the event loops when you're not the master of your domain, at least in a platform agnostic way. The workaround is usually to spawn multiple processes, but then the management of app state has to have an IPC layer underneath the internal APIs and there needs to be a master daemon running somewhere.

In keeping with front page posts, the plugin API for Apple's Logic Pro (audio units) is an example of that. You are handed an NSView* and need to render on it, but you don't create it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> MacOS implementation here [https://github.com/microsoft/react-native- macos](https://github.com/microsoft/react-native-macos)

</comment><comment><USER20> I think the killer feature here is natively targeting Windows AND macOS simultaneously.

The only cross-platform alternatives that I've seen in the ecosystem use either web or Gtk in the frontend, and both of these have a distinctly non- native feel to them.

<comment><USER21> In which ecosystem? If you mean desktop apps in general, then there are many other options. Qt and wxWidgets, to name a couple of popular ones that have been around for a very long time.

<comment><USER22> My problem with those two is the damn C++ API. I've used both in the past, but I've moved on from C++ for desktop applications to greener pastures but these toolkits' APIs are a pita to use via ffi.

<comment><USER21> They're both pretty popular to wrap; I'm surprised that whatever language/ecosystem you're using doesn't have a wrapper lib already.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> While personally I dislike React Native in the strongest terms possible for the number of nigh impossible to debug technical issues it has brought the projects that tried to tame it, there is a really interesting moment happening here. Microsoft is embracing Facebook's cross-platform tools to eventually compete with Google's cross-platform Electron. Microsoft currently relies on Google for the internals of VS Code, Github for Desktop and many more of its popular pieces of kit, and it doesn't seem very happy about it.

My own experience with React Native has been nothing but terrible, but it will be interesting to see how all of this will play out in the long run.

<comment><USER24> V8, Chromium and Blink are an Open Source projects that Google is one of the main contributors to, but they're not 'Google'.

If Google went away tomorrow, V8, Chromium and Blink would still exist, and Microsoft would be able to use all projects.

<comment><USER25> Sure they are open source projects, but the majority of dev work is done on Google's dime. Google employs many of the most important people in these projects. Sure the code will still be there if Google gives up, but will anyone have the capacity to step up and maintain them?

<comment><USER24> Yes. Microsoft would hire them, and already is doing do.

There's plenty of commits to V8 from outside Google. Blink is a fork of a fork of a twenty year old project.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I'm really excited, although the Mac part of this page is somewhat misleading — there isn't anything available on the Mac side yet (everything is "coming soon")

<comment><USER27> you can checkout the code here [https://github.com/microsoft/react-native- macos](https://github.com/microsoft/react-native-macos). It still being actively developed and not yet ready for release.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I wish someone would take a web renderer, took the Javascript away, made a native react-like library for it, and made a universal interface to it so any language could use it. That would finally fix the problem with the UI building issue, while allowing flexible language access. That would be the best of both worlds.

<comment><USER29> sounds a lot like what wasm is trying to achieve (minus the web rendering part)

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> > Windows

> We are actively developing React Native for Windows...

> Mac

> Coming soon

So React Native for Windows.

<comment><USER31> Don't forget... Microsoft <3 Linux. You can tell it's a top consideration.

<comment><USER32> They don't <3 _desktop_ Linux and probably never will. To them, Windows and macOS are the major desktop operating systems, and Linux is the server operating system. VS Code likely only runs on Linux because Electron runs on Linux.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> I've used React Native for a client and, whilst it was super clunky, I still enjoyed being able to write React to deploy to mobile. With React Native for Web, you can technical write code that writes to a bunch of different platforms, a big selling point for businesses.

<comment><USER34> Check out Ionic which now fully supports React and will give you a similar benefit but without the need to use RNW or have different code for each platform. Also Ionic's components are much more robust and widely used than RNW.

<comment><USER35> I agree that Ionic's components are easier to work with and less of a hassle. However, React Native components let you talk directly to native, even using native components from the native platform's ecosystem in your code. It's a tradeoff developers have to make.

[https://github.com/wix/react-native-navigation](https://github.com/wix/react- native-navigation) is beautiful, it uses iOS' own navigation APIs, but it's a pain.

<comment><USER34> That's fair! One other option is to do both: use Capacitor and embed it inside native navigation controls (i.e. a native shell), then use Ionic React for screens, etc.

One other aspect is that Ionic React uses react-dom so it will be a pretty normal react dev experience compared to RN which isn't 1-1 (CSS being an example).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I asked this on a previous React Native thread, and I'm still curious: is RN (on mobile, as that's where it's currently used) _actually_ faster than something like PhoneGap? Are there any benchmarks or demos? Anyone got any anecdotes of a like-for-like comparison?

I'm skeptical (though certainly willing to be convinced) because RN runs your JS application in a separate thread from the UI, with a rather expensive bridge sending JSON messages back and forth. That seems to me a poor design choice.

Browsers have the downside of working with the complex DOM that doesn't map as well to native widgets. But browsers are mature and highly optimized. So I would guess that performance might be a wash.

<comment><USER37> Performance is just one reason companies adapt something like React Native, the ability to have web developers* come in and string native-quality components together is another. React Native can feel better than mobile web and have access to lower level APIs.

* I think this is more of a selling point than a reality. I think in practice, to make a React Native feel and work well requires native platform knowledge.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> Not sure what the advantage here is over Electron. I know the chromium engine is a resource hog, but the scalability/mix between platforms makes it worth it. Curious to know what your thoughts are folks!

<comment><USER39> > I know the chromium engine is a resource hog, but the scalability/mix > between platforms makes it worth it.

Worth it for some. Personally, I refuse to use any Electron apps because they have a highly non-native-feeling UX and because they're resource hogs.

This announcement excites me, because React Native is likely to be an improvement on both counts.

The UX still won't be quite as native-feeling as a single-platform app designed for that platform's unique idioms – but as long as it uses native controls under the hood, that's still 10x better than Electron in my book.

And even without the bloat of Chromium, an app written in JS is still likely to be slower than one written in, say, C++ or Rust – but most GUIs don't really need that level of performance. And at least on macOS, the competition is not C++ or Rust but Objective-C and Swift, which are both slower, more on par with JS in terms of performance.

<comment><USER40> VScode looks and feels native and not memory intensive

<comment><USER41> It might feel native on platforms where 'native' doesn't mean anything (Windows, Linux), but the only native thing about it on macOS is the fact it has proper global menu bars — which is something provided by Electron for free.

Everything else is custom.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> I'd love to see some dog-fooding on this. Maybe a branch of VS Code for RN.

I mean, say what you will about the quality of even Apple's own Catalyst apps, but at least they eat their own dogfood (although with the unfortunate consequence of making us eat it, too).

There are so many different competing projects at MS to do practically the same thing, it'd be great to see RN for Windows and macOS used for something major from MS.

<comment><USER42> Last I heard, they are using it for at least significant parts of Office and Skype.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> There was a community effort[1] with similar goal on macOS. I was a tiny bit disappointed that they stopped working on it when Apple announced Project Catalyst. It's good to have MS carrying the touch on this topic.

[1] [https://github.com/ptmt/react-native- macos](https://github.com/ptmt/react-native-macos)

</comment><comment><USER44> Looked at it a while ago when I was trying to start a cross-platform app (both on mobile and on desktop), but under the Mac section it simply said "Coming Soon!". I thought there's some update with this post receiving so many upvotes, but apparently it's still the same, and Mac support is still in a very early experimental stage.

Flutter left me a similar impression.

I eventually ended up using Quasar [https://quasar.dev/](https://quasar.dev/), which allows you to use one Vue.js codebase but deploy to Cordova on mobile and Electron on desktop. Vue is definitely not the prettiest solution out there, but I had to be practical and actually get the app out.

Maybe if I started the project one year in the future, the landscape would be totally different already. It's definitely changing rapidly.

<comment><USER45> I think I might be on the same boat. I have personally looked into all frameworks and planning to hire a team, quasar seems is one of the options. The application isn't for any mission-critical application, revolves around curd. Quasar is a good option albeit with a lot of baggage, Flutter is clean but for Desktop use case it's still evolving. How was your experience with Quasar? Would you recommend Flutter over Quasar?

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> They supply short Counter example and claim they're both the same. However looking at the code button handler called onClick for react and onPress in React Native. Unless this is a simple typo why doing crazy things like that?

</comment><comment><USER47> React Native is getting better all the time and it's mature already. I think people who criticize RN are the devs who had to work with the first few shitty versions of RN in a shitty complex project. I think that's the case in many, if not all, open source projects.

We do pretty complex stuff with RN as does Facebook and it's been serving us well. I don't know why someone would want to use it with Windows, but this tells how far the project has gotten.

I would love to developed native, but you just save a lot (maybe half) time using RN if you need the app for both platforms.

</comment><comment><USER48> I looked at the docs, and checked the Calculator demo app. It a Visual Studio solution. I will not install Visual Studio because each time I install it (last time it was 5 years back now), my Windows Installation gets polluted with all kinds of packages that I now never ever been able to figure out how to uninstall.

I can copy couple of dlls in a project folder, and run npm / yarn install, but that is the most I am willing to do.

So, my question is: is there a VS Code / npm only demo?

As an ex-windows developer, turned react dev - I am excited.

</comment><comment><USER49> I swear to gosh Facebook, if you tempt my employer into making me write Windows apps...

<comment><USER50> I would be happy to add Windows as a platform to my apps. More market == more money. Only as an add-on. I wouldn't want to write Windows exclusive apps for sure.

<comment><USER51> Not meant to disparage, but how lucrative is that market? How much do Windows users (outside of business) actually spend on software (regardless of business model)? It's a leading question, but a sincere one.

<comment><USER52> Who buys software outside of businesses? God I feel like I haven't paid for a stand-alone piece of software in years.

<comment><USER51> I do. Not a ton, but enough to be a part of the drop in the bucket that makes the Apple ecosystem more attractive to smaller-purchase businesses that target it. I just... haven't seen much of that targeting Windows for a long time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> On the React Native MacOS fork:

> This repository is a working fork of facebook/react-native that adds support > for the official React Native for macOS implementation from Microsoft.

Does anyone know when these changes are planning to be upstreamed?

<comment><USER51> RN's been available for many years, and little interest has been shown in providing first class support for desktop targets. That said, it wouldn't surprise me if:

1\. the recent FB messenger desktop apps are RN.

2\. they leverage work done in forks (like this one from MS) to achieve that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER54> React Native for Xbox seems like a step in the complete wrong direction...

<comment><USER55> Glad to see I wasn't the only one confused by the Xbox and game controller in the header.

(I mean, sure, it "just" runs Windows, but...)

</comment></comment><comment><USER56> > React Native for Windows and Mac

> Mac: Coming Soon

You know what, I think I'll wait for Flutter Desktop, or see who wins true cross-desktop compatibilty since Flutter already has Mac support but no Windows.

</comment><comment><USER57> A decade ago, Java was the de-facto language to build a cross-platform desktop application (with Java Swing). Now it is JavaScript. So be it then....

Too bad Rust does not have something similar.

</comment><comment><USER4> Didn't Microsoft use RN for building Skype or did I dream that?

<comment><USER58> Skype is Electron now.

<comment><USER59> The previous version of Skype was based on an older, internal-only fork of RN for Windows.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER60> Is anyone able to provide a map of modern frameworks? With React-native, React-redux, Angular, Vue and probably a bunch of others.

I'm really not sure what's relevant now and what was relevant 6 months ago. I'm genuinely curious, but it's pretty difficult to grasp and no framework homepage is going to tell you "Don't use me, I'm about to be a dead project!" and every developer will tell you their preferred framework is the best framework.

<comment><USER61> "I can't figure out what will be relevant in six months" might have been a legitimate complaint a decade ago, but those days are long gone.

React has been a core part of the front end ecosystem for almost 10 years. Angular is more than 10 years old. Vue is the "new kid" on the block at about six years old.

React is roughly 10x more popular than Vue or Angular according to npm usage, has been far more popular in usage terms for many years, and continues to be growing faster than either Vue or Angular.

Complaining you can't figure out if React or Angular or Vue will be relevant in six months is a bit like complaining you can't figure out if C++ or Java will be relevant in six months. Yes, there is lots of advancement happening in the front end space. Yes, that's a good thing. No, it's not an excuse to act like you're paralyzed to understand the current state.

<comment><USER62> React, almost 10 years? It was only open sourced 7 years ago and definitely took time to fully catch on..

<comment><USER61> I'm truly amazed to still encounter "omg React is so new and unproven how can we possibly keep up with stuff like this?" posts. Next up: is no-sql just another fad or will it catch on?

<comment><USER63> Who said that in this thread? (Nobody, they just pointed out you are wrong about the timeframe)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER64> No Linux support.

<comment><USER65> You could try moving [https://github.com/justinmcp/react- native/tree/ubuntu](https://github.com/justinmcp/react-native/tree/ubuntu) forward. I no longer have the time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER66> React Native seems to be quickly becoming the standard for fast development coupled with native integration

<comment><USER67> Does Facebook use it?

<comment><USER68> Yes

<comment><USER69> Only for its marketplace app

<comment><USER42> This isn't true.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER70> Unfortunately, `Good First Issue` and `help wanted` sections are currently empty for the macOS fork.

</comment><comment><USER71> Excuse my ignorance. What's new about this? I thought React Native was already a thing?

<comment><USER72> React Native was a thing for native mobile app development. The post is talking about React Native becoming available for native desktop app development.

<comment><USER73> You mean when this came out 4 years ago? I'm not sure why this is being posted as "News"...

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11386595](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11386595)

[2] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11490190](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11490190)

<comment><USER59> While it's not that new (has been public for over a year), this is a different, newer implementation of RNW (written in C++ instead of C#)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER74> The web site reads "Mac coming soon" the headline reads differently.

</comment><comment><USER75> Only a matter of months before VSCode will not be an electron app anymore.

</comment><comment><USER76> . (dot) (ignore me, I need this comment to comeback to it in the future)

</comment><comment><USER77> The mac related lib and docs are still ComingSoonTM

</comment><comment><USER78> Why is Microsoft doing this instead of Facebook?

</comment><comment><USER79> What would be the benefit over electron?

<comment><USER50> 1\. Not using the DOM for rendering. 2\. Integrating native APIs is much easier.

<comment><USER80> > Being compiled to native code is a huge benefit.

It's still just running Javascript. The real difference is that it uses widgets that are native to the platform, instead of a browser engine/DOM.

<comment><USER51> It's not "just" running JS, it's _also_ running JS. Part of the control flow into and out of the native widgets is JS, and part of it is abstractions over scripting bridges employed by RN (and its various forks).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER81> Where's the Linux one?

</comment><comment><USER82> Today an Electron wept

</comment><comment><USER83> Of course, no Linux support, since this is still Microsoft :(

<comment><USER84> Classic HN - never anything positive to say about any story here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER85> React Native is best understood as an insurgent attack on native mobile platforms, funded by overwealthy and bloated companies that do not control mobile platforms, but feel entitled.

Microsoft and Facebook attacking Apple and Google basically.

IMHO it's not a sincere effort to make a nice platform. It moves fast and breaks things in major ways with each minor point release, with the current excuse being that it's not at 1.0 yet. But it offers just enough to introduce FUD into the competitors' ecosystems. And that's the entire goal as far as I can tell.

If you value getting useful deep knowledge, stay away. If you want to play in the shallows and be patching stuff up all the time with JavaScript/TypeScript, React Native is an option.

<comment><USER86> How are Facebook and Microsoft any more or less "bloated" than Google or Apple?

Also Discord's iOS app is built with ReactNative, and it is a pretty feature rich application, seems like it works for those use it.

<comment><USER85> They have lots of money but without carrying the cost of maintaining an active hardware product line. Unless you count Oculus for Facebook and a few minor things for Microsoft but those are in the noise.</comment></comment></comment>


The Inside Story of BitTorrent's Bizarre Collapse - <AUTHOR> https://backchannel.com/the-inside-story-of-bittorrents-bizarre-collapse-a0766a5442d7#.l79uptnzs <comment><USER2> This is a dupe.

Here's the first post.

* The Inside Story of BitTorrent Inc's Collapse | Hacker News || [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13375350](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13375350)

This story has been posted at least 10 times in the last 4 days.

[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Bizarre%20Collapse&sort=byDate...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Bizarre%20Collapse&sort=byDate&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story)</comment>


Show HN: Bare-bones API to retrieve Corona Covid-19 Data - <AUTHOR> https://coronaapi.com/ <comment><USER2> Edit: maybe Johns Hopkins is behind a day/not yet updated in their data reporting?

How does this compare in how the data is reported to: [https://fitnessai.tryretool.com/embedded/public/464cee3a-6d5...](https://fitnessai.tryretool.com/embedded/public/464cee3a-6d56-4b68-b934-6af12c014a54) which I saw on HN about a week ago. For example US on [https://coronaapi.com/api](https://coronaapi.com/api) is 1281 but on the other tool it's 2300+. Is it behind the other?</comment>


Is AJAX On The Way Out? - <AUTHOR> http://www.mappingtheweb.com/2008/05/09/is-ajax-on-the-way-out/

<comment><USER2> Awful, egregriously bad article. Beyond wanting to tear my hair out from the prose itself, it doesn't provide any proof to support its central thesis. "The frenzied days of web 2.0 are over", "others believe this technology is on its way out." Citation, please? If you just pull something out of your ass, say so; otherwise provide some evidence for your conclusion. Is it worth pointing out that the principal reason the author gives for AJAX being on the "way out" is that developers misuse it? Boy, that sure hasn't stopped HTML, Flash, Javascript, CSS...

Ugh. How did this make the front page again?

"No", indeed.

<comment><USER3> I was thinking basically the same thing. If I'd submitted an essay like that at college, it would have come back dripping with comments like "please justify", "what exactly is your argument?" and that old favourite "you need to develop your ideas".

Also, this: "The user doesn't care about sophisticated interface features. Locating the desired information is the primary focus." I do care very much about sophisticated interfaces, maybe the author meant "interface bling"? I suspect, in fact, that _is_ what was meant -- fancy but pointless DOM effects are on their way out. We can always hope.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> There's a lot of UI terrain we haven't explored yet, and AJAX makes more of that terrain reachable. It seems silly to suggest it's on its way out just because it's no longer the cool new thing.

<comment><USER5> This first sentence comment by itself is more informative and interesting than the entire "article" under discussion.

<comment><USER4> I'm honestly a little stunned by the stagnancy of innovation in online interfaces. It's way beyond just laziness or hewing to trends -- it's virtually a total refusal to believe that we can do better. One of my goals right now is to develop ideas (that is, UI setups) that question some of our fundamental notions about what interacting with a website is supposed to look and feel like.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> No

<comment><USER6> Looks like you have been working on your points to syllables ratio ;)

<comment><AUTHOR> Not quite. Points per character. "No" is 50% more efficient that "lol".

<comment><USER6> _> "No" is ... more efficient that "lol"_

Not if we count unique chars.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry. "No" is 50% more efficient than "wtf".

<comment><USER7> You forget that you had to press "shift" to type "N". The number of key presses are the same ;-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> AJAX, like Flash is a tool. Back in 2002-2004 everyone thought Flash would take over the web. I got resumes/applications from designers who 'only' did Flash and tried to convince me it was the future. Fast forward to today and Flash remains a very important "tool" but only a tool and not the answer to all our woes. AXAX is now just another tool in my virtual toolbelt, one I use from time to time, but not something I'd base my entire site on (hmmm kind of like javascript was in the late 90's early 00's)

</comment><comment><USER9> With pretty much every creative endeavor, taste dictates the results. When used taste and as needed, AJAX can provide great functionality. It's not going anywhere.

The headline is just fishing for clicks.

</comment><comment><USER10> My suggestion would be to change the title to: How not to write an Essay.

It's one of the lamest articles to make the hacker news front page in ages.

</comment><comment><USER11> This article has nothing to do with its title. In any case, the question practically answers itself. Just look at what people are using.

</comment><comment><USER12> The author clearly does not know what "ajax" is. It may be a misnomer and a buzzword, but what it means is something substantial.

This article is so, so bad.

</comment><comment><USER13> AJAX may be on the way out, if only that people are more interested in AJSONC (asynchronous javascript object notation with callbacks). Most people have realized that any code that writes XML from internal data structures can easily write JSON, which is more useful if you're using Javascript and not exchanging hierarchical data structures.

</comment><comment><USER14> If anything, tools like GWT will enable a whole new level of AJAX powered web interfaces.

</comment><comment><USER15> Yes. Or at least I hope so. I think it's convoluted, cumbersome and an embarrassment. We can do better.

<comment><USER16> I don't get the hate. Sure a lot of web apps abuse the hell out of it but there's some wonderful things done with Ajax. Google Maps, Meebo are two of the most well known. Gmail does some cool things with Ajax as well</comment></comment>


Show HN: Music Playlist from your Facebook likes and shares - <AUTHOR> http://www.hickery.net/

<comment><USER2> Awesome! It also gives you recommendations based on the music collected from Facebook account.

<comment><AUTHOR> You can also see what your friends listen to.</comment></comment>