Hutter Prize for Compressing Human Knowledge - <AUTHOR> http://www.hutter1.net/prize/ <comment><USER2> Matt Mahoney has a neat page compiling text-compression benchmarks:

[http://mattmahoney.net/dc/text.html](http://mattmahoney.net/dc/text.html)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6001489](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6001489)

It's linked in the OP but easy to overlook.

Here's how the prize winner compares with generic tools on en-wiki text (from Mahoney's page):

                  Compression
        	      Ratio (in/out)  Time (ns/byte)
        decomp8   6.27            324,000
        xz -9 -e  4.72            2,482
        bzip2 -9  3.94            379
        gzip -9   3.10            101

</comment><comment><USER3> This competition is flawed in the context of artificial intelligence. Most of the information in the Wikipedia text is in the language, not in the 'actual' knowledge. It would be much more interesting competition if it would allow the uncompressed text to say the same things in different words. Although there's the problem of how to verify if it's the same thing.

<comment><USER4> Compression is closely related to intelligence. In order to compress something you have to understand the pattern behind it. The better you can learn the pattern, the better you can compress.

<comment><USER5> Lossy compression, yes. Lossless compression, not so much. And, the parent post seems to have been hinting at this. I.e. being able to usefully "tl;dr" all of Wikipedia would require a rather intelligent system. But, recapitulating all of Wikipedia's content word-for-word and pixel-for-pixel (including page layout for the truly pedantic) would not meaningfully test the sort of abstract pattern recognition that you seem to be confusing with lossless compression.

In other words, though often conflated, information and meaning are not equivalent. "Meaning", as people typically use the word, seems to include some concept of the utility of a bit of information. Most information in typical text/images/sounds/etc. is really quite useless. Being able to discard the useless while keeping the useful actually seems like one of the key traits exhibited by intelligent systems, and this ability is not measured (and perhaps even selected against) by lossless compression performance.

<comment><USER4> Loseless compression may not be as _useful_ as a summarizing algorithm, but it is definitely a test of intelligence. Lossless compression requires identifying the pattern that produced an input as perfectly as possible. If you have an algorithm that can predict the next letter with great probability, you only only need a few bits to store a string of text. And making good predictions on real world data is a good test of AI and machine learning.

<comment><USER5> "Lossless compression requires identifying the pattern that produced an input as perfectly as possible": no, it requires identifying it absolutely perfectly. This includes all vacuous information as well. E.g., in the Wikipedia example, if there were a 2d scatter plot of a sample from a bivariate uniform distribution, lossless compression would require "memorizing" all of the plotted points.

Predicting perfectly is much, much different from predicting well. Machine learning is about the latter, while lossless compression is about the former.

<comment><USER4> This is not true. If you have a good predictor, you only need a few bits to store a piece of information. One way is just to record the places where your prediction is wrong. The ideal way would be to split all the possibilities so exactly half of possible sequences are on one side, and exactly half the probability is on the other. Every bit tells you what path to go down.

So instead of using 64 bits to specify the x y coordinates of every point on the plot, you could just use a much smaller number to represent how far it diverges from it's predicted location. You could narrow down the possible locations the point could be in by half, and then you just bits to specify only those possibilities, not all of them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Looks like a fun challenge. However, I must say that it reminds me of the story Ms Fnd in a Lbry: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_Fnd_in_a_Lbry](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_Fnd_in_a_Lbry)

<comment><USER7> Forgetting is a valuable skill.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Its going to be hard to beat "the inventor" who's won it a few times already...

[http://www.linkedin.com/in/theinventor](http://www.linkedin.com/in/theinventor)

</comment><comment><USER9> Would it be considered cheating if you found a pseudo random generator that took a small seed and expanded to the executable of the current first place winner?

<comment><USER10> No. It would just mean that you are a God.

I mean, if there would be God and he would want to prove that he really is all powerful, he would have to be able to pull that kind of trick to convince me.

<comment><USER11> I think that's a bit strict. The Judeo-Christian God, if functioning exactly as advertised, shouldn't be able to do that.

<comment><USER12> That depends on the advertising you decide to accept as valid; I'm sure none of my Christian friends would agree with you, assuming I could explain the scenario to them.

<comment><USER13> If you take it for granted that the pretext of the question is an analogy of the creation of the universe, and the consequence of the ability is the knowledge of all that occurs, then that isn't how omniscience was explained to me because a key aspect of Catholicism is free will, and that would allow God to sort out the sinners without running the "experiment", viz. the universe.

I have to mention that this is only according to my meagre and disinterested understanding.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Some other problems with the prize task as defined:

* Wikipedia is light on images (due to copyright issues I suppose) but the wider challenge of compressing 'human knowledge' really has to deal with the vast masses of paper books. Which are fundamentally images (before they are OCR'd and compressed.) Also since this is really an exercise in preservation of historical record you really want to preserve the exact original visual appearance, blemishes and all, which means the true image must be retained along with the OCR text. Additionally there other recording media- photos, film, etc to capture.

* When you include analog original formats (of which ink on paper is one) then the whole idea of 'lossless' compression is moot. What you're really after is compression with no _perceptible_ content loss.

* Which means that the issue of 'acceptable quality' is crucial. And deciding what is acceptable quality loss for different forms of source material is something that will require very good AI.

For instance, images that are printed with mixes of offset printed screening (those tiny dot patterns) and solid ink edges (text, hard lines, etc) is very difficult to compress. You can't just blur everything to reduce the screening dots to an even gradient, because that ruins the edge definition of the text and lines. You can't scan at a lower or similar resolution to the dots, since that produces horrible moire patterning. You can't scan and save the image at a high enough resolution to capture the dots exactly, since that makes the filesize HUGE.

So your AI has to actually 'understand' the image to some extent, and smooth out just the screened areas, with precise but hard to identify mask edges. If you've ever done this by hand in photoshop, you'll know how hard it is.

That is actually a problem I'm stuck on with some historic technical manuals I'm trying to make digital copies of atm. If anyone knows of an automated way to blur offset screening (but not other printed elements on the page) to evenly shaded tones, please say so. See: [http://everist.org/archives/scans/query/image_processing_que...](http://everist.org/archives/scans/query/image_processing_query.htm)

Another question: are there any freeware compression utils, that can do the RARbook trick? ie pass them a file.jpg, and they'll ignore the type extension and just scan through the file for a valid archive header then unpack from there on. As WinRar does. So frustrating that WinZip, ALzip etc don't do this.

</comment><comment><USER15> Can any one confirm this prize is still alive?</comment>


Google Glass support winking to take pictures - <AUTHOR> http://www.guruht.com/2013/04/google-glass-support-winking-to-take.html A closer view on the SDK code of the upcoming Google Glass core, reveals what Google may be don't want you to know at this time, the device will support  winking to take picture or execute any other task. <comment><AUTHOR> ur comments ?</comment>


Can a site succeed with two core offerings? - <AUTHOR>

I had recently launched a site called http://okshr.com. As posted here last week, the site' main use-case was for site owners to snoop on the usability of their rival sites (test how good conversions are there on the rival vis-a-vis their own site,etc.).
Now I realized that the way the site is scripted makes it also a good tool to help people create mirror of webpages that are likely to be taken down.
Now these are two entirely different use-cases. As a new site just off the mark, does it make sense to highlight both the offerings and go with the flow, or should I stick plainly to one offering at this stage.
What are your thoughts? <comment><USER2> Just offer 1. Which one of them would either keep business owners awake at night, or make their mouth savor at the possibility of more money? Do that 1 instead.

Also, your idea is a very horizontal one. It seems like there are many different types of businesses that would be interested in this. But that may not be the way to go if you don't got a lot of money to spend on advertising, or a lot of connections already. Why not do something that targets a vertical niche instead? Find a specific use case, and build a product for that specific one.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'd worry about fixing your site first.

Also, conversion rates and usability are two completely different things. Usability can affect conversion rates - only relationship. Usability is also not something you're going to diagnose adequately without trained human eyes. You need to know the field better if you want to successfully build a product in that domain.</comment>


Ask HN: What should I learn right now to keep my programming skills current? - <AUTHOR> I just had my review and for the first time in a few years, I got 100% of my bonus. Learning Webpack and React helped a bit as well as getting more stuff done at the beginning of a sprint instead of the end. To keep my programming skills up to date, what else should I learn right now? <comment><USER2> You should learn how to monetize your skills and avoid being judged or scored by any employer. Your bonus could be much higher.

<comment><USER3> I can't quite figure out what you are getting it. It sounded like you were suggesting OP consider freelancing. But then you suggest his/her bonus could be much higher.

How would one earn a very high bonus while not being judged or scored by any employer?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> how about some more core Javascript

[https://github.com/getify/You-Dont-Know-JS](https://github.com/getify/You- Dont-Know-JS)

<comment><AUTHOR> Solid chapter on asynchrony! I really find the "Review" section at the end to be useful and tying concepts together. Yeah, I need to learn more core JavaScript.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> If you haven't done much on the backend (databases, web servers, server-side web frameworks, etc.), then taking some time to familiarize yourself with what is going on there might be worth it. Even if you don't end up doing any work on the backend, you will have a better understanding of what is going on. I would start with the technologies in use at your current company.

Edit: clarification

</comment><comment><USER6> Tools are temporary, foundations are timeless.

</comment><comment><USER7> You might be already doing this with your React/Webpack, but picking up some ES6 might be a good thing to do.

I've slowly been adding some ES6 into my code and there are some really nice things.

</comment><comment><USER8> I concur with TurboHaskai, stop worrying about the next hot thing, focus on building solid applications that are flexible, maintaining, user friendly and solves a business problem.

</comment><comment><USER9> Swift -- but not just on client side, Swift on server side.

</comment><comment><USER10> Functional Programming.

The language does't matter but learning the concepts challenges you to think in different terms.

<comment><USER11> I second that. Learn Clojure! =)

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> React

<comment><AUTHOR> How has React been for you? Have you had to rewrite a Rails or PHP app in React?

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Babel</comment>


Magic Leap Raises $793.5M Series C at $4.5B Valuation Led by Alibaba - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2016/02/02/ar-startup-magic-leap-raises-793-5m-series-c-at-4-5b-valuation-led-by-alibaba/ <comment><USER2> This company is starting to approach Theranos-levels of hype. Do they really have such amazing tech that they can garner these kinds of valuations? Sure, the demos look amazing but they're a far cry from a production product.

<comment><USER3> On the other hand, as is mentioned in the article, part of this may be just knowing that the actual engineering and processing power needed to produce a marketable product still costs more than feasible for an actual item that people can afford.

I make lots of analogies between the nascent consumer AR/VR sphere and the smartphone landscape in the early 2000's. I'm sure there were companies capable of building something like an iPhone back in the days of Treos and PocketPCs but just because you can draw it up and design it doesn't change the fact that the actual chips and parts weren't available at costs the market would bear until several years later.

I'm sure Apple had been working on the development which led to the iPhone long before they were able to produce an actual iPhone at consumer prices. This venture could just as easily be similar early development that needs to take place in order to produce an actual product once the needed hardware is available.

<comment><USER4> _I 'm sure Apple had been working on the development which led to the iPhone long before they were able to produce an actual iPhone at consumer prices._

Right, it was called the Newton.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Their name seems so relevant now</comment>


Ask HN: How much do you remember from books you read only once? - <AUTHOR> I find it difficult to remember much from a book -- technical and non technical -- I read only once, especially when I haven't used the knowledge or facts. Is that true for everyone? <comment><USER2> Your brain has a policy of use it or lose it. If what you are reading is relevant to what you are doing, you would remember it otherwise finer details would mostly evaporate rather quickly. This is not just about books but for other things in life too, for example, your past travels or people you meet day to day. Some people are fortunate to have photographic memory way in to their 30s but that's rare.

For most things in life, I would suggest using this philosophy: You don't want to or need to remember everything, rather you want to figure out what insight you attained from something. For example, after reading a book, writing down the summery, your opinions and insights at that point would help you more than remembering every detail. Some people use margin of the book or highlight passages that they find useful and that's good technique that really works. Similarly for your travels, instead of writing down every tiny details if you just maintain logs of surprises and insights you attained each day would be great way to remember it. Lot of people just go through one book after another and that's actually significant waste of time as you are not taking time to digest and reflect on the effort you put in to go through the thing. Writing things down jogs your memory, forces you to ask questions and brings up the critical insights that you are otherwise just passing by. In essence, 3 things helps you the most: write, write and write :).

<comment><USER3> _> For example, after reading a book, writing down the summery, your opinions and insights at that point would help you more than remembering every detail._

I usually type up notes "on the cloud", what's your opinion on writing up notes v.s. typing the notes?

<comment><USER4> I find using a computer while reading a book to be very distracting. Or a phone. I don't like scribbling on a book. I'm hopeless. :)

<comment><USER5> See my response below regarding note cards. As an alternative, a twice-folded sheet of letter size paper may be more available and gives you much more space. I lay the card down either beside the page I am reading or on the back cover (you can affix with tape if this makes it easier) depending on the size of the book.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This happens to me as well. Here is my experience and interpretation.

Before I turned ~20 years old, I was able to remember almost everything from a book, except exact numbers and foreign names. Along with getting older, I could remember less and less. However, I feel a good book has greater and greater influences on me. It makes me think more, gives me more perspective, makes me realize more how little I know and understand. I paused more often to think what I just read, instead of just browsing through the book.

This also applies to technical books. Take books on programming languages as example. When i was young, I could remember most of its syntax after finishing a book on a new language, and I could jump into writing a program using the language that could actually be compiled and run. Now, I cannot remember much about syntax, but I feel I understand more about the new language, in term of its design, internals, pros and cons, etc. When I am ready to get hands dirty, I have to keep checking manuals for syntax.

<comment><USER7> Glad I'm not the only one who feels that way about technical books. I feel like for me now its much more of a challenge for me to remember how to put my designs into a language the compiler/runtime for a language understands than most any other part.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> One book? Not much. Effective storytelling helps a lot, but only for fiction.

The trick is to read many interrelated books. Same topic, different words. Those variations on a theme let you quickly uncover the core message behind authors' styles. The repetition, with slightly different editorial choices, drills into your mind. _Variations on a theme_ are what makes play so effective as well.

Take notes in a fixed ritualistic manner. Choose the ONE notebook you'll use; Write down the most important passages by hand in a slow, precise way. Most importantly, write a summary of the whole book and FIND CONNECTIONS between concepts from different books.

I have no scientific paper to show you. I read +-50 books every year and this is only my personal experience.

</comment><comment><USER9> slightly ot, but pg just recently wrote an essay about the issue:

> Reading and experience train your model of the world. And even if you forget > the experience or what you read, its effect on your model of the world > persists. Your mind is like a compiled program you've lost the source of. It > works, but you don't know why.

[http://www.paulgraham.com/know.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/know.html)

<comment><USER10> Fascinated by that context which leads me to remember what a wise man once taught me (at a church I used to go to).

He said, "I can't always remember what my wife cooked for me last night, neither can I last week, or even many of the meals she's lovingly prepared for me over the last 10 years. However without them, I wouldn't be here today"

Bringing it back to topic, I forget very easily but read quite often. When I do read, I find it often helps if what I'm reading is of interest to me or at least inspiring in some way.

<comment><USER11> A book shapes the mind and allows us to ask more questions, pushes creativity new directions. Very rarely does one want to just _download_ a book into the brain. We want to synthesize it, as you say, eat it as food.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Depends on the book; the average book I remember very little of. But the books that are great, and that hit me at the right time, I tend to remember more about, but not enough, so I tend to re-read them.

Re-reading books is underrated.

<comment><USER13> Re: re-reading, for me reading a few books on the same or similar subjects approximates re-reading enough for me to have felt like I've re-read after only having read.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Nowadays I use spaced repetition software to capture anything interesting I see in a book (including insights that occur to me while reading), so I basically remember everything I want to. Before using SRS I might remember ~20% of a book.

<comment><USER15> Which software is this ?

<comment><USER14> I use ThoughtSaver (www.thoughtsaver.com, currently in very early beta), but most other people I know who use Spaced Repetition prefer Anki ([http://ankisrs.net/](http://ankisrs.net/)). Gwern has a good introduction to the general concept of Spaced Reptition: [http://www.gwern.net/Spaced%20repetition](http://www.gwern.net/Spaced%20repetition)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> 'I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.'

~ Maya Angelou

</comment><comment><USER17> Mostly everything, I just have trouble accessing it without a lead. But I can't read a book twice, as I instanty know what happens next.

</comment><comment><USER18> Depends on the book, for most of the Science Fiction I read I can recall them entirely and so re-reading them is not nearly as fun as the initial reading. My Engineering Calculus book from college? Not so much. Although I still remember all of the examples from my differential equations textbook. I have hypothesized in that this is because I tend to reason by analogy and those examples were examples by analogy so they found fertile ground to land in my head. Bulk facts? Don't remember. Stories? Almost always remember. And oddly enough when reading scientific papers I'll often recall the story of what the investigators were trying find out or how they got there, before I can narrow it down to the actual result.

As a kid I figured that this was why peoples who didn't have writing passed on knowledge in stories (easier to remember). But I've never found any support of that theory one way or the other (at least that I can recall!)

</comment><comment><USER19> It probably is true, but IMHO it's not "how much you remember" but how you are changed by what you read.

</comment><comment><USER20> A little over two years ago, I answered a related question on the Academia stack exchange site:

[http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/7514/what-is- the...](http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/7514/what-is-the-best-way- to-read-a-textbook)

<comment><USER11> I enjoyed your post. You might like _How to Read a Book_ by Mortimer Adler.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Read_a_Book](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Read_a_Book)

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> This happens to me as well. I have noticed, however, that while I can't recall facts very well from books I've read they often do change my perspective on things and that is much longer lasting. For example, reading the book "The Selfish Gene" had a profound effect on how I thought about the world, even though I can't remember much at all of its contents other than it being about how evolution selects at the level of genes.

With more technical books I find it is almost impossible for me to learn anything substantial from them unless I do the exercises, however, the exercises tend to take an enormous amount of time. So what I find myself doing is skimming most technical books and then then going more in depth on the few that seem relevant/interesting to me.

</comment><comment><USER22> I remember almost everything and here is I think why...

I have an ereader which I take to bed at night and I love reading until I pass out!

It takes me a few nights to finish a book and most of the time the next morning I practice.

Most of the books are about programming which is a topic that I'm literally in love with!

</comment><comment><USER23> It really depends on the book for me. Technical topics I already know pretty well, I find easy to commit new methods to memory when I come across them. Nontechnical, I can remember a good deal of fiction, but factual things fall off pretty quickly.

I think the most important thing is chunking[1]. You remember key things, such as storylines or plots from fiction, or, with technical writing, where to return if you find yourself needing a particular concept in practice.

1\. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chunking_%28psychology%29](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chunking_%28psychology%29)

</comment><comment><USER24> I am actually developing an iPhone right now with the intentions of solving this problem. Email me and I can tell you what I am building - maybe you have some ideas for features that might help: firstname.lastname@example.com

</comment><comment><USER25> Well, it's a good thing to ponder on and it's also a pressing issue. In most of the cases, I only remember those facts and incidents, which have affected me or appealed to me in a significant way. When I read a book, I can relate to particular parts based on my life experience, my culture and environment. Sometimes, longer retention of a book depends on how much the book is awe- inspiring and the age of the reader. I guess the pressing issue is to learn and retain relevant things for a longer period of time after reading a book

</comment><comment><USER26> For me there are two modes with a thin line of difference whilst reading any book.

In one mode, I tend to have a huge affinity towards either the author of the book or the potential content of the book. When I happen to read a book in such a mode, my grasping power works super good and whatever I read on seems to stay in memory for a longer time.

The other mode is when I come across a resource, that looks potentially interesting and I'm scanning it to pick up anything that takes me from zero to one. This is when remembering things takes a little more effort for me.

</comment><comment><USER27> Here is my procedure for anyone interested:

* I read all books through audio, with the PDF of the book and the Voice Dream app on iOS.

* I make highlights and notes as I go, then export to a text file when I'm done. So I have the highlights on one hand and the highlighted PDF on the other.

* If I think the notes are important, I will break the text file into individual notes and index them with SCAN and/or dtSearch. I've heard DevonThink is perfect for this, but it's Mac only.

I could probably integrate spaced repetition here, but I haven't explored that yet. Just my $0.02.

</comment><comment><USER28> My brain tends to retain information that it can "see" being played out or performed. Formulas and equations for example from math textbooks or whatever have to be focused on and drawn out as if I have a tiny go pro looking down the end of my pencil at what's being written in my mind as I read the content. Sounds strange but when I actively make myself retain it this way I can usually bring it back from my memory very well remembering the "go pro on pencil video" of the content I need to remember.

</comment><comment><USER29> It depends on the book and whether or not I was impacted by it.

Just reading means I will recall something about the book, it's coverage domains, and maybe some higher level details.

If I work with material in the book, even once, what I remember is significantly improved.

Impact can be from that, working with material, or it can come from relevance to things I'm focused on. Sometimes, I read a book, and some parts of it end up being very relevant and I think about it and make connections.

I recall a lot of this, and do so in detail.

</comment><comment><USER30> Depends on your goal.

1\. If you want to remember a book, so that you can write about it later in life -> start writing summaries after every chapter you read and a final one at the end of the book.

2\. If you want to remember details in the book, so that you can talk clearly about it to someone -> get in the habit of speaking to someone about what you learned from the book, while you am reading the book. It is best if this is your significant other or someone who also has interest in the subject.

</comment><comment><USER31> This concept is sometimes called the Forgetting Curve and is described by an formula. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forgetting_curve](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forgetting_curve) Also see [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaced_repetition](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaced_repetition)

</comment><comment><USER32> That entirely depends on the book (but not the subject matter). There's some books that i read once and am constantly recalling things from, there's other books that i can read a couple times, feel like i'm understanding or enjoying it while reading it, and then a couple weeks later i can't remember it at all. This holds true for me across technical, non-technical, and fiction.

Writing memorably is a skill.

</comment><comment><USER33> I am a mildly dyslexic. I have excellent reading comprehension, but I read about a standard deviation slower than the average reader.

Thus, I don't think I've ever read a book "only once," since in order to understand much of anything, I always end up reading each page paragraph, sentence, or word until I understand it before I progress.

<comment><USER34> I find myself doing this too. When I usually read stuff, I understand it on the first read almost every time but when I'm reading something that I need to grasp completely like a book or article, I reread the same lines, even in easily comprehensible novels.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Once had to read a fiction book for school, and write a summary. By the end of the book I drew a blank, and I had to skim the entire book again.

Technical books are a lot easier to remember, well assuming you are reading them to learn something (specific ). But that also implies you read something think about it, make exercises, learn it and THEN move on.

</comment><comment><USER36> Consider how you haven't adjusted how you read probably since you were in grade school. [http://www.farnamstreetblog.com/how-to-read-a- book/](http://www.farnamstreetblog.com/how-to-read-a-book/)

</comment><comment><USER37> I have read a lot of books but only a few more than once. I probably only remember bits I thought were important from any particular book, but when I read several on the same subject they tend to overlap in certain parts and I find I remember those parts very well.

</comment><comment><USER38> A well-written book will be easier to remember.

Granted, that one may have to read it again to remember the finer details, but rarely is a technical book written with the aim engaging the reader in as many ways as possible.

This is why telling a story is so important. People remember stories.

</comment><comment><USER39> Shameless plug: [https://medium.com/@otar/lifehack-remembering-what-you- read-...](https://medium.com/@otar/lifehack-remembering-what-you- read-d8bdb60b7fed)

Lifehack: Remembering What You Read

</comment><comment><USER40> I've a particularly bad case of short term to long term drought. More than once I've been well into a book or short story before realizing I've read it before. Occasionally not until I get to the ending.

</comment><comment><USER41> Not nearly enough and that's why I have decided to actually re-read the books that I find great; after a certain amount of time though so I can do it with a (more) "clear" mind.

</comment><comment><USER42> Reading alone, even repeated reading, has been shown to be ineffective in committing information to long term memory.

You should be able to remember the basic story in a piece of fiction though.

</comment><comment><USER43> I find it normal.

Whenever I re-read a book I look at it in a different light or, better yet, I have a new understanding of the book.

</comment><comment><USER5> I used to be able to remember most of what I read verbatim without any effort. These days, the harder I try to filter and remember selectively, the worse my memory gets. What started as a mild compulsion has since become very useful– taking brief notes as I go on a blank 4x6 notecard. I have stacks and stacks of them, and every book I start gets a fresh one. Annotating books in the margins can help you get _into_ it more, but it makes going back much harder (might as well re-read the book) and pains anyone who likes to keep their pages scrupulously clean. My "system" is not very strict but mostly follows these ideas:

        - Every note begins with a page number unless the same as the previous note
        - Notes are separated by a /
        - Underline names/places/any *thing* to look up later
        - Mark very important notes with a star or border
        - Copying chapter titles sometimes helps
        - Copy quotes, quick references (to other works), typos
          (not really necessary, but "Statute of Liberty"...), or
          thoughts & tangents. Typically I just write down a few
          words here and there and then write about them
          elsewhere (on the computer or in my notebook)
        - At the very end, include a brief summary of what I felt
          like or knew about before reading, while reading, and
          after reading. I only find this useful for bios,
          letters, theses, and that sort of thing.

I can: re-read my notes and it will come back, skim notes to narrow down a page range for a detail that I'm looking for, scan the notecards for reference anywhere, keep my notes for library books, etc. That being said, I don't really recommend it to people. If you write slowly, large, or don't like keeping a pen/pencil on hand then it can be annoying.

Aside: I've considered automatically putting these notes into Anki after OCR (the one shown is a messy example, it seems to work though) but I think that's touching a matter apart from the top poster's intention. Rote memorization is useful, but the simple act of writing stuff down by hand has its own benefits without requiring much involvement.

Another thing to point out is that _what_ you read is just as important. The reason I care about extracting references to other works, even if I can't read them immediately, is because it cements a topic in your mind rather than just being another cloud of words and hazy memories. Today I read _Species of Spaces_ (Georges Perec) and on one page he references Forbidden Planet because of the large triangular doors. I made a note of it since I don't actually know what he's talking about (born in the '90s, didn't have TV, didn't see Forbidden Planet, don't blame me). Mentioning it here might actually be enough to make it stick, but I still intend to either read up on the film or, if I have the time, watch it (but not just for that scene!).

Example: [https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/28629850/Condit%2C%20Car...](https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/28629850/Condit%2C%20Carl%20W.%20-%20American%20Building%20%281%29.png) (side 1 of 2)</comment>


Shopify launches the Build-A-Business 2011 contest - <AUTHOR> http://www.shopify.com/contest

<comment><USER2> Last year DODOcase won $100k, this year it's a $500k prize.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BBL_L4_y94&hd=1](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BBL_L4_y94&hd=1)

</comment><comment><USER3> Seth Godin, Gary Vaynerchuk and Tim Ferriss are involved too.</comment>


Beyond the $1K Genome: DNA 'Writing' Comes Next - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2015/09/18/beyond-the-1k-genome-dna-writing-comes-next-2/ <comment><USER2> > Illumina hit the $1,000 mark in January of 2014.

Everyone I know (admittedly small sample size) is still paying around $2000-3000 for 30x WGS. Does the $1000 genome actually exist, or is this just pure PR on Illumina's part? What is BGI charging nowadays?

<comment><USER3> If you own your own Illumina, you can arguably get everything done for ~$1200-1400 with current chemistry, which gets better and cheaper with each iteration. We've also tested Oxford Nanopore's minION, which has probably the best chances of truly cheap sequencing bit that comes at the expense of accuracy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> At 10¢/bp, that's <$100/gene for most averaged-sized proteins. That price range makes producing _novel_ proteins competitively priced over the tedious effort of stitching up chimeras from preexisting templates. Scientifically there's a lot that can be done if you can order proteins from scratch rather than having to scrounge around and copy/paste from what you already have access to. However, that de novo synthesis is currently only economically accessible to very few scientists/companies.

This new cheap synthesis will effectively make economical the 'writing of new code' rather than the current state of 'copy and paste from github, with a couple of minor modifications', and will bring commensurate advances to the industry. This will drop a significant barrier to the progress of synthetic biology and its downstream uses.

</comment><comment><USER4> Twist just raised their series C at $37M (~80M total) [1]. Emily (the author) is their CEO.

[1] [http://boston.citybizlist.com/article/275318/fidelity- manage...](http://boston.citybizlist.com/article/275318/fidelity-management- joins-37m-series-c-for-twist-bioscience)

</comment><comment><USER5> How does that math near the end work out?

If there are 3B bp in the human genome, then the write the whole thing for $1000 it should be $3.3e-7, which is a whole lot less than the quoted $0.02.

<comment><USER6> The comparison is rather confusing because this article is not about synthesizing genomes, but individual genes. The $0.02 seems to be just a somewhat arbitrary number at which DNA synthesis isn't a large cost factor anymore.

The genes that are typically ordered are a few thousand nucleotides long, synthesizing the whole genome would be an absolutely monumental effort and probably out of reach for now. The largest artificially synthesized genome was done by Craig Venter and that had only about a million base pairs.

<comment><USER5> Interesting, thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Writing is only a small step, the real goal is virtualization. Also, with tools like crispr, writing is not as big of a problem, per se.

Though really, if parallelization is the method maybe a cool benchmark would be sequencing a whole genome and then reprinting it, all while you're out for lunch or coffee.

<comment><USER8> I don't think you know what a CRISPR is. It doesn't have anything to do with DNA synthesis.

<comment><USER9> Lol and the GP is a cofounder of Experiment (YC W13), "an online community and a crowdfunding platform for scientific research." You really have to wonder how much due diligence YC does on its biotech founders.

<comment><USER7> I actually ask that question myself all the time :)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Reluctant Self-Promotion - <AUTHOR> http://tylerkieft.com/archives/2010/10/17/reluctant-self-promotion/ <comment><USER2> Nice timing for me. I'm writing a book called "Self Promotion for Geeks" inspired by about 120 upvotes I got a cpl years back on HN talking about such a project. The "reluctant" geek, like this guy, is exactly who I'm aiming at (because there are plenty of good self promotion books out there already for the people already raring to go). I have no link to plug yet but if you're interested, you can probably figure out where to follow me.. :-)

<comment><USER3> No landing page yet? The reluctant promoter of a self promotion book! :-)

<comment><USER2> Yes! Haha. No, really, the book is only _just_ getting to the point where there's something worth getting excited about and I've had so many side projects that setting up a mailing list and site for it has been a lower priority than it should have been ;-)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Critically, all your sentences begin with I which bore people. None of your statements communicate how these statements can be of value to the other person. You're communicating features not benefits, and it's unclear what the purpose of the communication is for. I've quickly rewritten it with out I's, it sounds a bit awkward, but at least it's less boring. Normal conversation allows for a lot more grammatical faux pas than the written word.

"Hi, I'm Tyler. Loved computers from an early age and have been coding since the 4th grade. Internships include helping IBM, develop an automation system written in Python, and a real-time wafer data mapping program written in Java and Python. Graduating from the University of Rochester, I wrote a personal power meter. Working with Matt on SpeakerText for over a year, and I'm pretty proud of our latest version, which was built from scratch in three months by three developers."

Also, what is the point of the promotion, to generate interest in yourself or generate interest in the company you work for?

Having taken a look at SpeakerText I'd suggest something like the following.

"Hi I'm Tyler, As a computer genius, having programmed since 4th grade, interned at IBM creating data mapping systems for nanoscale technologies, created grass roots green technology at the University of Rochester. I've teamed up with Matt from SpeakerText to create a system that helps you make more money from videos on your website, would you like to know how to make more money from videos on your website?"

Then describe the steps, ask them if it sounds like a lot of work, then pitch your product that will do the work for them for the low low price of $X.99 a month.

It's as simple as following AIDA, (Attention Interest Decision Action)

Attention (Hi I'm Tyler, im a computer/nanotech/green genius)

Interest (i can make you more money)

Decision (want to make more money?)

Action (sign up for speaker text)

<comment><USER5> > "Hi, I'm Tyler. Loved computers from an early age and have been coding since > the 4th grade. Internships include helping IBM, develop an automation system > written in Python, and a real-time wafer data mapping program written in > Java and Python. Graduating from the University of Rochester, I wrote a > personal power meter. Working with Matt on SpeakerText for over a year, and > I'm pretty proud of our latest version, which was built from scratch in > three months by three developers."

I don't think that removing "I" from a sentence improves the sentence if "I" is still implied and the sentence just becomes ungrammatical. I tried to imagine someone speaking like that and it sounded like they were just making a list. I think that your _point_ is good, but your example is harder on the ears than the original.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> This reminds of a HN article (last week?) from a VC who was only half interested in someone presenting to him until he found out after the fact that she was uniquely qualified at the subject at hand. He was saying that she should have started with her bio.

I think that that applies to this as well. You only have a few moments to really capture someone's attention these days and you have to use every gun in your arsenal. Techies (like myself) tend to downplay or outright denigrate marketing and sales tactics, but there is a lot of truth to them that we would do well to follow. Sure there are some slimy tactics out there, but polishing your elevator pitch (e.g. option #2 in the article) is essential.

<comment><USER7> Mark Suster's post. [http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2009/06/06/the-first- vc-m...](http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2009/06/06/the-first-vc-meeting- post-1-of-many/)

referenced: [http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2010/10/06/the-four- main-...](http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2010/10/06/the-four-main-things- that-investors-look-for-in-a-startup/)

<comment><USER6> Thanks for pulling that up. I couldn't remember it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm turned off by the aggressive self-promotion style, to the point where I'd suggest that you seriously consider whether you want to be associated with such a company.

I also like succinct and colloquial: "Hi, I'm Tyler. I'm a co-founder of SpeakerText, and am in charge of the all the Tech. [Explanation of SpeakerText as appropriate]."

Of course, this depends on your audience. But all the examples you give seem to concentrate too much on you, and not enough on the product or the customer.

<comment><AUTHOR> Investors and potential partners often want to hear about the people behind the tech.

<comment><USER8> Absolutely. But I'd wait for them to say "So tell me about yourself" rather than trying to shoehorn it into a paragraph long introduction. The goal of the intro is to make them want to know more.

If they ask why you went to Rochester, you can tell them that you chose it over Harvard. If they ask about your outside interests, you can tell them those instead. If they ask you how you got involved, etc.

Obviously, some circumstances, such as introductions on a speakers' panel, demand a different approach. But if you are playing the role of Tech Lead, I think you are better off being confident with less than blustering.

<comment><USER9> you're missing the point. This is not how we start our pitch. The use case here is when it's time to offer your bio in a pitch meeting. People don't have time to tease stuff out of you––it's one shot and that's it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Now I am curious: What does the HN audience think? Should he put bio #1 or bio #2 on their companies about page?

I would recommend #2, the "Harvard" version.

(I ask because we are discussing EXACTLY the same thing at the moment, only with Stanford instead of Harvard :-)

<comment><USER11> If I were talking to someone, I'd give #1. If I were writing to someone, I'd write #3. If someone told me #2, I would hear _"I am a loud person with no soul and I am going to try to sell you something. Please interpret everything I am about to say through that lens."_

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I think this is REALLY common.

</comment><comment><USER12> In Ben Franklin's autobiography, his remarks on self promotion are (paraphrasing):

If something really matters to you, you should be able to put your ego aside. When good things happen, you should be grateful, humble, and modest. Don't seek out or ask for promotions or raises; just do great stuff and you'll get recognized.

Sound advice.</comment>


NSA Boss Wants More Control Over the 'Net - <AUTHOR> http://www.technologyreview.com/news/428644/nsa-boss-wants-more-control-over-the-net/ <comment><USER2> Dear god no. I sleep well at night knowing that this is far fetched. But each time I see something like this I get a bit worried.

</comment><comment><USER3> I know this is typically poor form, but I would give as a resounding response: "get bent"

</comment><comment><USER4> tl;dr The NSA boss would prefer a more "centralized" Internet, on which they'd have full oversight.

Scary stuff. The solution should be a more secure and stronger infrastructure, protected against both the Government and attackers, not to "allow the NSA to get full control of it so we can 'prevent' the attacks".

They'd never be able to prevent all the attacks anyway, and the overall outcome would be horrible for normal citizens because the Government could control the Internet and monitor their communications.</comment>


How Toy Ad Vocabulary Reinforces Gender Stereotypes - <AUTHOR> http://www.achilleseffect.com/2011/03/word-cloud-how-toy-ad-vocabulary-reinforces-gender-stereotypes

<comment><USER2> Wow, if toy ad vocabulary is reinforcing gender stereotypes rather than simply catering to gender preferences then this is a great startup opportunity. Produce and market toys for boys with words like "love", "friendship", "babies", "magic" and "mommy". You'll be rich!

If you really think everyone else is being irrational, stop writing blog posts. Put your money where your mouth is and arb it.

Of course, if boys really want ultimate special forces power battle swords and girls really want mommy&me friendship magic wands, you will lose your time/money. But you are confident that won't happen, right?

<comment><USER3> I think you are somewhat missing the point of the blog post. It's highlighting that, from a very young age, society's gender roles are being insinuated into people. This leads to gender disparities such as those in the STEM fields and only helps to perpetuate harmful stereotypes.

Zach Weiner (SMBC) did a comic that fairly eloquently expresses the problem: [http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=1883](http://www.smbc- comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=1883)

The problem highlighted in the blog post is that children are conditioned by the toys they are bought, and those that they see their friends with, to perpetuate the gender roles and stereotypes that have been so omnipresent--and harmful--in our society.

<comment><USER4> It's a "chicken or the egg" question. Are boys attracted to guns, action figures, etc because of advertising, or do advertisers seek to sell boys guns, action figures etc because that's what they want?

I think the answer is far more boring than most pedants would like. It's both.

Biologically, men are born with hormones that give them aggressive traits, while women are born with hormones that give them nurturing traits. These are adaptive influences: male protector, female child-rearer; a partnership that works. Advertisers target their message to exploit these instincts.

None of the above implies that we cannot rise above our instinctual urges and make something different of our lives. It also does not imply that any of this is black & white. Some men are born passive and some women are born aggressive. Some women have no desire to have children. Some men prefer to stay at home and raise their children.

Humans are a complex and diverse bunch, but as with most systems, there is a distribution wherein lies a "typical" state of being. When there's money to be made, you don't make it by ignoring the facts, so advertisers target the "typical" boy and girl, and make a boat load of money doing it.

<comment><USER3> As mentioned in the post GiraffeNecktie linked above:

      Regarding gender differences being in-born, poster cpt.sanity wrote: "It has been repeatedly shown and is accepted as fact in modern psychology from Rogers onwards, that while sex is a biological fact, gender roles are sociologically determined, largely by peer pressure in early years and mediated by advertising and media images."</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Putin orders combat readiness test in western regions - <AUTHOR> http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/02/26/russia-putin-combat-readiness-troops/5829301/

<comment><AUTHOR> Is he really going to go all 'North Korea' on us? I really hoped we (civilization) were beyond this... Sigh.</comment>


Scheduling Async Voice Commands Made Simple - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/ruchir594/NatOS <comment><AUTHOR> Hello developers.

Now you can schedule voice commands on a Raspberry Pi with a single line of code.

from ActionsA import scheduler

scheduler.message(seconds=4, text='I am Batman')

Checkout the Github repo to install and use the library. Comments and criticism are super welcomed.</comment>


Super Secret Iminlikewithyou preview - <AUTHOR> http://static.iminlikewithyou.com/preview.html <comment><USER2> Either launch or shut up..I am not watching the video, and I don't want a super secret invitation code either. This secrecy thing is getting real old.

</comment><comment><USER3> Instead of a "CONFIDENTIAL AND SUPER FUCKING SECRET" preview why not release and start getting users? I see a lot of very rich functionality (a good thing), but are they sure users really want/need all of that at this point?

It looks good already guys, you should let everyone else start using it

<comment><USER4> I hate the over-use of Flash. I couldn't upload images because of it.

<comment><USER5> I've filed a bug a couple of days ago that i can't upload images on Debian even with Flash.

<comment><USER6> I don't think Debian users are a large part of their target market...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Well...if I were match.com's CEO I would probably buy you guys. Strip out 90% of the features/flash. Make you build something that integs with current stuff while you vest.

What you've done shows major framework/flex talent, but tone down the features. Just my uneducated .02c.

<comment><USER8> match.com couldn't be bothered with i'm in like with you. match.com pulls in 300 million dollars in subscriptions a year from frustrated middle aged people. ilwy is clearly meant for a much much younger audience. college kids certainly won't pay a cent for it and i doubt twenty-somethings would either. it would make the whole thing too creepy.

but, i think the ilwy team has done a good job avoiding creepyness. (that is their primary focus, i think.) but, i can't imagine a great deal of young people using this (or any other web application for dating).

the web is simply not a great medium for this sort of human interaction. there is a lot of crucial physical, chemical and social data that is not communicated through pictures and fragments of text. further, what information is communicated is unreliable. clearly the picture selection will not be without bias and the text is highly premeditated, which confuses the sexual selection for verbal acuity and mental quickness. there isn't enough bandwidth if you will.

i think this is only useful for sex addicts and predatory men (and who wants to compete with craigslist?). clearly everyone involved would be better off just going outside.

although i suspect (some) girls may use this, but only for their egos. this may even skew the female participation towards the more attractive. this would of course attract men who want to 'interact' with them. but, i don't see these attractive young girls actually following through however. so i think the system would be fraudulent and unsustainable.

but that doesn't mean there isn't money to be made.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> What's that annoyingly addicting song in the background?

</comment><comment><USER6> Is it too early to start talking about facebook killers?

<comment><USER9> Too late, actually.

<comment><USER10> Same thing, really. There are two times to kill a company:

1.) When it's small and not established yet.

2.) When it's big and complacent.

FaceBook is neither at the moment, so it's not really a good target to compete against. But that doesn't rule out them becoming #2 in the future. (Particularly since Zuckerberg is quite a bit more arrogant than, say, the Google founders.)

<comment><USER9> I'm not a huge believer in ____-killers, at least not via direct competition. If you're small and not established, no one even mentions you in that blank, so that's out. In the case where you're big enough that people could consider you worthwhile attempting to kill, you're well-enough entrenched that no one will beat you at your own game. The way you have to die, instead, is by some alternative that wittles away at your core business. No one will kill Windows by making a better desktop OS, and no one will kill Facebook by making a nicer student networking site.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> If anyone needs an invite, lemme know.

</comment><comment><USER12> 86 the flash and sound so bored people at work can use it.

<comment><USER13> It's hard to believe YouTube was ever a success.

<comment><USER12> A video site HAS to have sound (unless you're watching Charlie Chaplin). A dating site with sound has immediately lost half its market.

(Most important skill of the 21st century: speed of your alt-tab)

<comment><USER13> I seriously doubt that the sound will lose them half (or even 1%) of the market (I don't think the sound is required, it just makes the site nicer). If sound is a big problem for you, why not keep your computer muted?

<comment><USER12> I normally do. Today I goofed. Should have seen the prairie dogs when I clicked on that link!</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Graphene Device Sops Up Sunlight, Heats to 160 Degrees Celsius in Seconds - <AUTHOR> https://spectrum.ieee.org/nanoclast/semiconductors/optoelectronics/new-graphene-metamaterial-device-heats-to-160c-under-sunlight-in-seconds <comment><USER2> This is cool, but at 85% absorptivity it's no better than coatings you can already buy. Absorber plates in glazed solar water heaters you can get in your hardware store today have numbers in the 90s.

Edit: I recommend a look at the original paper instead [0]. The significant feature appears to be the ability to absorb light at a wide range of angles, rather than simply the absolute absorptivity.

[0] [https://www.nature.com/articles/s41566-019-0389-3](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41566-019-0389-3)

<comment><USER3> What are these other materials' physical characteristics and cost to produce? Apart from absorptivity, a key factor here is the thinness and potential for inexpensive mass production.

In contrast, absorber plates tend to be large and heavy. 1lb per square foot isn't uncommon. They are also often produced with (relatively) expensive copper.

This might not be a breakthrough in terms of new capabilities, but it could allow a scale of use not currently practical.

<comment><USER4> The thing is a pound of copper has a pretty significant specific heat, and that's a feature rather than a bug. A thin graphene film may be more conductive, but what is it thermal capacity? If it's just a thin film that gets blazing hot it's not necessarily useful in that way.

<comment><USER5> Water has a much higher specific heat. If you just want to heat up water anyway, wouldn't you just transfer the energy to it as fast as possible?

<comment><USER6> Specific heat and thermal conductivity are two different properties.

<comment><USER7> Sure, but this is a terrible answer to the question "why do we care about specific heat? Wouldn't thermal conductivity be more relevant?"

That question already assumes that specific heat and thermal conductivity are different properties.

<comment><USER8> With copper you have 'heat battery' and can heat additional water by running it through the system without waiting for an equivalent amount of sunlight.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> '...the device can heat from 300C to 1500C in 30 seconds, he says." Furthermore, the ultrathin property allows easy heat transfer from the metamaterial to the material needed to be heated, such as water, and so could be used to desalinate seawater, for instance'.

If this is accurate that has great value and utility

<comment><USER10> Remember that temperature does not indicate energy. A graphene layer is a tiny amount of mass per surface area, so a absorbing single (small-c) calorie of energy would be enough to raise a patch of graphene to outrageous temperatures- _but_ , you'd still only be able to get that single calorie back out, which wouldn't do much to a liter of seawater or whatever.

For that matter, it doesn't seem like they specify under what conditions this heating is taking place. Fire a high-powered laser at something and you might see that behavior in a variety of materials.

<comment><USER9> I was thinking huge areas of graphene but point taken, I was just reading up about graphene after reading the post...

<comment><USER11> fun science experiment... fill a large beaker halfway with water and sprinkle a thin layer of powdered, activated charcoal (carbon/graphene) over the surface, cover the top of the beaker with saran wrap and place outside in the sun at midday. the temperature of the charcoal will get much warmer but not much else

<comment><USER12> Isn't that because it is fairly hydrophobic so it doesn't make good contact with the water?

<comment><USER11> yeah, there have been previous papers on creating membranes that wick some of the water up to be heated, and turned into vapor, but not so much that it cools down the carbon layer.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Are there any real world products utilizing graphene? I hear a lot about how wonderful it is, but don't know any real world usage.

<comment><USER14> Why graphene hasn't taken over the world...yet [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IesIsKMjB4Y](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IesIsKMjB4Y)

<comment><USER15> Ugh I hate it when they say "A sheet of graphene could support X". It's utter bullshit because you can't ever _have_ a sheet of defect-free graphene.

It's like how defect-free glass is 2-4 times stronger than steel. _Actual_ glass is obviously nowhere near that strong and nobody pretends it is.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Can we put a moratorium on articles about graphene until it can be produced at scale?

<comment><USER17> Even at laboratory-scale, almost all manufacturers are lying about their purity: [http://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2018/10/11/gra...](http://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2018/10/11/graphene- you-dont-get-what-you-pay-for)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> So... any else thinking Sterling Engine?

<comment><USER19> That and peltiers.

<comment><USER20> My senior project in college was on Peltier coolers. They're sort of like Cellular Automata of mechanical engineering - cool at first, but the novelty wears off shortly after.

Peltier devices are useless for most applications because of its poor efficiency.

<comment><USER21> TEGs are rarely over 15% efficient, and usually require 300+°C to operate. At 150C you're probably looking at traditional steam turbine for peak recovery, at this pressure you're looking at about 35% efficiency placing a potential absorber/generator combination a-la-stirling near 29% overall, which is great but for the price and complexity probably not ideal compared to solar at 20%.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Sorry to be that guy but no one gave it a meaningful name!

Vampire skin!

</comment><comment><USER23> This is also important as a consideration for what graphene is not good for or where you have to be careful using it. (A lot of the discussion appears to be around how we could use the heat - which would be great.) For example, if there was a good application in clothing, certain precautions might need to be taken to not burn someone.

</comment><comment><USER24> If it could boil water, could one use it for generating electricity or even as a part of a steam engine of sorts?

</comment><comment><USER15> I mean, it doesn't take a lot of energy to heat something that is 90nm thick. This is so misleading.

</comment><comment><USER25> Can this be used for indoor Ag or a new kind of greenhouse membrane?

</comment><comment><USER26> Why isn't it black?

<comment><USER19> Probably due to "It can absorb any wavelength of light from UV to microwaves", playing a factor. I'd speculate that the infrared spectrum as fully encompassed by that range being the primary target for energy transfer and with that, a red bias as seen in the picture would be logical.

Whilst it can absorb energy in the range specified - how efficient it is along that range is another question.

Another aspect, by not being black, I'd expect it to radiate heat less. But then, like many, so many question, so little data.

<comment><USER11> if it's absorbing all wavelengths of light then it should appear black, because it is not reflecting any light

<comment><USER19> Not if it absorbs more in one part of the spectrum than other parts. For example an object could absorb red,green and blue light. But absorbs red and blue light more than the green and as such would appear green.

Gets down to if the absorption rate is liner - which it almost definitely is not going to be the case here and as I suspect, an absorption bias in the infrared spectrum is at play.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> How would a heat engine using this compare to photoelectric cells for energy generation?

<comment><USER28> Look to Carnot vs photoelectric efficiency, modulo fabrication costs, maintenance, and operating life.

Carnot efficiency is dictated by the hot-cold side temperature delta. For internal combustion engines, 20-45% is fairly typical. In electrical generation, thermal energy is generally reckoned at 3x electrical generation.

PV efficiency has a maximum of 37% for single-layer PV, up to a theortical maximum slightly north of 80% for an "infinite" layer cell. (Additional layers provide a diminishing return.) In practice, 40-50% is a likely maximum achievable, and at reasonable costs, 20% is frequently assumed.

Additional considerations are capacity factor, spacing factor, panel angle, and inverter losses.

And PV has a practical effective lifetime of about 20 years, due to numerous degradation mechanisms.

See:

[https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/28cvgv/calcula...](https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/28cvgv/calculating_estimated_solar_energy_potential/)

Thermal materials such as this are likely best suited to thermal capture and direct-heating systems, as low-grade space or water (pre)heating.</comment></comment>


Introducing Google Earth 6—the next generation of realism - <AUTHOR> http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/11/introducing-google-earth-6the-next.html <comment><USER2> There is something about Google Earth that just doesn't make it as fun to use as Maps. Maybe because Earth is a lot uglier than Maps? There are all those customization options but no sensible defaults and a very strange aesthetic, completely unlike what you see on the much more subtle and sophisticated Maps.

Navigation also feels somewhat broken. I often manage to get lost in Earth, that doesn't happen to me on Maps. Is it the added degree of freedom? And now, Street View. It's not really a joy to use on Maps, either, but it feels atrocious in Earth. It's slow, it's too blurry for too long, it just doesn't feel right.

Earth has all those potentially great features but the UI feels like such a huge step back from Maps.

<comment><USER3> "Earth has all those potentially great features but the UI feels like such a huge step back from Maps."

You mean, for you.

On the contrary, I find Google Earth UI way better than maps. I have continuous zoom, continuous panning(you could use a joystick, multitouch or mouse wheel easily), huge screen(you could hide left tooltip menu with a simple key).

I just can't understand any of your comments, maybe you have a bad graphic card,I don't know but Earth is way way faster than maps and awesome.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> It doesn't do a good job of using the available UI on the Mac at least…

• No pinch-zoom or rotate.

• The two finger panning motions don't work, the vertical portion having been repurposed as zoom.

…but the animation seems smoother and the more prominent date display at the bottom of the view should lead more people to the historical imagery.

The transition to street view is brilliantly done! Moving around in street view is, um, trippy. (Two-finger scroll forward and backward works here, lose all relation to reality if you turn your head with the keyboard. Rotate gestures do not work.)

Pretty spectral artifact at the Missouri Botanical Garden on the north side of the climatron for the current imagery.

<comment><USER5> Agreed. It also slowed down my entire system to the point where I had to Force Quit it... and even then, it took a good 30-40 seconds before the system got responsive again... I kinda feel like Google Earth is less and less relevant and mostly always revert to using Google Maps instead...

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Tangential to the conversation. So theoretically, Google will be able to count the number of trees in a given city right?

<comment><USER7> I imagine that it would be a very rough estimate. In areas of dense tree coverage in parks or backyards Google probably just plants trees to cover the area since it would be nearly impossible to actually differentiate each individual tree in a canopied area. Trees that are out in the open, standing alone can obviously be counted, but trees in groups probably can't.

<comment><USER8> That's assuming they're doing the tree counting with imagery. The newer Google Street View cars I've seen have LIDAR rigs on top, so they could be mapping trees that way.

<comment><USER9> But presumably they aren't driving through most of the forests, right?

<comment><USER8> I don't see any reason they couldn't do the same from the air. You can tell foliage with LIDAR, and I'd imagine you could get a pretty good approximation of trunk location pretty easily by looking at the foliage height.

<comment><USER9> Fair enough, but do they collect their own aerial data? I was under the impression it's all collected through by third parties. Also, do they use anything other than satellite imagery right now? Is LIDAR effective at that range?

<comment><USER8> Yeah, they have some aerial data. For example: zoom in on downtown San Jose in satellite view. The perspective view is aerial photography, and is copyrighted by Google.

Although, now that I've done more digging, it looks like they're using satellite imagery for at least some of this, along with LIDAR and infrared techniques: [http://static.googleusercontent.com/external_content/untrust...](http://static.googleusercontent.com/external_content/untrusted_dlcp/research.google.com/en/us/pubs/archive/35659.pdf)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> They are using this as a vector to install Chrome.

That annoys some people, but at least the people most likely to be running IE 6 or 7 at home are also the ones most likely to remain co-opted-in to a Chrome download.

<comment><USER10> I have my doubts that bundling a browser with other software will really convert those that don't know what a browser is.

They go online by clicking the blue 'e' icon on their desktop or start menu, as that's what they've always done. Adding another browser or changing the default browser doesn't change this behavior, and IE will ask the user to make it the default again as soon as they do.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Still broken as hell on linux: <http://code.google.com/p/earth- issues/issues/detail?id=1068>

The quality of google earth for linux is an embarrassment.

<comment><USER12> Broke for me too, but this solved it: [http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/earth/thread?tid=14469...](http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/earth/thread?tid=144696eab7d5a9c7&hl=en&fid=144696eab7d5a9c70004963a23259a5a&hltp=2)

On Ubuntu: sudo apt-get install lsb-core

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> The new Street View in Earth features seamless movement. They apparently do it by mapping the Street View images onto 3D building models. The end result is pretty terrible, though: lots of warping and a visible "pop" when moving from one image to another.

</comment><comment><USER14> I wonder if zoom-scrolling follows the mouse in the new version. If not, then Google Earth is still unusable and I'll continue only using Maps.

</comment><comment><USER15> I'd be surprised if they're not working with Rockstar Games to build Grand Theft Auto maps from Google maps data.

<comment><USER16> Prepare to be surprised.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I instantly recognized that as exploratorium in SF. So, fairly successful realism.

</comment><comment><USER18> Hopefully it won't crash when I try to run it on Qt 4.7 anymore :D

</comment><comment><USER19> yay. trees.

</comment><comment><USER20> Wow. They have trees now. I should watch out for them.</comment>


Legendary Wings – Reversing a 1980s Arcade Game - <AUTHOR> https://ryiron.wordpress.com/2019/10/14/legendary-wings-reversing-a-1980s-arcade-game/ <comment><USER2> I'm skeptical that applying decompilers to C makes sense for these old games that were most likely programmed originally in assembler. Many of the examples in the post show the decompiled C being more complicated due to type casts, creation of temporary variables, missing inputs and even entire missing instructions, etc.

Maybe it's just that I've worked with Z80 assembler a fair bit, but I feel like what's going on is much clearer when you're operating in the same language as the original authors were, able to see exactly what it's doing instead of a rough approximation of some C that would generate semantically equivalent code.

<comment><USER3> The thing about C is that it's _portable_ assembly; decompiling to C is a good way to end up with reasonably portable code with little undue effort.

<comment><USER2> These games aren't portable to begin with - they use hardware-specific memory mapped IO, pixel processing units, DMA routines, etc. Simply taking the code and making it C doesn't let you run it elsewhere any more than taking the code for airplane systems and running it on your laptop will allow your laptop to fly.

The decompilation here is intended primarily to aid understanding or make changes, and I think targeting the system's specific assembly would serve that goal far better.

(to clarify: I'm talking specifically about retro video games here, because of a) the tight binding to hardware and b) the fact they were written in asm to begin with. I make no judgement on reverse engineering in general.)

<comment><AUTHOR> Ghidra specifically intends to handle arbitrary bizarre embedded systems, so does a good job.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This was interesting and it brought back some great memories. Legendary Wings and Dragon Spirit are my earliest memories of shmups, a genre I still love today.

</comment><comment><USER5> I am a little confused. What is being reverse engineered here? References include MAME which emulates the game entirely and documents it well.

<comment><USER6> The game operation (the ROM code) itself probably. MAME emulates CPU, various hardware components (which themselves were reversed).... except for a few exceptions, the game ROMs themselves aren't fully reversed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> This game was also released on the NES. I still have a copy in my basement. Wonderful game.

</comment><comment><USER8> Very nice article.</comment>


How Finland Rebranded Itself as a Literary Country - <AUTHOR> https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2018/07/16/how-finland-rebranded-itself-as-a-literary-country/ <comment><USER2> Finland has some interesting literary quirks. My favorite is that it's one of the few places other than the Vatican where you can read the news in Latin, for example:

[https://areena.yle.fi/1-1931339](https://areena.yle.fi/1-1931339)

It's an account of the US/North Korea meeting in Singapore. A little out of date on July 18 but still appealing since most other 'news' you can read in Latin happened 2000 years ago.

<comment><USER3> This is interesting. But why does anyone bother to write news in Latin?

<comment><USER2> Why not? It's fun to bring old languages back to life.

Also, Latin is a better 'universal language' than many alternatives, in part because it occupied exactly that role for many centuries throughout much of Europe. Something to consider in the EU if Brexit goes through. ;)

<comment><USER4> English will still be the official language of two EU countries :)

<comment><USER5> Still be _one_ official language of two EU countries.

Ireland has Irish, and Malta has Maltese; both non-Germanic languages, very different from English.

Oddly, Brexit can solidify the use of English as a common language in the EU, since its general use can now be considered not to give a political advantage to the UK.

(Of course, English is already a default de-facto common language in the EU, but some larger countries can be rather protective of their national language in an official capacity.)

<comment><USER6> As former Swiss resident, and fluent speaker of three of the national languages, seeing Swiss speak among themselves in English was always kind of ironic. :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Finland has a huge collection of quirky things, really:

\- the allegedly worst musicians: Elekäläiset

\- Literature that starts with glorification of collective suicide only to be attempted, failed, called off some pages later. Then rescheduled, and called off again, lather, rinse, repeat.

\- the most quirky looking blues-harpists: Sväng

\- allegedly Finland remains the only nation without weaponizable satellites

\- Finnish music, from classical through to folk, rock, metal and Avant-Garde there's literally everything and anything. Did you know they invented Tango?

\- Finland is kind of the opposite of Japan with its many islands when it comes to lakes. There are too many of them to count.

\- The language is amazingly versatile and abstract. The Finns also don't like borrowing words from other languages. If there's a word, there's probably a Finnish construct for it that sounds nothing like what you've heard of.

\- Home to a certain author famous for pissing off translators for her frivolous approach at above language.

\- Finland is, together with Scandinavia, home to an amazing bunch of Eurasian indigenous people

\- Finland is home to the creepiest Santa Claus there is. No dispute there.

\- Oh, and whatever started on that comp.os.minix newsgroup in 1991 is currently running my entire IT infratructure as well as that of my workplace's.

I could provide sources to all of these claims, but that would be no fun at all, right?

<comment><USER8> Other quirkiness:

\- Finland has 45 firearms per 100 people (3rd highest in the world) yet is was ranked the safest country in the world.

\- Enough saunas that the whole population could do it at the same time.

\- Most heavy metal bands, per population.

\- Annual championships in wife-carrying, air-guitar, boot and phone throwing, sauna, cattle calling, swamp soccer, mosquito swatting, ant nest sitting, etc.

\- Mämmi: food that looks like diarrhea.

\- Candies made of tar.

\- Birch branches are used to whip yourself with in sauna.

\- New years tradition of throwing melted tin in water. The shape tells of the future.

\- Easter tradition of kids dressing up as witches and going trick-or- treating.

\- No trespassing laws, so you can roam and camp anywhere (although not too close to anyone's home).

\- Finland is a 3rd world country by the original cold war definition (politically non-aligned with either NATO or the Communist block).

<comment><USER9> > \- Finland has 45 firearms per 100 people (3rd highest in the world) yet is > was ranked the safest country in the world.

I wonder what the ratio between hunting and handguns are...

<comment><USER8> I googled a bit. Officially Finland has 1.5 million firearms. Mainly for hunting and sport. Handguns make up only 0.2 million, which is about 13%.

Most all murders in Finland are done with a knife while drunk.

(The Finnish police, which keeps a database of firearm permits, objected to the mentioned study that Finland is ranked 3rd in the world. The study was updated and now Finland is ranked "only" 8th:

[http://www.smallarmssurvey.org/fileadmin/docs/T-Briefing- Pap...](http://www.smallarmssurvey.org/fileadmin/docs/T-Briefing-Papers/SAS- BP-Civilian-Firearms-Numbers.pdf) )

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> One Finnish scifi author that I've particularly enjoyed is Hannu Rajaniemi, who has a PhD in Physics and writes excellent speculative novels like The Quantum Thief and The Fractal Prince.

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

<comment><USER11> And is a YC founder (post-books)

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> i dont think literature can ever replace actual business. most books that sell are not even literature.

as for the new nokia, maybe the old nokia is also the new one? i have no doubt a lot of people there still know how to make good phones.</comment>


Lucene's FuzzyQuery is 100 times faster in 4.0 (2011) - <AUTHOR> http://blog.mikemccandless.com/2011/03/lucenes-fuzzyquery-is-100-times-faster.html <comment><USER2> At first, i was disappointed that the Levenshtein Automaton is not some sort of golem. But then i read the rest of the post and realised that the Lucene committers have at least created a pretty impressive Frankenstein's monster.

The Python code; does it execute at runtime as part of Lucene, or is it only used in the build phase, to generate Java code which executes as part of Lucene? It sounds like the Python code implements the DFA generation, which would have to happen at runtime, surely?

</comment><comment><USER3> I wonder whether they reached out to the authors of that paper, or the author of the Python implementation? You'd think people would be pretty ready to help a big open source project like Lucene. Particularly the academics --- it's unlikely they'd find a higher-impact open source use of their algorithm!

</comment><comment><USER4> >We wrote our own scary Python code, tapping into various functions in the Moman package, to auto-generate unreadable Java code

Hnggg

If I wrote this code, I don't think I could ever convince myself I did it correctly.

<comment><USER5> Code generation does serve its purpose, but I would argue that it's only a bit more effort to make it readable and with code-generated comments as well.

I once had to build an Oracle PL/SQL interface for a rather complicated integration project between two old systems and the business requirements for what had to go where changed _daily_.

In the end I opted to code generate the PL/SQL interface and supporting code from a spreadsheet that the business always kept up-to-date with the latest changes to the requirements. Ultimately they could change things to their hearts' content and I would only have to press a button to re-generate it all.

<comment><USER6> Remember a story like that on thedailywtf.. Was it yours?:)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2489178](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2489178)</comment>


Linux netfilter IPT_SO_SET_REPLACE memory corruption - <AUTHOR> https://code.google.com/p/google-security-research/issues/detail?id=758 <comment><USER2> This is essentially a 0day out in the wild now, because of this policy:

"For networking patches, the networking maintainer requests that you just post the issues on the email@example.com mailing list, in public, and they will all work together on them as soon as possible."

Great.</comment>


When does money stop mattering? - <AUTHOR> What are the average lifetime earning of a VC? (vs) that of a founder with a 20m/50m/100m/1b/30b+ exit?<p>At what point does the amount of money create diminishing marginal returns? <comment><USER2> About the same time that touchdowns stop mattering for the Chicago Bears.

Money at that level becomes how you keep score.</comment>


Majority of Credit Card pins LEAKED - <AUTHOR> http://pastebin.com/2qbRKh3R

<comment><USER2> My pin number is 99990</comment>


Fab Lab – The Machines - <AUTHOR> http://janka102.github.io/FabLabMachineTest

<comment><AUTHOR> I made this mainly the summer after my junior year in high school. I kinda consider it one of my very first "real" projects I've done.

We got handouts of every machine we had in the shop and had to take a test on the parts and what they did, so from those handouts I made this site hoping it would make it easier for people to study.

<comment><USER2> This is very _very nice_. If it doesn't hit the front page, you should consider resubmitting as a "Show HN", which typically gets more votes. This is great work, and kudos to you...both for making a polished, professional website and for doing so in the service of education.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey, thanks! That means a lot and it's cool to know other people like it

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Honestly, I would pay for a website like this but with even more stuff. English is my second language, but I currently reside in an English speaking country, and sometimes when I need something specific for some machine, car, dryer etc. I have to spend just too much time trying to learn names of parts needed to fix stuff.

<comment><USER4> I made a (free) site pretty similar to what you describe:

[https://www.takeitapart.com](https://www.takeitapart.com)

TakeItApart lets anyone can see or share annotated photo-based disassembly guides, to find part numbers, names, and required tools. We're tying to make the website the community-contributed disassembly encyclopedia of the web--so anyone can take things apart, virtually, without picking up a screwdriver. It's also super easy to add a new guide--just bulk upload a set of photos and click "next" a few times.

It's a way to share engineering and industrial design know-how. For example, I've learned to consider in-board strain relief[1] for cables and spray-on ground shielding[2] from taking things apart.

1\. [https://www.takeitapart.com/guide/51#step-4](https://www.takeitapart.com/guide/51#step-4)

2\. [https://www.takeitapart.com/guide/25#step-11](https://www.takeitapart.com/guide/25#step-11)

<comment><AUTHOR> That's really cool! Bookmarked.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Cute.

For the 19th century version, see "Catechism of the Locomotive", from 1877.

[https://archive.org/details/cu31924031173549](https://archive.org/details/cu31924031173549)

<comment><USER6> That's a great book, thankyou for telling me about it - these links, to interesting knowledge that I wouldn't discover on my own, are the best part of hn.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> So when are you going to start charging workshops for training their employees? Seems like it could be a profitable niche for safety training.

</comment><comment><USER4> Nicely done, OP! Have you considered making an app so it is simple to create new tests?

The interactive nature of this is great, and it's widely applicable. Beyond being wonderful for students, adaptations of this would be great for employee training on the factory floor. Every hackerspace would benefit from a system like this to qualify members for access to capital equipment.

<comment><AUTHOR> I haven't before, but I just might now. It was a real pain for me to add those machines that are there now, I did it all manually by checking how far parts were from the top left of the image. I probably could have came up with a way to add parts to an image by clicking on it... oh well.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I love this. Can I show it to a college prof who may need something similar for engineering freshmen?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, go for it

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Love it. Would be great if you included cutting speeds and lubricants for different materials. Great (and low-conflict) way to quickly qualify new people for machines at Makerspaces.

</comment><comment><USER10> This is insane for a high school web project. Kudos and props to the author. Be sure to put this on your resume!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! For some reason I never thought of putting it on a resume, but I will now.

<comment><USER11> Put everything interesting you do on your resume! Every opportunity I've been offered has been due to my side projects or non-programming experiences. Your formal education is still important, but, in my experience in the software world, people value the results of your work more than they value your education.

This app you've made is an amazing demonstration of your skills and understanding of web development. It's worth so much more than your GPA.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> You should do this for techshop</comment>


Walmart confirms iPad reaching its stores on Friday - <AUTHOR> http://www.electronista.com/articles/10/10/11/walmart.says.ipad.in.stores.october.15/ <comment><USER2> Is the iPad still considered a luxury good? If so, placement at Wall-Mart seems to have the purpose of eliminating that connotation. I also wonder to what extent Wall-Mart's stores extend the Apple store? Who's not going to drive the extra dozen miles to the Apple Store? Or are iPads potentially an impulse buy by consumers going through the electronics section.

<comment><USER3> And if I were Apple, that is exactly the connotation that I would _want_ to eliminate. As much as the fans want to think of Apple products as elite, Apple just wants to sell as many products as possible, and to make their name ubiquitous. Witness the $99 Apple TV.

By the way, I noticed the iPad is already at my local Target stores.</comment></comment>


A high performance forum software written in PHP - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/lincanbin/Carbon-Forum

<comment><USER2> As long as you do your caching correctly, performance will be good. But you can't do caching with dynamic content, and PHP, while these days getting a lot better, there are some faster tools out there these days. Still, this project looks interesting and I'd like to see an English version of the demo so I can understand what's going on.

<comment><AUTHOR> This is English version of the demo: [http://en.94cb.com/](http://en.94cb.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> The discussion of forum is categorized by tags, which looks like quora or stackoverflow? Execution time per page is generally less than 5ms.</comment>


Mineral hints at bright blue rocks deep in the Earth - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-26553115 <comment><USER2> The article seems more about all the water trapped in the Earth mantle. It mentiones it about a dozen times ;-)

<comment><USER3> There was an intersting comment related to that on reddit AskScience today: [http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/204xxh/is_it_jus...](http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/204xxh/is_it_just_a_huge_coincidence_that_all_the/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I haven't read the full article. But somehow it surprises me that the diamond was found in Brazil and not a single author is at least from a Brazilian university.

</comment><comment><USER5> Learning some 2% of water is fresh and the need to conserve water or it will run out by 2050 was a lie. There will always be fresh water and oil. The price will not soar when supply is limited, there usually happens to be a new discovery. Eg. The US is a huge unexploited oil field

<comment><USER6> It won't ever be economical to extract water from 600km below the surface. Also, oil won't last forever.

<comment><USER7> It's economical to desalinize seawater (once memorably [to me] described as "the most worthless substance in the world") now. We don't do it because using already-fresh water is even cheaper, but desalinization isn't exactly expensive.

<comment><USER8> Source on the economics of desalinization? Everything I have ever seen have put it at pretty expensive. Would love to see a per gallon or liter price.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Nose, face, cut, spite: Blocking Google - <AUTHOR> http://www.buzzmachine.com/2009/11/15/nose-face-cut-spite-blocking-google/

<comment><USER2> "How empty would the first 10 Google search results be if one could no longer find anything from the 148 German publishers?"

That question makes absolutely no sense at all, from googles point of view _nothing_ would change. There would simply be other sites now lower on the ladder that would move up. In fact, for every 'major' news outlet that does this a bunch of smaller ones will benefit.

</comment><comment><USER3> I liked the point made by the author that other publishers are going to rejoice if News Corp pulls out of search results. They are just going to snap up those top ranking search positions really fast. We'll see an explosion of news blogs fighting over positions that used to belong to major News Corp sites.

Then when News Corp tries to get back in they are going to be crippled and have to fight their way back up through the ranks.

</comment><comment><USER4> It's pretty funny how people's perceptions of their own significance are so bloated, especially in comparison with reality.</comment>


Why Arabs Lose Wars (1999) - <AUTHOR> http://www.meforum.org/441/why-arabs-lose-wars

<comment><USER2> "In every society information is a means of making a living or wielding power, but Arabs husband information and hold it especially tightly. U.S. trainers have often been surprised over the years by the fact that information provided to key personnel does not get much further than them. Having learned to perform some complicated procedure, an Arab technician knows that he is invaluable so long as he is the only one in a unit to have that knowledge; once he dispenses it to others he no longer is the only font of knowledge and his power dissipates. This explains the commonplace hoarding of manuals, books, training pamphlets, and other training or logistics literature. On one occasion, an American mobile training team working with armor in Egypt at long last received the operators' manuals that had laboriously been translated into Arabic. The American trainers took the newly-minted manuals straight to the tank park and distributed them to the tank crews. Right behind them, the company commander, a graduate of the armor school at Fort Knox and specialized courses at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds ordnance school, collected the manuals from the crews. Questioned why he did this, the commander said that there was no point in giving them to the drivers because enlisted men could not read. In point of fact, he did not want enlisted men to have an independent source of knowledge. Being the only person who can explain the fire control instrumentation or boresight artillery weapons brings prestige and attention. In military terms this means that very little cross-training is accomplished and that, for instance in a tank crew, the gunners, loaders, and drivers might be proficient in their jobs but are not prepared to fill in for a casualty. Not understanding one another's jobs also inhibits a smoothly functioning crew"</comment>


Lifestyle Businesses and The Unreasonable Woman - <AUTHOR> http://www.novemberwest.com/blog/2011/07/02/lifestyle-businesses-and-the-unreasonable-woman/

<comment><AUTHOR> Since ya'll are talking about lifestyle businsses again ( <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4041144>), I thought I would toss in my two cents, written some time last year. (AKA: I happen to be the author of this piece.)

Enjoy. Or not.</comment>