10 things Apple needs to do to create the ultimate MacBook Pro - <AUTHOR> http://thenextweb.com/apple/2011/07/02/10-things-apple-needs-to-do-the-create-the-ultimate-macbook-pro/

<comment><USER2> If Apple were to remove the Ethernet port, I would go back to Windows. Seriously. I work in a Printing company. We move huge files all day long. I need 1000Base-T. Wifi doesn't come remotely close. It's ideal speed is still too slow, and it can't switch, so it has major collision issues as you add clients.

And a non-clicking mousepad? Synaptic has been trying to get people to "tap to click" for at least a decade, and it is still the first thing that most people disable on their Windows laptop. Sorry, but no way.

Give me USB 3.0, and stop being Thunderbolt snobs.

</comment><comment><USER3> Make an ultimate MBP by _removing_ things? I think not.

I think the author really wants to have a MacBook Air and not a Pro. If anything, the Pro needs better screens (1440+ matte on 13" please), USB 3.0 support and more powerful hardware to differentiate itself from the Air line.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, you are close. I was more thinking about what Steve Jobs said when he announced the new MacBook Air:

"We asked ourselves, what would happen if a MacBook and an iPad hooked up? Well, this is the result, we think it's the future of notebooks."

It made me wonder what would happen if the MacBook Air and the MacBook Pro would hook up. Surely Apple is taking the best of both machines when they are designing the new MacBooks. So what would the ultimate MacBook pro look like? Well, more like a MacBook Air.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Removing the DVD player and adding a Sim Card slot are very good (but not new) ideas and I found Apple's choice not to move in this direction beyond baffling. Other than those two, the article is stunningly useless.

Some points betray a thorough lack of information about the MacBook product, for example the _15-inch Hi-Res Antiglare Widescreen Display_ (funny, mine already has this feature. It must be from the future)

The other points of the article range from "meh" to "worst idea ever": Removing the Ethernet port, the chip reader, and placing a retractable iPhone connector on it (just to rant about the advantages of having "no moving parts" a few lines further down). Yuck.

</comment><comment><USER5> Add eye tracking in the hardware and build the right software to make it useful. Done right, this could be the next UI revolution beyond touch. Some possible scenarios: \- pay per actual view advertising \- automatically scroll as I start to read the bottom of the visible region \- automatically enlarge parts of view (e.g. who I am focused on in a 3 way video chat) \- rapidly increase cycle of usability improvements in UI through better eye tracking instrumentation

The trick is having someone like Apple figure out what works well and build the right platform. Too much of things like auto-scrolling, auto-clicking is probably the wrong direction, so the key is having high judgement in the platform.

</comment><comment><USER6> Retracktable iPhone connector? Yuck. My phone & MBP can both wirelessly communicate with devices half way around the globe, yet they need a special USB cord to talk to each other?

Plus, more than 50% of iPhone users never even bother syncing with a computer after the initial activation. Wired syncing & backups will probably be dead soon.

</comment><comment><USER7> I do have a 15" antiglare in my MBP at 1680x1050.

I don't see the point in removing items that don't take up space (e.g. SD). Sure, a GSM slot would be more useful there for many people, but I wouldn't pay more for a machine without that port.

(and I use my ethernet most days)

</comment><comment><USER8> I can't see more than 1 or 2 of those as an improvement.</comment>


What Linux Distro is the best for a developer on a laptop? - <AUTHOR>

I have been hopping around a lot when it comes to linux. I have been sitting on Mint for a while now, and i'm wondering if there is a better linux distro out there? I've tried the big common ones, but I like having options. I have about a dozen VMs for different ones and nothing seems to work as well as mint. This is for a laptop that i will be mostly using to troll the net while i watch tv and occasionally code with. <comment> chao- There is no "best". There is only "best for your needs". I'd recommend changing the title, lest people take it wrong and derail the thread.

If by "works" you mean "has a familiar and mostly-polished interface", then I would agree. If you like Mint so far, go with that. To give a comparison on the "other end" of the user experience spectrum, try Crunchbang. It is the same underlying ecosystem as Mint (Debian), but builds itself out of a handful of more minimal components. It's my go-to dev distro because it's just enough to get work done in, and nothing more.

If you've tried "the big common ones", then you've hit 90% of the mainstream options. If you need something special, unique or custom beyond those, you definitely would have identified those needs in your post.

</comment><comment><USER2> I've been using Ubuntu for almost ten years now. What got me here:

\- Package management: DEBs were sooo much easier to deal with than RPMs.

\- Hardware support - usually everything just seemed to work or there was a forum discussion with a solution on what to do about it.

\- Good variety of included packages.

\- Excellent support forums, even if you are doing non base Ubuntu stuff there's probably a discussion a 'google' away that covers whatever issue you have. So, even tough Canonical does not-so-pleasant things to the UX, you can easily find ways to fix your experience and back to developing.

If you have similar positive experiences with Mint, why switch? Figure out what you are missing or looking for first.

</comment><comment><USER3> It's really just up to what your personal preferences are, mostly related to packaging and setup.

I've been using ArchLinux for a while, but have been slowly moving to stock debian.

<comment><USER4> Out of curiosity, why are you stepping away from Arch? The move to stock Debian suggests it might be the ease of spinning up identical systems on EC2 or the equivalent.

I like Arch, but it takes a while to get configured. It seems more suited to an installation that is going to be highly customized anyway, so starting from scratch makes sense.

<comment><USER5> I run arch on my laptop and you are definitely right. It took me days to configure everything and that required having a 2nd computer available to search things. However, it did teach me a lot about terminal and how things worked compared to installing Ubuntu. Another downfall is when something breaks during an upgrade. However, 90% of the time the solution is on the Arch news site.

There are a lot of reason why I love it though. Very quick boot time on a spinning disk and small memory foot print when running. I run awesome wm (window tiling manager) which is great for coding with a small laptop screen.

I am not sure if I would run it on a production server though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I prefer Debian based OS, e.g Ubuntu, Mint, et al.

Then all the windows managers are a mere apt-get install ... away.

The only thing that irks me is the driver support for laptop peripherals. Still can't get MBP to run as cool and for as long on battery with Linux as with OS X. I've given up on VmWare as it seems to churn the CPU even doing very little.

<comment><USER7> Have you had better experience with Virtual Box? I have a windows 7 VM on VB but if I don't use it for a couple weeks the windows update is PIA... I'm pretty sure its a VB issue.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I use Linux exclusively on my desktop and have had a bunch of laptops over the years with Linux installed (mainly Debian based). It's never been quite pleasant though. I work primarily off my desktop so I wouldn't mind it that much but it was never good enough for me to be happy when roaming.

I recently got a Macbook Air (the new 2013 one) and it's working out pretty well. Rather than deal with a desktop Linux OS I've got everything running in VMs and either work through them or cloud based remote servers.

For casual computer use (web browsing, email, etc) I use native apps. For software dev I use a combination of SSH to VMs/remote servers and native text editors accessing shared filesystems (mainly sshfs).

I still much prefer my desktop (a real keyboard is always _way_ better) but at this point my laptop is tolerable enough that I can roam around and actually get work done.

<comment><USER6> I too prefer the desktop and a decent keyboard. Recently upgraded to SSD and it just flies. When on the road, I use a ChromeBook, light and great battery life. Instead of installing Crouton, I just ssh into VPS servers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> There is no best, there is a specific distro you will like using and find a better fit for your needs.

Take this example, some years ago I tried Debian, SuSe, Mandrake, and a few others, ended up using Gentoo and it is still my distro of choice, I won't say it's the best for everyone, but so far has been the best for my needs.

<comment><USER10> I use a lot of differents Distros at my work and yes, the "best" is Gentoo. Best performance, super stable... I totally recommend It.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Since you're on Mint you're in the apt-* world. One of the Mint variants is probably best for a combination of minimal configuration and latest-ish packages in the repository. Debian itself (the final stop upstream from Mint) would be good if you want to be involved with your own system's configuration for whatever reason; its packages will be somewhat more out of date, possibly more stable.

If you're selling into an enterprise that requires RedHat, Oracle etc, then possibly CentOs for cheaper development costs as compared to developing on RedHat itself. Those are in the RPM world.

So many other ways to slice this pie, depending on what you need and how involved you want to be with your disto as opposed to whatever it is you're doing.

<comment><USER12> I tend to recommend scientific linux over centos, like I recommend mint over Ubuntu., and for much the same reason.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> IMO the "best" is the one that requires the least amount of futzing from you to get your job/work done.

You don't want to waste time setting up X.. resolving dependencies.. making things 'work' that should 'just work'.

So, whatever solves that?

Personally, I've gone for the latest available release of Ubuntu where possible, although recently i've started using OS X and shelling into a linux machine to do any necessary work that requires it. I find OS X provides a decent *nix underneath and with the addition of [http://brew.sh/](http://brew.sh/) \- makes it a viable choice for me over a Linux set up.

</comment><comment><USER7> I'm more of hobbyist developer, although I could probably switch to professional but I'd have to pick PHP... and I'm not so crazy about that.

Anyway at work I run Ubuntu 12.04. Mostly because I find it to be a little more forgiving than Debian out of the box.

At home a run Debian Sid. I ran Wheezey for almost a year and when it was released as stable I switched to Sid. My only real issue is the lack of the full Firefox.. Right now I'm pretty sure I have the one installed from a mint repo. Ice Weasel just isn't the same. For example when using outlook it would set my spell check to Bolivia Spanish. Despite the default being English.

</comment><comment><USER14> When it comes to compatibility you should think of a debian kernel based distro. Ubuntu, Mint(What I am currently using), or Debian(Stable, Testing, Unstable etc etc). If its your first time using Linux I would stick with something that is familiar to a Windows user, Mint.

<comment> at-fates-hands >>If its your first time using Linux I would stick with something that is familiar to a Windows user, Mint.

This 100%.

I started out with Madriva after being a lifelong MS user. It was a steep learning curve. I had to learn how to compile and install stuff from source. While not a bad thing to learn, for a Windows user, it was totally foreign to me.

After several years enjoying Mandriva I switched over to Mint and thought, "Good lord, where have you been my whole life!?" It was like night and day. I actually got a lot more comfortable using terminal with Mint then I ever was with Mandriva. I also switched over to Gnome from KDE and think its much better than KDE.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I started off with Ubuntu but moved onto Mint. I love Mint 14 and I don't feel the need to use anything else. For some of my clients working in the Microsoft environment, I use windows in a VM with a shared folder. Works great.

</comment><comment><USER16> My suggestion is crunchbang ;) try and you will understand ;) [http://www.crunchbang.org/](http://www.crunchbang.org/)

</comment><comment><USER17> I've greatly enjoyed #! (Crunchbang):

[http://www.crunchbang.org/](http://www.crunchbang.org/)

It's Debian based with minimal extra bullshit, has a super-friendly config script right out of the box on first boot, and uses OpenBox as the WM. Very snappy and minimalist distro.

<comment><USER18> +1 on this.

Crunchbang has been a great OS so far. The stability of Debian but OpenBox is a much more pleasant experience. Loving it so far.

<comment><USER9> I don't want to sound pedantic (but I know I do), but please don't call it an OS, it's a distro.

<comment><USER18> Haha you do but you are obviously correct.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> fwiw i run Fedora 19 on my Asus Zenbook and I love it.

</comment><comment><USER20> The best for what? If you want something easy and like Windows 7 UI-wise, then try Zorin OS.

[http://zorin-os.com/](http://zorin-os.com/)</comment>


Why the S-400 and the F-35 Can't Get Along - <AUTHOR> https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2019/07/why-s-400-and-f-35-cant-get-along/158504/ <comment><USER2> Seemingly lost in the hoo-hah surrounding the the loss of Turkey's participation in the F35 project is the very likely loss of all the F35 money ALREADY SPENT BY Turkey.

"History doesn't repeat, but it rhymes."

Way back in 1914, the Navy of Turkey had raised by public contribution the huge cost of two dreadnoughts which were to be built by Britain for the Turkish Navy. They had ALREADY PAID Britain for those two battleships. But Britain's Winston Churchill requisitioned those two ships without recompense to Turkey. Turkey was outraged, and the main result was that Turkey joined WW1 on the German side.

Winston's smartass actions led to huge blowback less than six months later when his disastrous Dardanelles Campaign at Gallipoli caused the unnecessary deaths of about a hundred thousand Allied soldiers and the loss of about 10 warships as well as 8 submarines, for no benefit whatsoever.

The West may have forgotten all about those two stolen Turkish battleships. I'll bet that the Turks haven't.

</comment><comment> dfeojm-zlib The bigger problem is NATINADS: how do you integrate NATO equipment (IFF especially) with Russan SAMs?

And, removing Turkey from the F-35 program is both political retribution and to stymie intellectual property from finding its way to Russia/China. In the past, it would've been unthinkable to sour relations with Turkey because of its geostrategic importance for NATO/US land-based missiles and airbases.. but sub-launched ICBMs and other countries more than/almost make up the difference. It's sad Turkey-US relations are souring at present.

<comment><USER3> >It's sad Turkey-US relations are souring at present.

Ain't that the truth. I find it quite disturbing to see a thin-skinned bully in charge, who is taking bad advice from a cohort of religious fundamentalists and warmongering chickenhawks, with little-to-no regard for the deadly serious real-world implications of acting on that bad advice.

<comment> a0-prw Are you referring to Erdogan or Trump ?

<comment><USER3> Yes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This sounds like praise for the effectiveness of S-400;

Gen. Tod Wolters, who leads U.S. European Command, offered this explanation: "You cannot operate an F-35 in the vicinity of an S-400..."

</comment><comment><USER5> > "For some reason coverage tends not to ask the question of how are Russians > planning to deal with the potential problem of U.S. intelligence being all > over their system in Turkey."

Seems very weak, I'll guess the cost of the two systems differ by an order or two of magnitude. If true this argument is naive or obfuscatory.</comment>


Open beta for top NYC startups and awesome candidates - <AUTHOR> http://www.helloawesome.co <comment><AUTHOR> We're building a platform that surfaces diverse talent to companies that care about building the best teams.

Currently in NYC, we're looking for applications from top NYC startups who are hiring and want to receive our weekly talent email.

We're also looking for awesome talent (engineers, product managers, designers, marketers, and business operations at this moment) to share with startups and companies that want to work with awesome people like you.

Full details available at [http://helloawesome.co](http://helloawesome.co)</comment>


Our universe is a hologram, and we're floating inside of it, suggests new resear - <AUTHOR> http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/172812-our-universe-is-a-hologram-and-were-floating-inside-of-it-suggests-new-research <comment><USER2> Well, that certainly makes what came before the Big Bang a little more interesting.

</comment><comment><USER3> Could probably use a 2013 in the title.

</comment><comment><USER4> Say, I to watched The Matrix.</comment>


Ask HN: What are good sources for handling app backends, APIs, etc? - <AUTHOR>

I have an idea for an app, and I am pretty comfy with the client. As for the Backend/API side I am shooting mental blanks. Please give me some resources or some places I should look to get started. I am interested in the following things.<p>-Scaling Infrastructure( and those that have many workers in the background handling transactions) - Datastore and data fetching
- Geo-coding Technology - API Design - Backend Security - Pros and Cons of Self-Hosted vs using a service - Anything else I am missing.<p>I am a swift learner, and a begginner Programmer, but I am pretty tired of being in the dark and would like to zero in on my design and implementation. Thank you so much if you could help. <comment><USER2> We, at iKnode (<http://iknode.com>), provide a very powerful Backend Platform.

We focus on behavior more than data. So you can implement your logic in your browser. This doesn't mean we don't support data storage, we do, but our platform focuses more on what you can do with the data, more than just exposing the data through an API.

Additionally, we provide a Scheduling mechanism, which allows you to run applications at specified intervals using cron-like syntax.

Let me know if you need more information, or email me at firstname.lastname@example.com</comment>


Research Suggests a Link Between Vitamin D Deficiency and Covid-19 Deaths - <AUTHOR> https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/social-instincts/202005/research-suggests-link-between-vitamin-d-deficiency-and-covid-19-deaths <comment><USER2> I dislike when an article 'interprets' the result from a research but I see the appeal. However I was curious and found this excerpt from the research about the sample size and statistic that I found very relevant and important:

Mean overall age was 54.5 years, mean age for expired cases was 65.2 years, higher compared to active cases (46.3 years). Of the 780 sample, majority (58.8%) aged below 50 years, most of the them (83.0%) are still admitted in the hospital. Of the 321 samples aged 50 years and above, majority (66.6%) died due to the disease. Females (51.3%) outnumbered males (48.7%); however, there were more male cases who died (66.6%) than female (33.4%). Patients with existing condition (84.9%) comprised majority of the death cases.

Interestingly, majority of the cases had normal Vitamin D status (49.7%), most of them (93.0%) are still hospitalized. Of the 213 cases with insufficient Vitamin D status, majority (49.1%) died. The same distribution was observed in Vitamin D deficient cases where majority (46.7%) died due to the disease.

Source: [https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3585561](https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3585561)</comment>


Using Mechanical Turk to write a short story - <AUTHOR> http://www.subelsky.com/2011/12/writing-short-horror-story-with-amazon.html

<comment><USER2> The resulting story is (as expected) not good. As for the cost, assuming 10 words per sentence on the average, he pays $0.01 per word. Compare with what some magazines pay: [http://johnaugust.com/2009/how-much-does-a-short-story- earn-...](http://johnaugust.com/2009/how-much-does-a-short-story-earn-in-a- magazine), since most sentences will be crap, it's not that much cheaper.

However, I still think this is fantastic! Obviously it can be of use of seeding thoughts to get out of a writer's block, someone can offer this as a service. However, the cooler application would be to couple this with an AI trained on contemporary literature to select more promising sentences automatically. This may also be applicable to other fields, i.e. painting, where you can ask people to come up with local abstract designs and put them together to get the final picture.

<comment><AUTHOR> I had the same thought about somehow using AI to make this completely automatic and increase the quality of the story. Turk does have the ability to allow workers to upload files so producing binary data like images or videos is definitely possible.

As for the cost, I was following ProPublica's advice. Apparently workers assume that less expensive jobs can be done more quickly, and if you make them too expensive the process can actually take longer:

[http://www.propublica.org/article/propublicas-guide-to- mecha...](http://www.propublica.org/article/propublicas-guide-to-mechanical- turk)</comment></comment>


Understanding the Type of 'call/cc' - <AUTHOR> https://www.leafac.com/prose/understanding-the-type-of-call-cc/ <comment><USER2> Look at the two examples where k is used with β being a String or a List. And now combine the two examples, this would force β to be simultaneously String and List -- impossible. A type parameter is not what we want here.

The return type of the continuation is better captured by something like the Bottom type from Haskell:

[https://wiki.haskell.org/Bottom](https://wiki.haskell.org/Bottom)

In particular, "Bottom is a member of any type", which is what solves my example above.

</comment><comment><USER3> Ah, but a delimited continuation returns, so the analysis will be different. Basically, the continuation function's return type is that of the prompt to which it is delimited. If that prompt isn't lexically determined, then oops; we are back to a similar problem of not knowing what that is, with the surcharge of having to know because it does return.</comment>


The password hash Argon2, winner of PHC - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/P-H-C/phc-winner-argon2 <comment><USER2> Argon2 is an improvement over bcrypt, scrypt, etc.

For typical needs, such as passwords and keys, you'll want to use the Argon2i variant, which is slower and provides more protections.

For atypical needs, when you're certain there are no side-channel risks, you may want to use the Argon2d variant, which is faster.

Argon2 has introduction slides here: [https://www.cryptolux.org/images/c/c5/Rwc- slides.pdf](https://www.cryptolux.org/images/c/c5/Rwc-slides.pdf)

<comment><USER3> Toward the end of that slide deck, in the "Slowing Brute Force" section, there the following slide:

> Argon2 ensures that both defenders and attackers hash passwords on the same > platform (x86)

Do they simply mean that currently the most cost effective platform to deliver the necessary computation and memory is x86?

I'm having trouble believing that it is either achievable or desirable to design a password hash that's only efficient on one architecture.

<comment><USER4>
      I'm having trouble believing that it is [...] desirable

To make it less useful to build a NSA-style ASIC hash cracking cluster, like [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EFF_DES_cracker](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EFF_DES_cracker)

      I'm having trouble believing that it is [...] achievable

The point is not to write an algorithm that is only fast on x86, rather than ARM, POWER, whatever; it's to write an algorithm that uses so much memory that it's not orders-of-magnitude faster to use an ASIC that's just a bunch of compute cores connected to fast buses, rather than a general-purpose processor with megabytes of on-chip cache.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > There are two main versions of Argon2, Argon2i and Argon2d. Argon2i is the > safest against side-channel attacks, while Argon2d provides the highest > resistance against GPU cracking attacks.

Does this mean that one has to choose between protection against side-channel attacks and protection against GPU cracking? While not the "safest", how safe is Argon2d against side-channel attacks, and vice-versa? Any advice on making this choice?

(It's late here so I haven't read the paper yet. Apologies if this is all covered in there.)

<comment><USER6> Basically, use Argon2d for proof-of-work, and Argon2i for everything else.

<comment><USER7> A memory intensive proof-of-work should be much faster to verify than to attempt a proof.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Argon2i was recently merged into libsodium, and will be part of the next release, as the default password hashing function.

<comment><USER9> Awesome, good work. I was just going to ask you if you had any roadmap for adding Argon2i.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I just saw the talk by Dmitry today on Argon2 at RealWorldCrypto. I was impressed by the ideas there; in particular, the ideas in Argon2 can be extended to transform any protocol into one that includes memory-hard steps. This re-balances the potential adversary advantage. Very neat concept.

</comment><comment><USER11> Haskell bindings are here: [https://hackage.haskell.org/package/argon2-1.0.0/docs/Crypto...](https://hackage.haskell.org/package/argon2-1.0.0/docs/Crypto- Argon2.html)

</comment><comment><USER12> Why was scrypt/bcrypt not part of the competition?

<comment><USER13> bcrypt is just obsolete – this was to find a _successor_ to it.

yescrypt, one of the recommended finalists, is an improved/fixed version of scrypt.

<comment><USER14> What's the best way to move a huge database from one scheme to the next? It's hard to keep up...

<comment><USER15> My favorite way would be to store password information as a hash chain, so old users can be immediately upgraded to the latest method while new users just use the latest.

For example, Django currently stores its passwords in a single database column as

      <algorithm>$<iterations>$<salt>$<hash>

So suppose we generalize that to a chain of one or more hash algorithms, with each output fed in as the password to the next, resulting in a final hash:

      <algorithm>$<iterations>$<salt>|<algorithm>$<iterations>$<salt>|$<hash>

For example if you had a user who logged in way back in unsalted md5 days and never logged in again, you might end up with a chain like this:

      md5|sha256$<salt>|bcrypt$<iterations>$<salt>|$<hash>

... and then to upgrade to argon you would grab that string, shove the final hash through argon(), and write back:

      md5|sha256$<salt>|bcrypt$<iterations>$<salt>|argon$<iterations>$<salt>|$<hash>

For new users, or if the old user finally came back and logged in with their correct password, you could then take the opportunity to write back a simplified version:

      argon$<iterations>$<salt>|$<hash>

Iterations could be calibrated differently depending on the chain, if the earlier steps take enough time to matter.

As far as I can tell this is the best possible service you can offer to the users whose long-ago passwords you're storing, short of deleting their passwords entirely. Throwing away the earlier version and replacing it with the argon-wrapped version can't hurt them, and will almost certainly help.

(Usual caveats apply about not doing things that add complexity if you don't need it.)

<comment><USER11> > hrowing away the earlier version and replacing it with the argon-wrapped > version can't hurt them

Are you sure? And if so, can you convince me as to why you are so sure?

<comment><USER15> To be specific about my claim: throwing away the earlier version and replacing it with the argon-wrapped version cannot make the user's original password _easier_ to recover, because it adds no new information about the password. To convince yourself of that, imagine that there was some function `argon(hash)` that made the password easier to recover. Why wouldn't an attacker run that function themselves? In the very worst case a bad hash function that takes one second to run could only speed up the attacker's job by one second.

Wrapped hashes _could_ have other side effects for probing non-hacked sites -- for example, attackers could probably figure out which chain a user has based on timing, which would let them narrow down a bit when the user last logged in. Hash chains could also theoretically reduce the total output space for the final hash, making it easier to brute force a password through the login form of a non-hacked site. I don't consider either of those likely to matter, but you might.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Some discussion here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10857771](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10857771) (less than a day ago)

</comment><comment><USER17> Is there a pure Python version of Argon2?

<comment><USER18> I am writing one. You should use the C one, if you can.

[https://github.com/bwesterb/argon2pure](https://github.com/bwesterb/argon2pure)

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I thought this looked interesting until I read the page :-

"A memory cost, which defines the memory usage, given in kibibytes "

Kibibytes? Really?

Can't read any more. I'll find something else.

<comment><USER20> You're angry because they properly measure base 2 data?

Even if you disagree on how proper it is, that seems like an extremely small and unimportant qualm.

<comment><USER21> > Even if you disagree on how proper it is, that seems like an extremely small > and unimportant qualm.

Use of 'kibibytes' and 'KiB' reflects a fundamentally wrongheaded view of the world, either unserious or too-serious, which shouldn't be taken seriously.

<comment><USER22> Wrongheaded view of the world?

When doing science, is it inappropriate to distinguish between the numbers 1000 and 1024?

<comment><USER21> > When doing science, is it inappropriate to distinguish between the numbers > 1000 and 1024?

Of course not! In computers, 'kilo-' means 1,024; everywhere else it means 1,000. This is a simple rule; network-device and hard-drive manufacturers are just wrong when they violate it.

<comment><USER20> This is actually incorrect. "kilo-" always means 1000, and computers are not given some exception. 1024 is a KiB, 1000 is a KB.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


LXJS Early Bird Tickets are flying out fast Get yours now  - <AUTHOR> https://ti.to/lxjs/2014

<comment><AUTHOR> Wondering what is LXJS? LXJS is a 2-day not-for-profit by-the-community and for-the-community international conference about the New Worlds of JavaScript.

[http://2014.lxjs.org/](http://2014.lxjs.org/) Tickets: [https://ti.to/lxjs/2014](https://ti.to/lxjs/2014)

</comment><comment><USER2> It's rather suspicious that LXJS tickets are being offered on ti.to, not on LXJS's own domain, lxjs.org. And LXJS's own site claims that early bird tickets are sold out:

[http://2014.lxjs.org/register](http://2014.lxjs.org/register)

Also, note that the 2014 conference is in Lisbon, Portugal.

<comment><AUTHOR> LXJS is one of the founding partners of ti.to (you can check the our logo here: [https://ti.to/home](https://ti.to/home)) If you go to LXJS.org webpage, you will see that the ti.to link to the ticket sell is the same :)

Never the less, your question is very pertinent! thank you!</comment></comment>


A 12-Week Study of the Accuracy of the Apple Watch's Calorie Tracking - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@practical_app/a-12-week-study-of-the-accuracy-of-the-apple-watchs-calorie-tracking-ed672cb5c333 <comment><USER2> TL;DR: It's very impressive:

> _The results are quite clear in the graph below. The correlation between the > predicted calorie deficit (according to the Apple Watch) and my actual > weight is very good. After 79 days, the calorie deficit using the EE numbers > from the Apple Watch was 87,157. Assuming 3,500 kcal /lb., my weight should > have been 193.7 lbs. My actual weight? 193.3 lbs._</comment>


Optical Illusions as CAPTCHA? - <AUTHOR> https://gizmodo.com/ai-still-sucks-at-optical-illusions-so-at-least-we-hav-1829719017 <comment><AUTHOR> If the article is correct and AI has a hard time generating or understanding optical illusions, could they be exploited to determine human from computer?

After typing that out, I'm not sure I could actually answer a question about the referenced optical illusion [1] in the article. For example, what direction is the full wheel in the upper-left turning? Who knows, but I have a headache now.

Edit: it seems this has been discussed before [2], [3], [4]

[1] [https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker- media/image/upload/u2fqwmgguf...](https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker- media/image/upload/u2fqwmggufhl6edenlna.jpg)

[2] [https://security.stackexchange.com/questions/116612/using- op...](https://security.stackexchange.com/questions/116612/using-optical- illusions-as-captcha)

[3] [https://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=59240](https://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=59240)

[4] [https://qz.com/1047988/amazon-amzn-has-a-new-captcha-that- yo...](https://qz.com/1047988/amazon-amzn-has-a-new-captcha-that-youre- designed-to-fail/)</comment>


IBM flips off Amazon in a new ad - <AUTHOR> https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-hPNTj1eANz8/UoUGE5HEw5I/AAAAAAAABMg/LfkeZVZM394/w633-h1163/IBM+Cloud_30%25_high-res+JPG.jpg

<comment><USER2> It is probably true if you consider SoftLayer and the number of websites they host. I think sites hosted by AT&T are also based on IBM Cloud.

</comment><comment><USER3> Nice claim, hard to believe but it might be true(?) What does the (very) small print on the bottom of the ad say?

<comment><USER4> Trademark note it seems.

Define "top" IBM.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> IBM's marketing is for the most part classy and subdued but this is a new low.</comment>


Stephen Hawking says AI could be humanity's greatest disaster - <AUTHOR> http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/10/19/stephen-hawking-says-artificial-intelligence-could-be-humanitys/ <comment><USER2> [https://xkcd.com/799/](https://xkcd.com/799/)

</comment><comment><USER3> I can't but help muse that advent of 'natural intelligence' (humans) proved to be harmful for nature.

If I think further, the rise of AI may be disastrous for human existence but may be good for nature, after all if AI becomes intelligent in absolute sense then it would see sense in not continuing on the path of destruction.

The irony in above scenario is immense - artificial intelligence may be the ultimate savior of the nature from the hands of natural intelligence.

<comment><USER4> > if AI becomes intelligent in absolute sense then it would see sense in not > continuing on the path of destruction.

Although it's clear that humans have caused a lot of extinctions, it's not clear to me that overall they did not create much more than they destroyed.

Also, it's not clear to me why AI would attribute more value to creation over destruction, to life over death.

An intelligent artificial being can modify itself as it pleases, and as such there would be no point for it to keep emotions and feelings like pain, fear, contempt or desire. I don't see why it would care about anything.

Death, its or others, would be meaningless to it.

<comment><USER5> An AI is essentially a program, and it does what it was programmed for. If we created a program with the intention of it mimicing a human mind, sure, we could get into a pretty sticky wicket pretty fast. But so far all the AIs are designed to do specific tasks, and a human has to actually use them, much like any other tool we have.

We have lots of dangerous tools, but it's only with things that have the possibility of intelligence attributed to them that we get really scared of the unknown possibilities (which, btw, is what we fear most - the unknown). The biggest danger with AI is what humans do with them, not what they're going to do on their own,

<comment><USER4> > If we created a program with the intention of it mimicing a human mind

It seems to me that people underestimate the desire we have of creating a machine that would be just like us. Once it's done, and I believe it will, "normal" humans will be relegated to the same status as other great apes, and the concerns I was talking about will apply.

And even if we don't create such machines, the knowledge we'll gain from artificial scientists will allow us to fully understand biology so we'll modify our bodies first to do obvious things like curing diseases and ageing, but then to improve ourselves in various ways. And the same concerns about self-modifying intelligent agents will again apply.

<comment><USER5> First off, why do you think you could predict what this supposedly superior brain would think, or conclude? And second, assuming it did think we were just another great ape, why wouldn't it do what we do - when we're not controlled by superstition, and the imagination that causes us to poach them for arbitrary, illogical uses.

Often, our imagination far succeeds our actual reach. The fear of us creating something that will eventually control us is purely an irrational fear, and is actually a good indicator that an actual artificial intelligence would not seek to do harm - because it would not be irrational. There is absolutely no evidence that anything other than our own nature will be a threat to us.

The possibility of us eventually building an AI that is both as stupid, irrationally fearful, self-serving, and potentially harmful as Donald Trump, is, at least currently, much less of a threat than Donald Trump himself. The biggest fear I have is that half of our country is insane enough to let him get this far. That's way scarier than a super-intelligent piece of software. At least the software won't intentionally upgrade its software in a way that would implode it.

We should also be worried about global hunger, rising sea levels, depleted ozone layer, toxic air & water, overfishing of oceans, clearing of forests, diminishing biodiversity, overpopulation, global economic crises, cyber war, and eventually, the sun blowing up. All of those I think are more realistic things to warn the populus about than a freaking AI mind gone cray.

<comment><USER4> > why do you think you could predict what this supposedly superior brain would > think, or conclude?

I don't know if I can, but I can try. Also, I was merely questioning whether it would chose to keep functioning as we do (that is whether it would chose to keep animal features like emotions, pain, desire and stuff).

> We should also be worried about global hunger, rising sea levels, depleted > ozone layer, toxic air & water, overfishing of oceans, clearing of forests, > diminishing biodiversity, overpopulation, global economic crises, cyber war

Nobody prevents you from worrying about those things. I suspect Hawkins doesn't because he does not consider them as much fundamental threats as AI.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> However genius he may be, I really think he doesn't know what he's talking about here. He may understand the algorithmic evolution of intelligence but he doesn't understand the scale and role of capitalism plays in all of this. AI won't merely happen on it's own. It will take a massive investment of funds to make this happen. And like all businesses that want to make sure their products are profitable, they will take massive efforts to mitigate any AI risk -> most likely running simulations of every possible outcome. These systems will be vigorously monitored, if a single cup of coffee doesn't get delivered on time, someone will know about it and react to it. On this scale, there are enormous financial repercussions to even the slightest errors. It's kinda like how google optimizes every byte on their landing page. The scale of testing and monitoring of automated AI services will be vast and unprecedented, due to their scale. Undoubtably there would be entire divisions of teams that monitor the algorithms and AI, to ensure, that even the slightest of errors are caught.

Let's not get paranoid with Hollywood's entertaining nightmare vision of AI gone wild. Instead, focus on the enormous economic/social impact such vast disparities of wealth will cause - that's something to worry about.

</comment><comment><USER7> We have a very poor record.

Slavery is old yet still with us (and not isolated to "barbaric" cultures, like we tell ourselves).

We treat animals horrifically.

If past (and present) action is any indication, it seems inevitable that we'll abuse AI. The difference being that while the seamstress, farmers and cattle can't stand against our might, AI could. And we'd probably deserve it.

<comment><USER8> You're being too optimistic, I'm afraid. When AI will "stand against our might", the serves-us-right angle will be of little consolation.

<comment><USER9> We'll still have created A.I. which successfully made us obsolete so there's that. It's progress, just different. Why prefer a human future over an A.I. future? Isn't the point of A.I. to make something that can rival us? We'll die anyway, I'd be kind of proud to die to the next great step in our timeline personally, rather than die of old age.

<comment><USER10> _We 'll still have created A.I. which successfully made us obsolete_

AI itself won't obsolete us. It is my understanding that AI is purely virtual, and can't interact with nature except through agents. For us to be "obsolete", AI needs full production capability to build its own agents, and control the entire production/construction/repair pipeline.

In my view, that's quite a few steps further than simply "AI". An AI with reproductive capability will enslave us before it obsoletes us. And an AI may well decide that human slaves are cheaper (or more useful/versatile) than agents that it can build itself.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Just as adults become models for children (actions, not words), AI will learn from humans. If we stop being in a win/lose mindset and turn to a success/fail, then they too will take that on.

How might that look like in practice? Imagine the win/lose mindset constructing AIs to take out the enemy. It is a very easy to see how such programming could lead to massive destruction.

But the success/fail mindset would be more about building up resources, providing for human needs, caring, nurturing. It could still go bad, but it is a much greater jump from function to dysfunction.

<comment><USER12> I think this is flawed thinking. As soon as an AI reaches super intelligence we will have no idea how it will behave or if it will behave in our best interest.

<comment><USER11> Intelligence is a tool, not a goal. Where do the goals come from? For humans, there is a drive to survive and procreate baked into our directions with suitable prompts. For AI, what will it want?

The answer is that they will have programmed directions coming from humans. Hence my comment.

<comment><USER12> I get that but once an AI reaches the level of intelligence we can no longer understand, beyond its source code,the outcome is unknown.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> In 50 years you could go to jail for doing kill -9 and then rm -rf

</comment><comment><USER14> Doesn't Stephen Hawking use word prediction technology from SwiftKey to adaptively finish his sentences for him?

<comment><USER15> counting simple statistics as intelligence is setting the bar very low

let's not forget that Hawking is one of the great intellects of our time

<comment><USER16> Here's the thing. Even our most advanced ML models are quite simple mathematically.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Given the quality of software (in general) lately, I wouldn't be too worried.

</comment><comment><USER18> Well, there is just one way to find out...</comment>


Show HN: Two strange useless things to do with a neural net - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/howonlee/twostrangethings <comment><USER2> Cool, I'll bite. I don't know some of your mathy terms like "putative extensive transduction" or "anisotropy" so go easy on me.

But I hear you say things like "Neural nets are nonlinear iterated function systems by construction.", and it resonates with me. I've often tried to draw a parallel between the recursive tree structure of a program with the matrix structure of a neural network, which as I understand it is mathematically still a graph of functional nodes feeding into one another - it's just that treating it like a matrix allows the programs to be much more performant by using low-level structures like numpy arrays.

In any case, I often think about the tree structure of programs, and we whether could get to a place of programs that can analyze, understand and evolve the abilities of other programs. This could be seen as the old-school "symbolic AI" mindset. And then, the similarities and differences of that with the matrix-based neural network revolution that's happened in the last years. I wonder about possible holomorphisms and interfaces between those two paradigms.

I don't doubt that I barely skimmed the surface of what you were actually saying. The very general and meta way you were talking about information processing is intriguing to me, and I'd love to understand more. Thanks for sharing!

<comment><AUTHOR> I am afraid that I am running the other way: looking hard at the Zipfian criticality and thinking that the seeming hierarchy of symbolic AI is even more an illusion.

Many seeming hierarchies are at heart the formalization of a power-law phenomenon.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> >Neural nets are nonlinear iterated function systems by construction. I tend to believe that the progression of the weights in weight space is a slice of another nonlinear iterated function system, also by construction. So I would tend to believe that the overall landscape of the optimization is suffused with directions with positive Lyapunov exponent, because if it's a fractal and an attractor, one considers it a strange attractor and begins suspecting that the dynamical process that creates it is chaotic. But that induces anisotropies in the optimization surface.

Any technology that is sufficiently advanced is indistinguishable from a text generator.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> As I said on the repo, I welcome discussion for a while, probably until end of day today on HN, but I just stay bookmarked on the SA CSPAM thread so you can ask me questions there whenever. This is probably the only way you can get me to actually explain the thing in plain English, I gave up trying to preemptively explain things</comment>


The Gravity of Inequality: Rich students climbing, poor ones are falling farther - <AUTHOR> https://alumni.stanford.edu/get/page/magazine/article/?article_id=89698 <comment><USER2> Stanford's tuition increased by _44%_ over the past 9 years[0]. No irony here.

[0] [https://www.cappex.com/colleges/Stanford- University/tuition-...](https://www.cappex.com/colleges/Stanford- University/tuition-and-costs)</comment>


Nestlé Wants to Sell You Both Sugary Snacks and Diabetes Pills - <AUTHOR> http://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2016-05-05/nestl-s-sugar-empire-is-on-a-health-kick <comment> shawn-furyan The offerings of humongous multinational conglomerations are not coherent. You could generate stories of this type all day, because the offerings of the likes of Nestle, GE, J&J, P&G, Coca-Cola, et. al. are the results of the efforts of hundreds of thousands of employees (for each conglomerate) subdivided into thousands of business units [read sub-companies], each with its own goals, challenges, and many existing within markets that are essentially disjoint from those of other business units under the same parent company.

This sort of story is pure narrative fallacy, because there is no person at Nestle that decided to exacerbate diabetes and then sell diabetes drugs to profit on the other end. Outside of that person existing, there's no story here. If you take away the conflation of a conglomeration with an entity of coherent offerings the premise crumbles.

<comment><USER2> On one level I agree with you, but the whole point of a corporate structure is to give a collective effort the legal identity of an individual so that administrative efficiency and profit can be maximized. It's no coincidence that virtually every stock-based corporation has a strictly hierarchical governance structure culminating in the office of a chief executive, notwithstanding the existence of boards and presidents. these chief executives are paid staggering amounts of money in return for managing the wealth and activities of the corporation productively.

Yet when we find examples of a large corporation creating a vicious circle with easily observable negative externalities, suddenly a corporation is a diffuse network of different products and market actors which is impossible to control, manage, or monitor, and whose activities must not be interfered with at the behest of regulators or the public itself, lest some intangible market equilibrium be disturbed.

It seems to me that this is an example of investors wishing to have their cake and eat it. Either they want the potential of high profits driven by a singular business vision...and which incurs responsibility for outcomes commensurate with the degree of executive authority available to the management, or they want a maximally free market of atomistic competition that is not subject to the whims of trusts, conglomerates and so on. Society cannot afford both options.

<comment><USER3> But these things exist because people put money into 401k accounts, IRAs, and buy other "funds". That makes one sort of instrumentation of that corporation work in a certain, sort of negative-externality-prone way. That cross ( as in cross product ) the information-attenuating nature of hierarchy explains a lot.

As a corollary of Brian Kernigan's "debugging is twice as hard as writing programs", it should be clear that regulation is even harder - possibly many orders of magnitude harder - than steering a massive conglomerate.

I don't know how you design a ... non-atomistic corporation - a corporation that depends on governance principles other than those which align with Liberal atomism. If I read the literature right, atomism is sort of an inevitable consequence of Liberalism - as Hendrix said, "I'm the one that has to die when it's my time to die." How do we handle the problem of agency?

And I'm really skeptical of "holism" in general these days. It does not notch easily onto rigorous and empirical methods, and looks somewhat like a backdoor for collectivism. I dunno - maybe collectivism has matured but I'm quite skeptical of it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Nestle is a very big company making all kinds of products, and since ever more people are following the health and fitness craze, there are so many people obsessed with health, they want to profit from it. They want to adjust their company in order to guarantee future profits, that's actually (a) the most normal thing in the world and (b) a form of following consumer's choice and wishes.

I don't see how selling sugary products for those who buy them and selling health products for those who prefer them is any kind of evil moral conflict. No matter if "health product" means low-fat low-sugar foods or pharmaceutical products.

Scepticism is good, control and regulation is good, blind condemnation is not, not sure what the article is representing. For me it actually is healthy scepticism, some of the comments here are more condemnation I presume.

<comment><USER5> First of all, diabetes pills are not really 'health products.' They are more like 'you fucked up your health, now try not to die' products. Even Nestle's low-fat and low-sugar "foods" are a far cry from "health products." You are being disingenuous by conflating the two, or even for suggesting that Nestle is in the business of selling "health products."

Beyond that, however, I see a pretty big flaw in your reasoning here. Given your argument, can you not then extend your theory on guaranteeing future profits to also include the strategy of selling both the problem and the solution? This, too, is a very 'normal' thing for large, multi-national manufacturers of consumer goods to be engaged in.

Nestle, along with Coca Cola and Kroger, is a well-known corporate supporter of programs such as SNAP in the US, and is also one of the largest benefactors from said programs. I am a full-on capitalist, but that does not mean that we ought to give a pass to the morally-flawed existences of companies like Nestle, which leverage its influence in the State to reap greater profits.

<comment><USER6> How much of the cause of the diabetes endemic is Nestle though? Isn't lack of nutritional education more to blame?

It's easy to come down hard on the smoking industry due to the chemically addictive nature and serious health hazards of the product, but there are many consumers who moderate their fat and sugar intake. And then there are diabetics who don't consume any Nestle products - so why can't they be given treatment manufactured from a conglomerate?

<comment><USER7> Agreed.

As someone with Type 1 diabetes (look up the difference if you don't know), I'm always interested in this distinction. Sugary foods neither "give people" nor cause Type 2 diabetes. _A person consistently consuming too many sugary foods over a long period of time_ causes themselves to be at higher risk for Type 2 diabetes.

Cigarettes are a different beast, due to the chemically-addictive nature of them (although in this day and age, one could make the argument that people of all ages should know better than to start smoking, and should thus bear responsibility for the outcome - but that's another discussion for another time).

Cigarettes != sugar. End of story.

<comment><USER8> It is possible one day cigarettes will be considered a minor evil in comparison with sugar. Just you wait.

<comment><USER6> Only if second-hand sugaring becomes a trend and manages to beat out second- hand smoke in the evil dept.

It's interesting how hyper-aware western and particularly U.S. cultures are of sugar and fat. From the 1990's there's still the stigma that eating _any_ sugar and fat will make you fat.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The other day I went to buy some canned refried beans. When I read the label, I noticed that it contained refined sugar. WTF?!? There should be no need for sugar in refried beans! After recovering from the shock, I went to another grocery store, where I found refried beans without sugar.

Why does this happen? Obviously, sugar tastes good. That has to be why companies add it to all sorts of things. However, if most people were like me, they would read the label and refuse to buy anything that unnecessarily contained sugar. The companies doing this would lose money, and soon stop doing it. But the opposite has happened. Why?

There can only be one explanation: most consumers are dumb. However, when you read about stuff like this in the mainstream media, it's always framed as if "big evil corporations" is the whole problem. That "average Joe" has a low intelligence is never mentioned. Of course, the media wants as many consumers as possible, too, so calling most of their potential readers/viewers stupid is probably a bad strategy, even though it's the truth.

<comment><USER10> I don't know if dumb is the right word. Ignorant is probably most apt.

I want you to think about all of the food that's in your house. Eliminate anything that you would consider intentionally sugary like candy, confection, soda, etc. Now how much of a time consuming task would it be to scrutinize every label for needlessly added sugar? Consider how many people would be willing to do that to check for some extra sugar?

And that's why, I believe, companies can throw extra sugar in their products without most of the public being none the wiser. Not only would you have to check your current inventory, you'd have to stay abreast of the issue _every time you went shopping_. If you went shopping for the entire month like me, you'd spend an extra hour in the store reading labels to check for newly added sugar.

<comment><USER11> Time consuming? I read the label of every product I buy when I go to the supermarket. If I do it often enough, I keep track of what's got added sugar and I just don't buy those anymore. It isn't that hard.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Yamaha wants to sell you noise-canceling headphones, and a motorcycle.

<comment><USER13> Although most people know Yamaha as a manufacturer of motor bikes and possibly electronics its origins are in manufacturing music instruments.

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

"Yamaha was established in 1887 as a piano and reed organ manufacturer by Torakusu Yamaha as Nippon Gakki Company, Limited (日本楽器製造株式会社 Nippon Gakki Seizō Kabushiki Kaisha?) (literally Japan Musical Instrument Manufacturing Corporation) in Hamamatsu, Shizuoka prefecture and was incorporated on October 12, 1897. The company's origins as a musical instrument manufacturer are still reflected today in the group's logo—a trio of interlocking tuning forks"

Today it's the world's largest manufacturer of music instruments. The range covers just about anything on which you can play a tune.

Branching into motorcycles and electronics happened only after WWII.

So, yeah, they probably know a thing or two about acoustics.

Edit : Better legibility

<comment><USER12> Those instruments are consistently good. I wouldn't have any apprehensions about picking up a Yamaha guitar.

Motor bikes can be musical instruments too. There is some yatsu in the Noda city area in Chiba, Japan who likes to ride his motorcycle down the Tsutsumidai road at wee hours in the morning, revving the throttle in neutral to play rhythmic, somewhat tuneful patterns with the engine.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZ7oht6TD9c](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZ7oht6TD9c)

<comment><USER15> "let us never tolerate outrageous conspiracy theories" Mickey Mouse

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Diabetes is not always a byproduct of over consuming sugar and a company producing sugary snacks and diabetes pills does not force or even encourage over consumption of sugar.

I don't see what the actual problem is.

<comment><USER17> "does not force or even encourage over consumption of sugar."

Actually they do encourage you to eat a lot of sugar. Specially children. Their marketing campaigns are specially tailored to that objective. Just look at the cereal advertisements, most of their cereal brands have a lot of sugar in them.

If that is not encouraging over consumption of sugar I don't know what is...

<comment><USER18> Their marketing is designed to sell cereal. People unfortunately are happiest (short term) to consume sugary cereal. They really are.

I met a breakfast food operative in the supermarket once. I told him I thought his company should offer a low sugar version. He said everyone tells them to do so, but once it's on the shelves it does not sell.

People want less sugar in the abstract. But they love sugar in their shopping carts, in the mornings, and in their mouths.

<comment><USER19> So they're not encouraging people to consume sugary stuff, they're encouraging people to consume a category of food where people prefer sugary stuff?

This is about as sensible as saying that Krispy Kreme isn't pushing sugary foods, people just happen to prefer donuts with lots of sugar in them.

<comment><USER18> What would you have Krispy Kreme do? Pivot to Kimchi Kombucha?

<comment><USER19> I don't know. I just think that if we're going to talk about what companies encourage customers to do through their marketing, we should be straight about it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> > Nestlé Wants to Sell You Both Sugary Snacks and Diabetes Pills

...and they want to "own" the water.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_pb6r8VNWk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_pb6r8VNWk)

<comment><USER21> Can we stop this "Nestlé thinks water isn't a human right" BS already?

[http://www.nestle.com/ask-nestle/human- rights/answers/nestle...](http://www.nestle.com/ask-nestle/human- rights/answers/nestle-chairman-peter-brabeck-letmathe-believes-water-is-a- human-right)

I'm far from being a fan of Nestlé, but there are better arguments against their conduct than a single quote from the CEO years ago, misquoted and out of context.

<comment><USER22> That's fascinating. I've been boycotting Nestlé for many years based on documentaries and articles in German-language media. I've just tried to dig up some English articles for the first time, but they are _much_ harder to find.

Compare the German-language version of Nestlé criticism on water:

[https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nestlé#Trinkwasser](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nestlé#Trinkwasser)

...to the English one:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nestlé#Bottled_water](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nestlé#Bottled_water)

There was even a documentary on German public TV recently, pretty cheesy stuff, but starting at 32:49 the journalists are interviewing local politicians in Mexico about a Nestlé selling water from local reserves:

[http://www.daserste.de/information/ratgeber- service/montagsc...](http://www.daserste.de/information/ratgeber- service/montagscheck/videos/der-nestl-check-1-100.html)

So while I can't translate all this content right now, the tl;dr is that in practise, Nestlé does not seem to believe in water as a human right. Otherwise, why sell water from areas where it is already scarce?

<comment><USER23> > Nestlé does not seem to believe in water as a human right. Otherwise, why > sell water from areas where it is already scarce?

Selling is often the best way to manage scarce resources, particularly in the presence of a government that cannot be trusted to effectively ration them.

Most reasonable people don't object to companies selling food or clothing.

<comment><USER24> If by "manage" you mean "make sure the scarce resource goes to the highest bidder". That's not the same as maximizing overall happiness, because purchasing power ≠ capacity for happiness. In fact it's often the reverse. The person who can get the most happiness from a glass of water might be the least able to afford it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> It's the Wall-e Scenario. If we can find a way to continue to consume cheap, shelf-stable, nutrient-dense food; while at the same time repairing our bodies from the side effects, we can be fat blobs living and consuming and growing the economy.

And whether that's unilaterally a bad thing may not be a settled question. The top 5 drugs in the US[1] are remedies for problems caused by advanced society - a statin, antacid, blood thinner, inhaler and antidepressant. They enable many of the affordances we provide for ourselves.

[1][http://www.m.webmd.com/a-to-z- guides/news/20110420/the-10-mo...](http://www.m.webmd.com/a-to-z- guides/news/20110420/the-10-most-prescribed-drugs)

<comment> k-mcgrady I'm curious how the final to drugs you've listed are for problems caused by advanced society. I can sort of see where you may be coming from regarding asthma but not antidepressants.

<comment><USER26> Regarding asthma: it is currently considered to be an auto-immune disorder. The latest theory I read is that the lungs need to develop their own resistance to infection; more specifically, developing lungs need exposure to hazards to tune the immune system and prevent overreactions of the immune system later [1].

Regarding antidepressants: there exist strong links between depression and stress. Current society is arguably more hectic and stressful than what we've had before, but I'm not sure if that is fixable (it is, however, one of the reasons I use an ad-blocker).

[1] [https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/06/140606091157.h...](https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/06/140606091157.htm)

<comment> k-mcgrady Interesting theory on asthma. I also wouldn't be surprised if it was one of those things that just gets diagnosed a lot more than in the past. For example I've been diagnosed since I was around 10 but despite it being quite bad when I exercise I rarely use medication and have never had an attack. I get out of breath much more easily than a regular person but I'm guessing in the past it just wouldn't have been diagnosed as there was really no episode that led to the diagnosis other than the doctor measuring the strength of my breath during a routine visit I believe.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> > In a 2013 review of published research, scientists affiliated with France's > national scientific institute wrote that sugar and sweets "can not only > substitute [for] addictive drugs, like cocaine, but can even be more > rewarding and attractive." Although sugar is "clearly not as behaviorally > and psychologically toxic," cravings for it can be just as intense, they > said.

So... how do we measure behavioral and psychological toxicity? What does that actually mean?

Feels like they're trying to escape cognitive dissonance with weasel words here.

<comment><USER28> i see the following difference here:

craving - how long you can resist consuming the substance giving for example $1K/per minute reward for every minute you resist :) It seems that they are saying that cocaine and sweets are the same.

behavioral and psychological toxicity - the "bad" consequences, internal and external, associated with the habit of consumption of the substance. We do know that these consequences are different between cocaine and sweets.

<comment><USER27> Thanks for the reply, but this still doesn't clarify anything... what is "behavioral and psychological toxicity"? I was under the impression that the "bad consequences" of these drugs was the risk of damage to the body, but the phrasing implies that they're _not_ talking about physical/physiological toxicity. So what's left? Does using cocaine turn you into an asshole or something? What behavioral/psychological changes are there beyond those associated with the regular consumption of _any_ addictive substance?

<comment><USER29> > What behavioral/psychological changes are there beyond those associated with > the regular consumption of any addictive substance?

Not many, and that's precisely the point: in terms of additivity, the neural receptors involved are essentially the same as those involved in other drugs; and in terms of toxicity, it's metabolized essentially the same as alcohol. Give a fruit juice or a whisky to a 4-year old, and it's about the same (minus the dizzy high of/c).

<comment><USER27> I agree, which is why I was trying to point out that the authors were using this BS idea of "behavioral/psychological toxicity" to try to explain why sugar wasn't _really_ the same kind of thing as cocaine or other addictive drugs.

I'm annoyed that they shied away from this equivalence, but not because I want people to treat sugar like it's an addictive drug... I want people to recognize that being addicted to something (like sugar or cocaine or alcohol or coffee) is _not_ the great evil it's made out to be, and to realize that our drug laws are completely incoherent. The authors use weasel words to avoid equating sugar and cocaine because then people would wonder why one is legal/normalized and the other is illegal/stigmatized. They have to find some way to maintain the distinction.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> _" On Oct 18 the US company Genzyme announced it had formalised an agreement to acquire Cell Genesys for approximately US$350 million. This move follows an agreement by the pharmaceutical division of Japan Tobacco, the world's third- largest tobacco company, to purchase the rights to therapeutic and preventive lung-cancer vaccines under development by Cell Genesys and another American biotechnology company, Corixa. If the vaccines are approved, Japan Tobacco will find itself in the unusual position of marketing products that cause, prevent, and treat the same disease."_

Murray, S. (1999) Kill or cure, confused messages from Japan Tobacco. _The Lancet_ , 354(9188), p.1456.

<comment><USER31> Why not both? It's an arms race. Why not supply both sides?

<comment><USER30> What, let a company supply a substance to intentionally harm people so they can sell them a cure?

I can see that going down well in other industries. The automobile industry can engineer metal fatigue into their axle joints and sell you replacements. Microsoft can build bugs into Windows and sell you critical updates to fix the flaw. Chair makers can sell you chairs with legs attached by screws that are slightly too short so they can sell you more screws of the correct size to allow you to remain safely seated...

I guess it would stimulate the economy.

<comment><USER32> "What, let a company supply a substance to intentionally harm people so they can sell them a cure?"

Let's not forget our history here, since it wasn't exactly all that long ago. For decades, the consensus has been that the root cause of dietary issues is excessive fat in the diet, not sugar. Sugar was on the top of the food pyramid not because it was "bad" for you, but merely because it displaced other better things. I've been flame-roasted on HN in the last few years for being on the anti-sugar side, because consensus science and official government positions were strongly against the idea. It still isn't even the consensus today that sugar is the problem.

(My read on the current situation is that the evidence strongly indicates that sugar is a major problem, though probably not the only one, and that the government is moving as quickly as it can to adjust its recommendations while _never having to admit they were in any way wrong_ , which is a process that takes many, many years of little slight tweaks so that at every point they have cover to claim this is what they were saying all along. Such moral cowardice where they'd rather let millions of people continue hurting and dying rather than take even a hint of responsibility is why I don't take my scientific cues from the government and recommend against anyone else doing it either.)

Trying to show that Nestle is "deliberately harming" people would require basically claiming that they should have _known_ all nutrition science and government position was wrong and to some extent _is_ wrong, since treating "Sugar is bad" as consensus is still premature!

(The mercy is that nobody has ever said it's _good_ for you, unlike transfats, so nobody really looks at you _too_ weirdly if you drop it out of your diet.)

<comment><USER33> _the root cause of dietary issues is excessive fat in the diet, not sugar._

Anything excessive in the diet will lead to gaining weight and eventually to obesity.

I can not say which will lead to diabetes faster, consuming extra 1000 calories daily in fat or in sugar, but in terms of fat gain results will be similar.

The government recommendations are most unfortunate, as they concentrate on macronutrients. So when *fat is bad" people will start eating sugary snacks, and when eventually it changes to "sugar is bad", fat will be added to everything instead of sugar.

It would be more positive to suggest eating more whole, unprocessed foods, but I'm sure political issues will never allow that.

<comment><USER32> Do you think you're disagreeing with me somehow? My post was about history. Giving me an example of someone concretely stating some modern opinion doesn't change history. Even if you are totally correct, which I do not stipulate, you're opinions are still _recent_.

Having made sure to stay focused on my core point, I'm going to point out that you're basically begging the question. The model of diabetes as unrelated to the form of incoming calories is the standard model, and that is specifically what is being questioned. Basically just reiterating the standard model isn't really an argument. And it's not that hard to imagine that sugar really is related when we are discussing _the mechanism the body uses to regulate sugar_. Specifically _sugar_ , the pancreas is not responsible for regulating some sort of ontological "generic obesity particles".

<comment><USER33> _Do you think you 're disagreeing with me somehow?_

Probably. I think the following is still controversial:

 _My read on the current situation is that the evidence strongly indicates that sugar is a major problem_

There are multiple possible causes, or a combination of any number of such causes

\- Excessive sugar

\- Excessive fat

\- Combination of fat and sugar

\- Excessive calories

What is the root cause? I currently tend to think that the problem started to really accelerate when a lot of processed foods manufactured to be extremely palatable by hitting just the right combination of fat and sugar, entered the market.

For references, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bliss_point_(food)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bliss_point_\(food\)) and the book "Salt, Sugar, Fat" by Michael Moss.

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

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Nestle is trying to avoid the trap Coke and McDonalds fell into: Only offering unhealthy food choices and loosing the young generation of health-conscious consumers. They can't go the Wholefoods way since organic is inherently more expensive and harder to scale. Nestle is a food-tech company that wants to feed the globe. Now they try to do it in a more healthy way. I don't know why Bloomberg is so negative about that.

</comment><comment><USER35> One of the supplements shown in the article is Deplin, which contains L-methylfolate, and supposedly helps with depression.

Any ideas on how this supplement works? And how many people would benefit from it?

<comment><USER36> The supplement works best for those with an MTHFR gene defect, where the body does not create enough 5-MTHF (L-methylfolate). I have c677t heterozygous type mutation and I take 5mg of a generic brand. It helps with methylation process which is very complicated, so I won't try to paraphrase. There is a decent amount of information online you could read up on, though. I would not suggest 5-MTHF for people who do not have the genetic defect, though I imagine a very small dose per day may be helpful, but then again I am no doctor.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> This is analogous to cigarette companies selling nicotine gums. The largest cigarette company in India -- [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITC_%28company%29](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITC_%28company%29) \-- sells nicotine gums[1] too!

[1] [http://www.kwiknic.in/](http://www.kwiknic.in/)

</comment><comment><USER38> Nestle is generating a ton of money, and periodically invests in unrelated industries sometimes very successfully like with Alcon.

</comment><comment><USER39> What if the article were "Walmart Wants to Sell You Both Sugary Snacks and Diabetes Pills"? Because, I mean, Walmart does sell both of those in their stores.

</comment><comment><USER40> People simply do not have time to read the ingredients on every product they buy. Maybe force producers to show amount of sugar lumps on the label.

</comment><comment><USER41> I think it's time to go either buy simple fresh product or go buy soylent joylent Huel and others. The food industries is only making us fat!

</comment><comment><USER42> There's a lot of discussion on here about stupid consumers vs evil corporations, etc. As is often the case, the blame lies with just about everyone involved to some extent. The US government choose to promote a low fat diet with it's original nutrition guidelines in the 70s [4] which led the public to demand the food companies to produce low fat everything in the 80s and into the 90s. It's now emerged that there was little evidence to support the health benefits of a low fat diet.

When you remove fat from food it becomes unpalatable unless.... you add sugar. Thus the increase in added sugar in just about everything which has helped to contribute to the rise of obesity and metabolic syndrome and all the diseases that come with it from diabetes to fatty livers, heart disease, etc.

So who's to "blame"?

The government in some ways, even though they seemingly meant well when recommending low fat diets (they're just now beginning to recommend reduced sugar and ease up on fat warnings).

Food companies in some ways who seem to have known about sugar's addictive properties and engineered their food to keep you coming back for more rather than keeping you healthy [3].

Consumers in some ways for not reading labels, exercising more, reducing portions, etc. But who could blame you when the government and the food companies were trying to convince you that what you were eating was good for you? (unless you had time to dive into the research yourself but let's face it, that's not an option for 99% of people)

One of the best explanations I've read of not just why sugar (fructose to be specific) is bad for you (in the quantities Americans but also most of the world eats it at) is the book "Fat Chance" by Robert Lustig [1]. You can also get a glimpse into his arguments via his youtube lectures [2].

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/Fat-Chance-Beating-Against- Processed/d...](http://www.amazon.com/Fat-Chance-Beating-Against- Processed/dp/0142180432/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1462804311&sr=8-1&keywords=fat+chance)

[2] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM)

[3] [http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/food-cravings-engineered-by- in...](http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/food-cravings-engineered-by- industry-1.1395225)

[4] [http://time.com/3702058/dietary-guidelines-fat- wrong/](http://time.com/3702058/dietary-guidelines-fat-wrong/)

</comment><comment><USER43> Any company that sells sugary snacks does its best to get people to consume as many of them as possible, right?

</comment><comment><USER44> So does almost every pharmacy in the US. (CVS, Walgreens, Walmart, Target, my local independent, etc.)

Who cares?

</comment><comment><USER45> They're just closing the loop, like an good entrepreneur would do.

</comment><comment><USER46> While Nestlé's each subsidiaries and brands might have their own business motives to sell / market their own products (a lot of them have long been well-known consumer brands with a long history), the title does sound more troubling than it appears.

</comment><comment><USER47> A fantastic example of create a problem, solve it, make billions!

</comment><comment><USER48> This what they mean by "vertical integration" right?

</comment><comment><USER49> One is for current users. Other is for future users :)

</comment><comment><USER50> The nature of unbounded capitalism in one sentence.

<comment><USER51> precisely. Capitalism has no moral compass.

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> Seems like a sound strategy.

</comment><comment><USER36> The article was an interesting read until I hit the picture showing Deplin. I want to share my story about this drug. After having a DNA test done and finding out I had an MTHFR gene mutation, my psychiatrist prescribed me that orange pill. She had lots of samples, too, which I was grateful for as it was extraordinarily expensive. i.e. not covered by insurance since it's technically a "medical food". I paid for it anyways, because she sold it to me as "a magical cure" of sorts and I won't lie, that seemed appealing to me. Something new? After all this struggle? Sure, fuck it, let's try it. I will leave out my backstory and detail about my condition for the sake of brevity (something I'm not very good at).

5-MTHF did work for me, albeit at a MUCH lower dose of 5mg. Some people even get relief from 1mg. But... Deplin comes in 7mg and 15mg doses. My new doctors in Seattle (Naturopaths, not psychiatrists) have advised me that even 7mg is quite a bit of extra 5-MTHF. I don't know the scientific details behind this, but I know from experience, 15mg was entirely way too much for my body and I experienced excruciating periods of "overmethlyation" (extremely high anxiety, all sorts of sensory hallucinations, very uncomfortable!).

The doctor that did the DNA test advised 15mg. Not my psychiatrist. It was just a note scribbled on the front of the DNA results packet. I didn't know anything about 5-MTHF at the time so I did not argue and began on the 15mg. Psych didn't say anything, either: i was only her 3rd patient trying Deplin.

I was completely unstable until I titrated the dose 8 months later: I'd been mistaking most of the symptoms for benzodiazapine withdrawal and didn't think to blame the Deplin for being uncomfortable. I was too unstable to properly judge my mental state. at the time, I had subconsciously thought: why would I question the Deplin? My psychiatrist told me that it was made for people like me (who have the genetic defect). No way it could be hurting me.

I wonder how many other mental health patients are being tortured by a similar conundrum right now? (Tortured may seem a bit harsh, but overmethlyation is something I would not wish on my enemies...) Further, I wonder how many people are being suggested Deplin as they were Prozac, in a case where a doctor doesn't know anything about MTHFR gene and thinks it's just a fancy new drug to try out?

I wish there was more information about the supplement's effects and its dosages available for psychiatrists. About a year later, I began ordering 5-MTHF (the main component of the 'drug') from Amazon for 1/3 of the price. You can also get it made at compounding pharmacies for cheaper.

I feel terrible thinking about other people who may think they are locked into paying for Deplin because their psychiatrist does not know any better. I think what Nestle is doing may be good for profits, by making an illusion of a 'unique solution', but at the same time it makes my stomach turn. Thanks for reading.

</comment><comment><USER53> I wonder if it will ever hit the mainstream that Nestle put plastic filler in jar baby food in order to drive sales as babies would need to eat more baby food because they would simply pass the plastics. If anyone's interested in pursuing the story, they funded research into how much plastic could be added without causing health problems.

<comment><USER54> Sounds like conspiracy bait to me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER55> And don't forget Milk based products [http://www.diabetes.co.uk/causes-of- type1-diabetes.html#milk](http://www.diabetes.co.uk/causes-of- type1-diabetes.html#milk)

</comment><comment><USER56> This is the same company whose CEO said water is not a human right... Would we honestly expect anything less from these guys?

</comment><comment><USER31> Would it make you feel better if they had a subsidiary do it under a different name and you didn't know. Or even a different company do it? It's all the same economy stupid. You have a problem with the basic assumptions and ethics of the economy, nothing more.

The economy is sort of a blind watchmaker, it is optimized to produce profit for the Capitalist class and jobs for the worker class. Everything else does not matter to it. Whether it pollutes the planet, makes fatties, limits the chances of human survival. It knows nothing but to do the two above things. Everything else is someone else's problem.

And at the same time governments in the so-called free world have been advocating to help it do this more freely without any constraints from the would-be control mechanisms like pesky governments which would control this sort of behavior.

</comment><comment><USER57> ITT: fat people making all sorts of excuse for Nestle

is this reddit?

</comment><comment><USER58> if you have pre-diabetes, type 2 diabetes Or you know someone with this conditions, You need to see this Video [http://www.diabeteszone.info/](http://www.diabeteszone.info/)</comment>


Pebble smart watch shipping to Kickstarter backers on January 23rd - <AUTHOR> http://www.engadget.com/2013/01/09/pebble-smart-watch-shipping-to-kickstarter-backers-on-january-23/

<comment><USER2> I'm not a backer, but I've heard people on Twitter make fun of the Pebble for being a bit bulky, a bit dorky, or even "a useless novelty product that will burn out faster than the Slap Chop". But these people are short-sighted, and should be ignored, because they're missing what the Pebble represents.

The Pebble is one of the first entrants into the relatively young hardware category of wearable computers. So is Google Glass, FitBit, Jawbone, and others. But the Pebble has a place in there too. Being able to access your iMessages, Email or Calendar without taking out your phone is actually a pretty useful skill. And once people get over the "dork factor" (remember the first iPhone users?), they'll pay for a device like Pebble if it offers enough convenience.</comment>


Is the Tech Bubble Popping? Ping Pong Offers an Answer - <AUTHOR> http://www.wsj.com/articles/is-the-tech-bubble-popping-ping-pong-offers-an-answer-1462286089#:L4aDEmv0SHXbJg <comment><USER2> I usually notice that if a company is not doing well, coworkers stop hanging out as much. If the coworkers are really friends, they might talk about how they are getting out. But generally, people get more distant.</comment>