Google CEO says company genuinely struggling with employee trust - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/10/25/google-ceo-leaked-video-says-company-is-genuinely-struggling-with-employee-trust/ <comment><USER2> I don't think anyone is surprised by this struggle.

I have noticed in my life that there are people who operate on a principle that is sometimes called out as "It's not illegal if you don't get caught." Clearly that statement isn't literally true. The essence of the colloquialism is that rules are "arbitrary" and following them, when you don't have to fear the consequence of breaking them because you are unlikely to get caught violating them, is for "chumps." (sorry, another colloquialism).

What is lost on people is that people who don't follow rules erode trust. Especially when they could have easily followed a rule and didn't anyway. That trust erodes and is difficult if not impossible to recover. And not surprisingly those same people who are so happy to have "gotten away with it" have no idea that at some point in the future they are going to need that trust and it won't be there.

<comment><USER3> This is not about people skirting the rules, this is a poignantly political concern.

"Hiring an exec who supported Trump's travel ban" is purely a political issue. Temporarily halting travel from a list of countries designated by the Obama administration as 'dangerous' \- specifically because there's a degree of lawlessness and/or the governments can't/won't cooperate with background checks etc. has very reasonable arguments supporting it. (FYI the nations were Libya/Yemen/Syria/Somalia/Sudan/Iraq - all of which have dysfunctional governments unable to provide reliable identity information - and Iran, which has other problems). Note that Egypt, Tunisia, Lebanon, Kuwait, Indonesia, Saudi, Oman, Pakistan etc. etc. and the vast majority of states with many Muslim citizens were not affected.

Contextualising this within Trump's ugly rhetoric is another thing entirely and this part subject to interpretation.

If Googlers are going to be discontent about an issue like this then I'm afraid it's game over for their peace - because they are effectively internalising American political discord.

Google's direct participation in China etc. is another issue entirely, much more salient as it directly reflects 'what Google is doing' \- but even this can be very complicated.

Google is essentially 'choosing' a very specific political ethos which is problematic in itself because most of us tend to confound our own version of morality with that of others in a very intolerant manner.

<comment><USER2> > "Hiring an exec who supported Trump's travel ban" is purely a political > issue.

Yes it is. And that issue is that the person did something in a previous job which many employees found repugnant.

But the _trust_ issue, is that the employees also don't trust that Google has the integrity to hire someone who did that, without understanding the whys of it. Or being sensitive to both their existing and new employee on the issue.

If I were in Google management, and I had the trust of the people I managed, I could explain to them the reasoning that went into the hire; The skills that came with the candidate, the business need, the qualities of the candidate. And the sensitivity around their previous job choices and how they made those choices (most people do what the boss tells them to do) and what was expected of them at a place like Google. And the people who trusted me would expect me to hold the new hire to those standards and to fire them if they didn't live up to them. I would be able to lean on that trust and say, "Hey, we need to give this guy a chance to prove he can do the right thing and we and he both understand he is held to a higher standard here."

Folks I managed wouldn't trust me if they had found out that I had allowed a sexual harasser to work for me after I knew that they had a problem. That is because they would lose trust in me saying that I would hold people to a certain standard.

That is the difference in a "only if you get caught" situational morality play. Someone with principles and integrity will take the necessary action, even if it is painful, even when they could "get away with it because nobody else knows."

It is a good litmus test. That test being to evaluate how you respond to people who do the right thing even when no one is looking, and to people who do the right thing only after the need to do it comes to light through some other path. In my experience, I trust people who do the right thing even if no one is watching way more than I trust the opportunists.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Well, here's a few things off of the top of my head that have eroded my trust:

1\. Contracts with the Department of Defense

2\. Participation in project PRISM

3\. The Google Graveyard ([https://killedbygoogle.com/](https://killedbygoogle.com/))

4\. Abandoning "Don't be evil"

<comment><USER5> > 2\. Participation in project PRISM

I'm an ex-Googler, and I know how PRISM worked. This did not happen. All the statements made in [https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/06/what.html](https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/06/what.html) are true at the time they were written. The sentiment in the title of that post accurately reflects how everybody involved felt about it.

(I can't talk about whether they're still true because I've not been there in nearly two years, I wouldn't know)

<comment><USER6> > I'm an ex-Googler, and I know how PRISM worked. This did not happen.

But from the blog:

> We had not heard of a program called PRISM until yesterday.

Does not match up

<comment><USER7> Sure it matches up.

The poster, today, is aware of how PRISM worked.

The blog author, then, was not aware that PRISM existed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Google is struggling with "transparency at scale" which is just business speak for "our employees won't just shut up and do their jobs".

<comment><USER9> In a way. Transparency at scale is truly challenging because as you grow bigger you naturally end up with more diversity of opinions and thoughts. Diversity (and transparency) isn't _easier_ \-- though it is of course valuable. When you combine autonomy at the lower levels with large quantities of diversity your company moves in lots of directions. What they're struggling with IMO is either (1) front-line folks have too much autonomy and are moving in directions that no longer reflect the views of leadership or (2) the beliefs of the executive team do not materially line up with those of the majority of employees anymore.

In either case, it's a tough problem to be sure.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Got news for you, it's not just employees.

</comment><comment><USER11> I'm not convinced that it would be bad for shareholders to properly split the company, instead of having a holding like Alphabet.

I don't think you can mix a defense contractor and an advertising company that has a lot of public scrutiny, for the same reason tobacco companies and breakfast cereal companies tend to be separate entities (despite doing essentially the same thing: selling agricultural commodities to consumers).

<comment><USER12> What I genuinely don't understand about all these split up tech companies arguments, is I don't see how you'll end up with a small company from this process (I also don't see why smaller is necessarily better, but that's a separate point). If you split google search and ads from everything else in alphabet, it's still a multi hundred billion dollar business. If you split Facebook proper from Instagram from the rest, you'll have a couple of multi hundred billion dollar companies. What makes a 500 billion dollar company less likely to do shitty things than a 900 billion dollar company, for any given definition of shitty?

<comment><USER13> _What makes a 500 billion dollar company less likely to do shitty things than a 900 billion dollar company, for any given definition of shitty?_

Because it's constrained to its niche. Let's say split search/ads from the rest of Google. It's still a money-printing machine but what can it spend that money on? It has to pay dividends to shareholders rather than propping up YouTube and GMail and Google Cloud and cross-pollinating data with them. Ditto if any of them become profitable. Shareholders win, regulators win, its good for everyone.

Us split-advocates aren't just knee-jerks, we have thought about this.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> " But many of the questions related to software embedded internally in Google's Chrome browser that employees worried was designed to monitor large gatherings. The software engages when employees try to create meetings for 100 or more workers. Pichai and others said the intent of the software is not to prevent meetings or to stifle conversation, but they acknowledged that its implementation was flawed. "

</comment><comment><USER15> As soon as TGIFs started leaking, Pichai had to start treating them like public press conferences, resulting in them now being completely devoid of content.

</comment><comment><USER16> Googlers are overwhelmingly young compared to what they used to be. What these people want most, beyond the usuals of money and perks, is for their employer to give them moral structure in life and the constant reassurance that they are good people - something they've been told since birth is the most important thing to be but with nearly no guidance on what that means, beyond the plots of Disney movies.

In effect they want Google to be a church and executives to be priests, preaching a moral code and equally importantly railing against heretics, sinners and apostates.

This need for a new religion can be seen in many walks of life but it seems strongest amongst those immersed in the university system for longest. They've never been judged by any system that wasn't artificial and based purely on the opinions of superiors - from school to college to promo committees and peer bonuses, very few of them have ever really hunted hard for a job, made a product themselves or taken any risky decisions. They've got nothing to give them self confidence and thus fall back on membership of a group identity defined by a mishmash of whatever ideas they picked up from others just like them. Google struggles with them the most because it has hired so many and because Google internally is such a poor approximation of the real world: absolutely stuffed with "rewrite X in Y" style projects and people that don't have any strong reason to be there.

The best way for Google to solve this is a major reduction in headcount, least experienced first. But I think headcount is rather sacred there as it's used as a proxy for ambition, so instead they will continue struggling to be as holy as their student staff demand.

<comment><USER17> I strongly disagree with this. In fact, what this criticism boils down to is akin to whining about the younger generation. What is happening at Google is actually the opposite of your first paragraph, the employees aren't looking to Google to give them moral structure, their using their own moral code to judge whether google is behaving morally and holding Google to account for it.

The fact that the employees are speaking out and in many cases actually taking direct action that will effect their career prospects is the antithesis of

>They've got nothing to give them self confidence

People with 0 confidence aren't conducting walk-outs, they aren't whistleblowing on Google's questionable military deals. The problem Google has is exactly the opposite- they market themselves as a morally good company and so they end up with a high number of people who view that as important working for them. When they fail to live up to those actual standards, the employees protest. I think trying to ascribe the protests to a lack of courage is a very strange conclusion.

<comment><USER16> I think you missed my point, which is quite tricky to put into words so I may have not done it well.

"Google" in that context doesn't mean exclusively its management, but rather, the whole group of people. When Googlers stage walkouts and so on they don't care much about the specific situations at hand. If it wasn't one thing it'd be another thing. This is clear from scratching the surface of their complaints in any detail: it's all built on very brittle foundations.

What they want is the feeling of collective moral action, of clarity of purpose, of being a part of something bigger than building the next chat app, and they're able to get that at Google where it wouldn't be tolerated at most companies. It's exactly because this sort of activity does _not_ affect their career prospects or might even enhance them that is why they do it: remember that their promotions aren't decided by management at Google but rather, by committees of the same sorts of people who are protesting.

 _People with 0 confidence aren 't conducting walk-outs, they aren't whistleblowing on Google's questionable military deals._

This is exactly what people with no self confidence _in their own goodness_ would do.

If they were secure in their own morality, in their own sense of living a right life, they wouldn't be attempting to find it by engaging in constant cultural crusades inside their own place of work. It seems quite clear to me that many of their supposed moral positions aren't well thought through and exist primarily so they can protest. In other words, the protests aren't a means to an end (change of policy by Google's management), the protests _are_ the end, in and of themselves, because it's via noisy displays of moral virtue that they find what they're truly looking for.

If you like I can go through some of the inconsistencies in the various positions their employees have taken.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I don't see where the problem is with hiring someone who supports Trump's travel ban. I disagree with it and I wouldn't want to drink a beer with that person, but on which level would this hinder me professionally working with that person so long as that person does not abuse their power for their political views, which we must assume, until it can be proven otherwise? Isn't that what democracy is all about? Has the work environment become so casual, that we cannot set aside our differences in a professional setting?

<comment><USER19> >I disagree with it and wouldn't want to drink a beer with that person.

Wow, are you projecting an image with that statement? Just realize that your attitude of blind judgement of others perpetuates this partisan divide. Not wanting to talk to someone based on a differing policy perspective is /exactly/ the problem. This breaks our republic. You should desire to try and understand their perspective and enlighten them to yours. Honestly sickening to read that.

<comment><USER18> Erm? I'm saying that I wouldn't want to spend my personal time with someone who supports that, that's my own business, but that I wouldn't mind working with them, because that's a professional environment.

The Googlers are the ones who'd do neither, so what do you think of them?

<comment><USER19> >that's my own business

And I'm saying that by not engaging with people you disagree with based on politics in your personal life you are shirking your civic duty. It's selfish, short sighted, and intellectually dishonest behavior. Seriously reconsider because it reveals a certain closed mindedness and breeds partisanship and tribalism in others; things I'm guessing you aren't for based on parent comments.

I think a business is a business, it has its own charter to follow and it seems fair that it's within the abilities of that charter to limit the speech of at-will employees to some extent.

I can't believe Google is putting up with this behavior from employees, and makes me think their hiring process needs a rework and reaffirms the feeling I have that Google has a culture of immaturity. It just seems like a personal attention grab to me on the part of the Googlers. They should leave if they feel so strongly. People who really think the people they work for are evil defect, possibly after leaking information or making a mess, but usually posthaste. Google is letting them make a mess right now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I'm surprised they still had any trust at all. I thought it was pretty obvious - especially after dragonfly - that the company is only going through the motions of caring to pacify their employees concerns.

The moral questions that face google's rank and file are so poorly discussed in the tech sector or by society at large I'm not surprised that they only get rankled when the company does something that can be blogged about with a hot take. I guess it's good that things like "military contracts" and "former Trump staffer" can penetrate thick skulls, but they're many many years past nip-it-in-the-bud phase. They have no intention of establishing an overarching moral philosophy and have set themselves up to just rationalize questions away as come up.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Google could improve.

<comment><USER21> Well you underestimate how complicated it is to run Google, and assumed Sundar isn't doing the best possible job.

<comment><USER22> Even if you don't underestimate Google, there are really 2 options: current management is not doing the best job, or they're doing the best job but the company size prevents improvements (Google itself should be changed).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Non-paywall link?

</comment><comment><USER24> Gee, I wonder why.

</comment><comment><USER25> "But many of the questions related to software embedded internally in Google's Chrome browser that employees worried was designed to monitor large gatherings. The software engages when employees try to create meetings for 100 or more workers.

Pichai and others said the intent of the software is not to prevent meetings or to stifle conversation, but they acknowledged that its implementation was flawed."

 _If I am not mistaken_ Google has recently made a change to its Chrome browser (77.0.3865.105) that removed the ability to disable javascript, cookies, etc. (via chrome://settings/content or clicking to the left of the address -- "site information" \-- in the address bar) for all websites _when in Guest mode_. It can still be disabled for individual websites.

 _Assuming I am not mistaken_ , suprisingly, I have not read anything about this change. Is it possible there was no intent to stop users from turning off javascript and cookies and this was simply another example of a "flawed implementation".

<comment><USER25> One theory is that the update is making it impossible for Chrome to save settings when in Guest Mode and chrooted in Developer Mode. Probably not intentional but frustrating because it will neither be noticed nor fixed by Google.

<comment><USER25> ChromeOS/Chrome gets new update and sure enough, problem is partially "fixed". Now there is a new settings page: chrome://settings/content/all

These settings seems to stick, however the ability to globally turn off cookies and javascript remains broken. Also, it is so time consuming to change settings for each site, one has to wonder if this inconvenience is deliberate.</comment></comment></comment>


T1: Secure Programming for Embedded Systems [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://t1lang.github.io/NorthSec-20190516.pdf <comment><USER2> Pascal, Oberon and Ada were left out of the options, yet quite a few companies do their business selling tooling on this space. And regarding Java, there are other alternatives.

[https://www.mikroe.com/mikropascal](https://www.mikroe.com/mikropascal)

[http://www.astrobe.com/default.htm](http://www.astrobe.com/default.htm)

[http://www.microej.com/](http://www.microej.com/)

[https://www.aicas.com/cms/](https://www.aicas.com/cms/)

[https://www.ptc.com/en/products/developer- tools/perc](https://www.ptc.com/en/products/developer-tools/perc)

[https://www.ptc.com/en/products/developer- tools/apexada](https://www.ptc.com/en/products/developer-tools/apexada)

[https://www.ghs.com/products/ada_optimizing_compilers.html](https://www.ghs.com/products/ada_optimizing_compilers.html)

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

<comment><USER3> I think the PDF link is a conference talk, so I'd guess that a more exhaustive review of options could be impractical in the time available.

<comment><USER2> One more reason for it to convein sound and relevant information.

A simple slide with an overview table would suffice, no need to deep dive into all of them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Top level link: [https://t1lang.github.io](https://t1lang.github.io)

Spec: [https://t1lang.github.io/t1spec.pdf](https://t1lang.github.io/t1spec.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER5> Strange move to name a security focused embedded programming language the same thing as Apple's security processor in the 2016/2017 MacBook Pro.

[https://appleinsider.com/articles/16/10/28/examined-the- new-...](https://appleinsider.com/articles/16/10/28/examined-the-new-macbook- pro-touch-bar-and-apples-t1-authentication-chip)

Names are hard I guess. But if you're going to pick a [letter][number] name it'd be hard to come up with one that has a worse naming collision.

Apple's moved on to T2 in their current machines, so beyond "Isn't that Apple's old security chip?" questions it probably won't run into much overlap, but first thought was "is this Apple releasing something related to the T1 chip?"

<comment><USER6> The down votes are unjustified. I expected to see a guide on programming the T1 chip.

<comment><USER7> The previous version of the language was called "T0" and used for BearSSL. They were first, not Apple.

<comment><USER5> "T" beats it when you search for T0 programming language on google, so I don't think that was a good idea either.

As far as I can tell T0 doesn't exist anywhere online, unless I'm confused and it's actually this Scheme dialect from 1982 and T0 is a specific version number under that?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> > There is no null pointer value. > • Reading from an uninitialized object > field triggers a runtime error

How is this a better option? The side doesn't mention the alternative to null. Option types?

Also, what does a runtime error mean in this context? Restart of the whole application? Part of the application? Whole devices stops?

<comment><USER9> > Reading from an uninitialized object field triggers a runtime error

Can we catch errors? If so, then this isn't so much an issue.

<comment><USER8> How is that different than a null pointer exception will all it's downsides?

<comment><USER10> The slides indicated they were contemplating very small systems without an MMU or memory protection. Without those, a null pointer dereference may not be able to generate an exception.

<comment><USER8> Run time check, just like what happens here, I suppose.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I love the premise (seems suitable for non-embedded domains that currently use C!) but I can't get over the Forth-like / postfix syntax.

<comment><USER12> Personally I don't mind unusual syntax. I do find it a bit problematic that programming languages seem to select syntax almost at random, or at least they don't tend to spend a lot of time explaining it [0]. A lot of special characters can quickly become less pleasant with a non-English keyboard however. Especially if the syntax is hard to predict (with for example autocomplete).

[0] [https://www.adacore.com/uploads_gems/Ada_Safe_and_Secure_Boo...](https://www.adacore.com/uploads_gems/Ada_Safe_and_Secure_Booklet.pdf)

<comment><USER13> It seems strange to call out Ada for "unexplained" and "unusual" syntax. The syntax is very similar to the syntax of Pascal, which was an enormously popular language at the time when Ada was designed.

<comment><USER12> I meant that Ada does explain its syntax (at least partly in that pdf), but many languages don't seem to. And when they do I can more easily accept whatever it is. It is when the syntax seems random I can't wrap my head around it.

<comment><USER13> Ah, OK. It looked like you were citing Ada as an example of the problem, not of the solution.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Rust is described as having "lots of automatic magic". Not quite sure what they are describing.

<comment><USER15> I would consider the `Deref` trait as well as the liberal use of `Into` etc in libraries to fall under this category. Not _fully_ automatic, but generally not clear from the callsite (which, in the case of `Deref`, is the `.` operator).

<comment><USER16> How is Into magic? All it does is save some typing. It's obvious at the point of use what it's going to do. I agree that deref is slightly magical.

<comment><USER17> They want to promote their own language and wanted at least two reasons against Rust (the first with lack of LLVM support for many smaller embedded platforms is true).

To me Rust is much easier to understand than C++. But C is still more straightforward.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What is the optimal iteration? - <AUTHOR> I have a powerpoint presentation Version 1 targeting industry executives.  The goal is to create the most convincing presentation. I have n friends (Manny, Moe, et al.), unassociated with the project, whose advice I respect.  Time is not an issue. Each of them have roughly the same role and experience in the industry, although they obviously have nuanced perspectives based on personal experience. Should I:<p>(A) Send Version 1 to each person independently.  Incorporate each of their comments. (B) Send Version 1 to Manny; incorporate his comments, then send as Version 2 to Moe, etc.? (C) Have them all on a conference call and making changes collectively? <comment><USER2> Unless you want to keep each friend's contributions private from each other, I would:

1) do (A)

2) incorporate all comments as necessary, crediting each participant with the issue raised (i.e. in a footnote). This both allows all participants to benefit from everyone's participation and acknowledges the contribution of each... and gives the opportunity of a de facto peer review of those contributions

3) do one more pass with the "final rev" candidate

<comment><AUTHOR> thanks for your input.</comment></comment>


The Last Court Jew: A New Biography of Benjamin Disraeli - <AUTHOR> http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-arts-and-culture/books/202918/the-last-court-jew <comment><USER2> _Disraeli almost single-handedly invented the lexicon of modern racial antiSemitism_

 _he was ... one of the first victims of modern anti-Semitism._

Another interesting Jew of that era:

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

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm not sure how any of the article's contents (and I've only read the first half) is meant to be less racist than "Koreans are good with technology".

</comment><comment><USER4> Page title reads "Sponsored Content". It's an ad for a book. May or may not be a good book, but this is an ad.

<comment><USER5> Yes, but " . . . on behalf of Yale University Press and their Jewish Lives series." Not merely an advert from some publisher.

<comment><USER6> Is this sarcasm? Yale University Press _is_ a publisher...</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Maximum1X2 – Beta MacOS App for processing sports bets - <AUTHOR> https://maximum1x2.com <comment><AUTHOR> Maximum1X2 is an amazing Mac software that will allow you to enjoy sports betting at a high level.

We are just showing the product. We would like that community help us to test the app and also validate it as a new product. This product serves both beginners and experts in the development of sports betting systems.

More info in our web. Greetings.

WEB: [https://maximum1x2.com](https://maximum1x2.com) (Betting Mac Software) TWITTER: [https://twitter.com/Maximum1X2](https://twitter.com/Maximum1X2) FACEBOOK: [https://www.facebook.com/Maximum1X2](https://www.facebook.com/Maximum1X2)</comment>


Tesla California sales beat Chrysler, Volvo, Cadillac, other big names - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/08/tesla-california-sales-beat-chrysler-volvo-cadillac-other-big-names/ <comment><USER2> Is anyone else tired of tesla PR and seeing 2 tesla articles here everyday? Great for you Tesla and Mr. Musk, your PR team is great.

How about posting some articles about the voltage regulation algorithm, or leak testing of lithium batteries ?

Something actually interesting would be nice.

<comment><USER3> Absolutely. I'm of course supportive of innovation but I've been troubled to see this community get carried a little too far away with Tesla. I submitted this article: [http://spectrum.ieee.org/energy/renewables/unclean-at-any- sp...](http://spectrum.ieee.org/energy/renewables/unclean-at-any-speed) sometime ago (which is actually a series of articles that discuss possible problems with recent EVs) and it got no attention. This seems to be a trend, anything critical of Tesla, even if it's from reliable sources like IEEE Spectrum gets ignored, anything that praises it is accepted with jubilation.

edit: Just to be clear I'm not attacking Tesla/Musk, I love them both. I'm peeved by everyone pretending or thinking EVs are solutions without any shortcomings whatsoever, and I'm peeved that we sometimes ignore/attack people who are in good faith just pointing out potential problems.

<comment><USER4> Hacker news audience. We love technology. We love entrepreneurs. The audience skews towards being more concerned than average about issues like energy depletion.

Elon Musk - superhero entrepreneur. Tackling big ideas (how often do you see comments in threads bitching how Silicon Valley doesn't tackle big ideas any more?). Addressing energy crisis problems. Building real, hard, technology.

Doing so in a way that is making money and beating an industry which has massive legislative protection, political support from all kinds of protectionist players, known lobbying organizations with a track record of killing innovation JUST like this.

Not sure that for this audience this is getting too carried away with Tesla. The Tesla story is the epitome of much that many many folks on here believe in, aspire to, and stand for.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> As a politically right-leaning person, I have an instinctive aversion to the state intervening in the process of the market and was convinced Tesla would end up along with Solyndra, Fisker, 123 etc in the pile of failures.

I will also say that I was clearly wrong in my prediction, and Tesla has been a great success (I guess the virtue of having political opinions but not political office is that one can actually admit they were wrong and change their mind).

I will state a view that (sadly) may very well be heresy on both sides of the political aisle: the success of Tesla is not a blanket validation of government intervention in green industry any more than the failure of, say, Solyndra is a blanket indictment of it.

Politics aside, I'd like to ask the question: why was the Tesla investment successful where others were not? Was there any pre-investment indicator that Tesla was more likely to succeed? Did it have something that others didn't?

<comment><USER6> There is no formula for success. You are on Y-Combinator, built on the notion of spreading risk around through diversification.

The DoE actually has a better record than most venture capitalists and angels, but in reality, you need a pile of failures to get a success. Failure is the engine of success, and the demand from the right that the government not do anything that might fail actually acts to increase government failure and expense, by making agencies so risk-averse that they spend way way more money on analysis and over engineering to avoid failures. That's one reason why SpaceX can beat NASA military contractors because they design and test to try to reduce failure to zero.

If you care about small, effective, cheap government, it would be paradoxically better IMHO, to let the government dole out cash like a VC with the expectation of 40 failures for every 1 mammoth success.

What I don't get is, people on the right never complain about all of the government failures on military spending. X-Ray lasers, planes and tanks that don't work, crazy and kooky DARPA projects. Hundreds of billions are flushed down the toilet, trillions if you look at the disaster that is the F-35/JSF, and here they are whining about Solyndra.

Isn't the huge military industrial complex a ginormous distortion of the market? Why is it so much more terrible for the government to fund early stage industry (which is relatively cheap), but perfectly ok to give huge incentives to oil companies in taxes, regulations, military and state department support, or to spend hundreds of billions on weapon systems that never get deployed or used?

I wonder if it has has more to do with cultural conservatism than fiscal conservatism. The kind of George Will "Fossil fuel Cars are American/Apple Pie, and Trains, electric cars, are squishy European stuff" feeling. Green energy = hippies, latte sipping coastal elites, not real 'mericans who drive gas guzzling SUVs across the plains.

<comment><USER7> The problem was the DoE gave out loans, not equity investments. If the DoE had received an equity stake in Tesla (and the others), then it would be a more apt comparison to VC and PE. As it stands, the DoE took on tremendous financial risks with little financial reward.

Regarding military waste- there are many conservatives who are just as upset about that. I don't think the media pays as much attention to it, for one reason or another, and thus it is not part of the day to day rhetoric.

Also, defense is also generally considered by conservatives to be the Federal Government's primary reason for existence. ("To provide for the common defense"). Spending a large percentage of the Federal budget on Defense initiatives therefore makes sense within this paradigm.

Lastly, there is a major problem in our society, both right and left, conservative and liberal, that believes that throwing money at any problem will automatically fix it. Is Education lagging? Spend more money on it! Need a next generation airplane and it isn't getting here fast enough? Throw some more money at it! Etc.

<comment><USER6> But when the government takes equity stakes, the right complains even more loudly about interference, especially if they are voting shares.

The purpose of the DoE isn't to invest to get monetary award, it's to invest to drive basic engineering forward. The government isn't as business and isn't supposed to derive a profit, that's the basic fallacy of the idea that the government's budget should reflect how CEOs run corporations.

Throwing money at research, science, and technology is pretty much how you get breakthroughs. As a said, there's no formula, breakthroughs are often serendipitous, unpredictable, and happen over long time scales.

I view technological advancements as exploring an infinitely large landscape of possibility. There are mountains of opportunity, but you don't know if a given mountain is worthwhile until you scale it, and you may fine nothing, or a local optima, in which you see a better mountain farther away. From the ground level, most of the mountains look the same, and the landscape is always shifting.

What is the best strategy for finding the successful mountains? Hire as many teams of climbers as possible and distribute them around the landscape far and wide. That's what capitalism is, that's what the startup economy is, it's lots and lots of people doing local hill climbing.

There are some mountains that are too big to climb, the gear is too expensive, and the time horizon to summit, too long. That's the government's role in basic R&D, to fund research and development at an early stage that is not economic, has little chance for ROI in the short or near term, stuff that even VC's won't touch.

Could any private company have built the GPS system all our phones used, if the government hadn't funded rocketry, satellites (most for military reasons?) You've talking from the 1950s until the 2000s when practical consumer GPS became a viable business. What company could have stomached 50 years of spending for ROI?

Much of the technology we have today is the result of government spending in the military, national labs, the space program, and state funded academic research. Often, the private companies are successful in taking the basic advancements and figuring out how to manufacture them, but it is usually the government that proved the basic design first.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Are these sales to Californians, or does this include sales made in California and delivered to another state because of the dealership issue?

<comment><USER9> The latter, which is why the figure is so skewed in favor of Tesla.

<comment><USER10> In which states was Tesla unable to sell cars in 2Q13? Of those states, would California have been the best place to import a Tesla from?

<comment><USER11> The biggest example is Texas, as they have laws that prohibit direct manufacturer-to-customer car sales. I think that Tesla has had some problems in New York and New Jersey as well.

As for California being the "best place," my guess is that it has nothing to do with being the best - it just happens to be be the spot where Musk said, "Well, we need to sell cars in states that won't allow us to sell things. Let's collect all of the infrastructure to serve these people in a place that's already selling a lot of cars. Let's choose California!"

<comment><USER12> Elon Musk was also able to pick up Tesla's Fremont, CA factory from other auto manufacturers for pennies on the dollar, which I'm sure had something to do with it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> > legislative efforts underway in Texas, North Carolina, Colorado, and > Virginia to prevent Tesla from dealing directly with customers and instead > conform to antiquated franchise laws requiring them to only sell cars via > independently owned car dealerships

I really don't understand this. This is like saying... I make a product and I can't sell the product that I've made myself. Someone else is required to sell it for me. This law seems unfair and ridiculous. Is there a reasoning/history behind this and how it came to be?

<comment><USER14> AT one time, showroom/service center combos were a very good thing for consumers. Consumers want to test drive many vehicles before they buy. They want to have a range of options on hand to chose from. After they buy, they want somewhere they can entrust their car to for repairs. In summary, the type of role the dealership fills was and possibly still is an important role in the automotive market.

This is where dealerships came from. Manufacturers, especially when they were smaller, didn't want to deal with establishing such a presence in every town in America, so they left it to private business.

This brings us to the existing franchise laws. I'm told the rationale goes like this; if a manufacturer were to suddenly decide to sell its own vehicles and cut out the middleman, said middleman would be completely and utterly screwed for obvious reasons. The laws, thus, are a form of guarantee for the prospective middleman. He knows his extremely capitol-intensive venture cannot be toppled two years later when the manufacturer decides to sell direct. If such protections were not in place, (so the story goes) entrepreneurs would be hesitant to start a dealership, the absence of which would have been a negative for everybody.

<comment><USER7> Of course, a strong franchise contract with the manufacturer would have fixed this problem just as well (probably better) as legislation. And it would have only applied to parties who agreed to the terms.

<comment><USER14> Sure, there's a bunch of ways to do it. I'm not taking a position on the legislation, merely trying to answer my parent's question.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> 0.6% market share

4714 out of 850712 cars

[http://www.cncda.org/secure/GetFile.aspx?ID=2583](http://www.cncda.org/secure/GetFile.aspx?ID=2583)

For comparison, Toyota is #1: 157,035

<comment><USER16> Thats their share of the total car market. Given that their portfolio only consists of one model, it's probably better to look at their specific segment: Luxury and Sports.

In that segment, they had a 12% market share YTD.

<comment><USER15> "Thats their share of the total car market."

Yes, which is what the article is about. This article is not about a specific segment. This article is about Tesla selling more vehicles than Volvo, Chrysler, and 8 other manufacturers.

<comment><USER17> When Android was gaining ground 2 years back, the iOS folks used to draw similar conclusions. "But look at the market share of iOS" which was 80% back then.

Today it's the reverse, Android is 80% while iOS is about 13% (IIRC).

We need to realize that the trends are much more important than the current market share. Also that markets grow (and also shrink sometimes). We also need to realize that all products have a end-of-life, which means existing customers can switch after their vehicles become old after a couple of years.

<comment><USER10> Uh...the trend is that Tesla sales increased 13,000%!

<comment><USER18> Wow, if they keep that up, they'll be 99% of the total car market in just a few years!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Am I the only one that doesn't care for the styling? It looks good from the back and side, but I don't like the big mouth in the front. Also not a fan of the lines on the dash and steering wheel.

Would still take one of course. ;)

</comment><comment><USER20> Kudos to Elon. What's with some of the hate for Tesla in the red states? Tesla is 100% American owned/operated.

<comment><USER21> During the 2012 election, before Tesla showed profitability, it was lumped in with other companies that were given government loans for developing "green" technologies. Many of those companies failed and most people, who did not see electric cars as viable, felt Tesla was going to join them. So, it was held as evidence of the Obama administration wasting tax payer money during a recession.

Now, Tesla is trying to sell vehicles around the traditional car dealer system. This system was setup to prevent the manufacturer from holding a monopoly on price and protect the local car dealer's investment in both inventory and services. So, Tesla is now seen as disrupting and depriving local businesses of potential sales and investment.

But, in reality, most people hate the car buying process and think it needs disruption.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Regarding requirement to sell through dealership ... This kinda "service proxy" (which can be easily eliminated but it's not) is a common problem in this economy. Same thing with real estate agents. Do we really need that RE agent for our house sale/purchase to go smooth? Why not just create one central official website where sellers and buyers can find each other and do all paperwork, money transfers, bidding and other stuff online according to strictly defined procedure? I don't see any technical difficulty here.

<comment><USER23> > _Same thing with real estate agents. Do we really need that RE agent for our > house sale /purchase to go smooth?_

Huh? No. For sale by owner is a thing, and plenty of people buy without agent help. The only reason to use an agent is to have someone else handle your paperwork and if you're selling, market your home. There is no law requiring you to use an agent.

In contrast, many states have franchise laws forbidding a car manufacturer from selling its own cars to the public.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> From a long-term cash perspective, it is likely that, due to the market segment, saturation may be reached faster as most UHNWIs that want one will have already purchased a unit already. But of not yet customers are at least un-convinced, conservatives, cheapskates, brand loyalists and bad timing quants that maybe microstrategized.

Without enough cash, what are the odds of Tesla pulling an iPhone 5C to tap others with six-figure incomes?

</comment><comment><USER25> With so many millionaire/wealthy hackers in California it is not so abnormal. Plus Tesla being based in this region they probably benefit from the proximity and the Silicon Valley Pride effect. Now I'd be really interested to see Tesla being more aggressive in cities like NYC/New Jersey and Boston. There are definitely quite a few well off people who would be charmed by the car.

</comment><comment><USER26> In the quest for zero emissions - we are creating the Electric Cars - I want to compare the environmental footprint of Electric car building vs Normal cars, there are interesting articles pointing to the fact the electric cars have bigger carbon footprint for manufacturing etc. I would love to have Cradle to Grave Carbon footprint of Cars not just during the operational phase.

<comment><USER27> If you're interested in following up on this you can start with some of the stuff Amory Lovins[1] has done at the Rocky Mountain Institute. He was one of the first people I am aware of to look at the entire life cycle of cars as a way of evaluating different options. I've not always agreed with his conclusions but I appreciate the clarity of his presentation and thinking.

[1] [http://www.rmi.org/Amory+B.+Lovins](http://www.rmi.org/Amory+B.+Lovins)

[2] [http://blog.rmi.org/blog_the_electric_car_lighter_less_costl...](http://blog.rmi.org/blog_the_electric_car_lighter_less_costly_plugged_in)

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Many people including me were skeptical about Tesla when it just came out. I'm surprised it became that popular at that price. On one hand it's good, because means that people are ready to pay more for technology and innovation.

<comment><USER28> Don't forget that they also care about the environment and the US dependence on foreign oil. They will also save money since they don't need to buy gasoline.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> I saw the other thread about Tesla S.... never heard of it up until now.. To be honest it seems like my dream car. Going to test drive one soon and buy the middle or top model of the S. So insanely sexy.

</comment><comment><USER30> They had to widen the columns in the chart to make room for Tesla's growth numbers. What is interesting is that Tesla is right behind BMW and Daimler for the "luxury and sports" segment.

<comment><USER15> Because in 2012, they sold 14 cars (during the same period last year)

<comment><USER30> Right, so it conveys little info, and is rather funny looking.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Hype.</comment>


If You Do This In An Interview, I Won't Take You Seriously - <AUTHOR> http://www.ruli.us/rulius/2011/12/4/if-your-company-does-this-i-wont-take-you-seriously.html

<comment><USER2> _You throw a programming puzzle at me, after you've looked at my portfolio, admitted it qualifies, and I explained in detail how I coded each item. If you do this, it shows me you're following a trend in the industry, but that you don't really have a good interview plan._

I just went through an interview, and I got a a puzzle to solve. Basically I had to design a controller for a traffic light at a 4 way intersection. I could use sensors, timers, etc. to control the timer. I could use as little or as much time as I wanted, and make my solution as simple or as complex as I wanted. Once I was finished, I had to present my solution to the tech team, including defending design/architecture choices I made. I thought it was an elegant way to introduce me to the team, and for them to get a feel for how I approach difficult problems and how I would balance time constraints, performance, and complexity on the job.

</comment><comment><USER3> The first point about the not liking programming puzzles made me not take the article seriously.

Its one thing for you to explain in detail things you did. Some of the best stories about how things are made are told by those who did what they were told and couldn't themselves actually have solved the problems.</comment>


How I monitor my VPS for free - <AUTHOR> http://adampatterson.ca/blog/2014/08/how-i-monitor-my-vps-for-free/

<comment><USER2> Not sure, it doesn't explicitly say in the article, but these scripts run on the same server as the stuff that it's hosting, correct? If so, that will mean that if the server is down, nothing is being monitored?

</comment><comment><USER3> You could you [http://mongu.ru](http://mongu.ru) nagios instances</comment>


The US government poisoned alcohol during Prohibition (2010) - <AUTHOR> http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_examiner/2010/02/the_chemists_war.html <comment><USER2> The alcohol used as torpedo propellant was that was often used by sailors to make "torpedo juice" ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torpedo_juice](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torpedo_juice)) so that ended up being tainted as well to render it undrinkable.

That was also a severely misguided effort.

<comment><USER3> I'm always kind of amused by the effort people will put into getting drunk throughout history.

<comment><USER2> If you're on a boat that's likely to fire torpedoes at the enemy then you're in one that's likely to be blown to pieces by the enemy at any moment without warning. In a situation like that I can empathize with people wanting to take the edge off.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Denatured alcohol (e.g., ethanol with added methanol to render it undrinkable) is still used today for industrial purposes since it's much cheaper than pure ethanol, which is heavily taxed:

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

<comment><USER5> And yet some people (mostly homeless and addicts) find a way to drink it anyway, with such strange methods like filtering through bread crusts.

I totally don't understand why article tries to blame government for all those deaths when it was clearly mob trying to make money.

<comment><USER6> If you take an action and know that there is a direct consequence that will kill people who have not done anything that could justify death (i.e. almost anything short of murder), you can't ignore that consequence. The only way to justify it is to say that for some reason, not acting would be unacceptable. And that is a high bar to clear, one that is obviously not met by the prohibition policy.

<comment><USER7> But it's not a direct consequence, that's the point. It's an indirect one, completely dependent on other people trying to renature it and drink it - ignoring warning labels like this one: [http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/warning- label...](http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/warning-label-from-a- pharmacy-bottle-of-denatured-alcohol-news-photo/146438213)

<comment><USER6> I should have avoided the word 'direct', because of that potential for confusion. What I meant is predictable.

<comment><USER7> But there's a big difference between consequences that are predictable because of nature (i.e. if I kick this rock it will hurt) and consequences that are predictable because of people's decisions.

The redistillers' resolve to keep selling even if they couldn't renature their product and it would be deadly - should that be treated the same as a force of nature? When should people's decisions be treated as a fact we just have to adapt to?

In my experience, people mostly want their own decisions, or the decisions of the people they agree with, to be treated as facts of nature. But the decisions of people they disagree with, they want to treat as their own free decisions.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Just like there are regularly reported "MDMA deaths" in the mainstream media despite MDMA never having been reasonably blamed for any death (beyond crazy "took 50x recommended dosage" or disingenuous "took something they thought was MDMA but was actually ketamine" cases).

<comment><USER9> > _despite MDMA never having been reasonably blamed for any death_

You're just plain wrong here. Ecstasy is a dangerous drug that can cause overheating, dehydration, and other very serious conditions that can and do result in death. Further, the drug's effects discourage the behaviors, like eating and drinking water in reasonable quantities, that are essential to preventing those conditions. With their sense of hunger and thirst totally haywire, some people try to overcompensate and end up dying from _too much_ water.

And as for the long-term effects of regular MDMA use: persistent brain damage and loss of cognitive function.

<comment><USER10> >drinking too much water and dying

Citation needed.

<comment><USER9> Definition: _Hyponatremia is a condition that occurs when the level of sodium in your blood is abnormally low. Sodium is an electrolyte, and it helps regulate the amount of water that 's in and around your cells._ [http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases- conditions/hyponatremia/b...](http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases- conditions/hyponatremia/basics/definition/con-20031445)

Risk factors: _Certain drugs. Medications that increase your risk of hyponatremia include thiazide diuretics as well as some antidepressants and pain medications. In addition, the recreational drug Ecstasy has been linked to fatal cases of hyponatremia._ [http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases- conditions/hyponatremia/b...](http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases- conditions/hyponatremia/basics/risk-factors/con-20031445)

 _While staying hydrated can reduce the risk of heat stroke associated with MDMA, the drug can also cause the body to retain water, so drinking too much can lead to a potentially fatal electrolyte imbalance._ [http://healthland.time.com/2013/09/03/concert-deaths-five- my...](http://healthland.time.com/2013/09/03/concert-deaths-five-myths-about- the-drug-molly/)

 _More common, ecstasy has led to serious hyponatremia and hyponatremia- associated deaths. Hyponatremia in these cases is due to a "perfect storm" of ecstasy-induced effects on water balance. Ecstasy leads to secretion of arginine vasopressin as well as polydipsia as a result of its effects on the serotonergic nervous pathways. Compounding these effects are the ready availability of fluids and the recommendation to drink copiously at rave parties where ecstasy is used. The effects of ecstasy on the kidney as well as therapeutic measures for the treatment of ecstasy-induced hyponatremia are presented._ [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18684895](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18684895)

<comment><USER11> _> Risk factors: Certain drugs..._

Additional risk factor: Poorly thought out radio contests:

 _" A 28-year-old woman found dead hours after taking part in a radio station's water-drinking contest died of water intoxication, the coroner's office said Saturday" [1]_

[1] [http://articles.latimes.com/2007/jan/14/local/me- water14](http://articles.latimes.com/2007/jan/14/local/me-water14)

<comment><USER9> What point are you trying to get at here? Every stupid thing that a drug can make you do has also been done by someone sober at some point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> > _As one of its most outspoken opponents, Charles Norris, the chief medical > examiner of New York City during the 1920s, liked to say, it was "our > national experiment in extermination."_

One of their experiments.

</comment><comment><USER13> OTOH, governments sure love alcohol. Consumption and VAT tax adds to 50% on hard alcohol. There's a lot of profit to be made. Gov makes many times more than the actual producer.

Denaturation is just a way of pleasing industrial users, while keeping the exorbiant profits from drinkers. If they could, they would tax the industrial users too.

It's a blood money because of artificially increased incetives for unsafe production of alcohol. Which killed and blinded people in the past. Even those who thought were buying the "good" taxed alcohol because of supply chain contamination.

Cynical view perhaps. Though when thinking about effective measures the government decision making is always contaminated by losing their precisous billions of $.

(non-US)

<comment><USER6> The thing is, alcohol taxes are too low. There are huge social costs of alcohol use and alcoholism, ranging from direct health risks, to drunk driving and assault. The taxes on alcohol (unlike the taxes on cigarettes) do not even come close to matching the social costs of alcohol. For references, look at Mark Kleiman's work.

So no, the taxes are not blood money, though I suspect adding methyl alcohol to industrial alcohol is indefensible.

Fwiw: I do still drink, typically 1-2 drinks, no more than 1-2 days a week, so I'm not a particularly heavy drinker (i.e. this would cost me money, but not as much as it would cost some folks). I also believed this when I drank more than I do now.

<comment><USER14> The higher you push alcohol taxes, the more people turn to black markets, the more people get injured by improper distillation.

<comment><USER6> Definitely true, but the important point is that's a measurable effect, and one that can be weighed against the people being harmed by the effects of alcohol consumption under the status quo. At the moment, there are already some alcohol taxes, but relatively limited black market consumption. And odds are that you can push the taxes somewhat higher before black market consumption starts to negate the benefits.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> We need to decrease focus on "the U.S. government" in such history and reporting.

" _People_ poisoned alcohol during prohibition."

Once you get to that point, you realize that the lessons of history apply all around you. Basically, people are still people. And what happened before, is bound -- history demonstrates, very likely to -- happen again.

You learn to view everything with a critical eye.

I guess I can't avoid the meme: "Because people."

OTOH, this also means that the beauty and awe found in history is also to be found around you, every day. You don't have to leave your time and place to... "live in interesting times."

So, have a good Sunday (today)! :-)

<comment><USER16> "Government" is the term we use to describe a type of structure that "people" form. This type of structure usually ends up doing these sort of things.

"History will repeat itself" isn't very useful unless the aim is to soothe oneself into giving up hope.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Who would poison our liquor without government?

<comment><USER18> Criminal gangs selling bootleg liquor will sometimes sell contaminated product.

<comment><USER10> Due to incompetence/apathy. They have no motivation to kill their paying customers.

<comment><USER19> They do have motivation to undercut the competition and make short term profits. With many middlemen, the bootlegger's customer is rarely an end user. The end-user doesn't know who on the supply chain has adulterated the alcohol for a quick buck, and the lack of enforceable trademark protection and brand loyalty means a distiller will have less oversight on the distribution.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azeotropic_distillation](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azeotropic_distillation)

You can't distill ethanol to 100%, only 95%. To get the last 5% of water out you typically add benzene or cyclohexane, which remains as a trace contaminant in the final product.

Also note that methanol (and other unsavory small molecules) normally contaminate distilled ethanol unless you actively take steps to remove them. For something you intend to drink, you need to carefully control fermentation to reduce the amount of methanol, toss out the early distillation fractions to remove as much methanol as you can, and then let your remaining distillate sit in an open tank for a couple of weeks to let whatever methanol remains evaporate off (along with some of your product).

If you're making ethanol as an industrial solvent or fuel, you don't need to do these things. It's not crazy that under prohibition, taking all those extra steps would be seen as evidence of an intention to violate the law and make drinkable spirits.

But whatever, Slate says it was a conspiracy to poison poor people, I'm sure that's the right explanation.

<comment><USER21> > By mid-1927, the new denaturing formulas included some notable > poisons—kerosene and brucine (a plant alkaloid closely related to > strychnine), gasoline, benzene, cadmium, iodine, zinc, mercury salts, > nicotine, ether, formaldehyde, chloroform, camphor, carbolic acid, quinine, > and acetone.

I don't think any of those are just natural byproducts of making high proof industrial alcohol. Or do you contest that claim?

<comment><USER20> Formaldehyde could happen by accident during the process (it's the aldehyde form of methanol).

The organic solvents (kerosene, gasoline, benzene, ether, chloraform, carbolic acid, acetone) would be used to break up the azeotrope during distillation to 100% ethanol. You can't make 100% ethanol without making it poisonous. It's still poisonous now that prohibition is over.

The rest are primitive bitterants of one form or another to make poisonous denatured alcohol less palatable-- they're there to save lives by making it so disgusting that you spit it out instead of swallowing it. We still add bitterants to denatured alcohol (and to rubbing alcohol, and nail polish, and spray cans), but they're way more bitter than any of those.

You're just freaking out because the chemicals sound scary. The author goes out of his way to mention strychnine just to scare you about brucine, but it's still used as a bitterant.

Look I don't doubt some people callously said people who died or went blind drinking denatured alcohol or wood alcohol got what they deserved because they shouldn't have been drinking it anyway. I do doubt that these things were put in industrial alcohol to kill people. The bitterants are there for the exact opposite reason.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> What's shocking to me is the extent to which some people think this is OK. This is why we will never run out of prison camp guards and executioners. They're on a continuum with the sort of people who will formulate a product to conduct mass murder. It's a sanitary mass killing. They're addicts, after all. I've got qualified immunity as a DEA agent if I'm formulating opioid painkillers with a drug that will give you liver failure so you have plenty of time for a slow painful death, denied a transplant due to "drug abuse." It takes a special kind of ghoul.

</comment><comment><USER23> Reminds me of the poison baked-bean menace :)

Start here:

[http://www.animationresources.org/pics/fosdickbeans01-bigz.j...](http://www.animationresources.org/pics/fosdickbeans01-bigz.jpg)

Rest of cartoon strips:

[http://animationresources.org/biography-al- capp-2-a-cappital...](http://animationresources.org/biography-al- capp-2-a-cappital-offense/)

</comment><comment><USER24> How many americans die each year because FDA has taken too much of time to approve drugs ?

<comment><USER25> This is the only collection of research on the topic I've seen but if anybody has evidence for a lower number I'd be happy to see it.

[http://www.fdareview.org/05_harm.php](http://www.fdareview.org/05_harm.php)

Specifically:

 _[T]he benefits of FDA regulation relative to that in foreign countries could reasonably be put at some 5,000 casualties per decade or 10,000 per decade for worst-case scenarios. In comparison, it has been argued above that the cost of FDA delay can be estimated at anywhere from 21,000 to 120,000 lives per decade_

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Why is this a surprise ? US government sells child porn to catch child porn consumers, US government sells prohibited weapons to drug dealers, US government sells weapons to terrorists.

US government has too much of money that is the problem.

</comment><comment><USER26> To protect your liver take a HEPAMERZ pill before consuming alcohol

</comment><comment><USER27> Although this had unfortunate consequences, and would be unthinkable in today's enlightened world, I'm not sure the line of reasoning here was unreasonable.

The idea that manufacturers would be allowed to produce vast quantities of a partially illegal substance, without putting in efforts to prevent illegal use, seems unreasonable.

Imagine the outcry if it turned out Phizer was manufacturing all the heroin. (They and their friends are manufacturing the heroin addicts, but the doctors are equally to blame here) It seems reasonable the government would act to stop it. The understanding of human behavior was not developed enough in the 1920s to really expect a perfectly safe program.

You could argue that the government should have been serving, rather than fighting the people, but a democracy, even a republican one like the US's is subject to the whims of an easily frightened electorate.

<comment><USER9> We still do this. Don't drink a bottle of rubbing ethanol (not taxed as drinking alcohol) or you will get extremely sick: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubbing_alcohol#US_legislation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubbing_alcohol#US_legislation)

<comment><USER28> The colloquial usage of 'rubbing alcohol' in the US refers to isopropyl alcohol and no reasonable person would think to drink it.

Denatured ethanol comes up more at the hardware store.

<comment><USER9> In stock at every Walgreens near me: [https://www.walgreens.com/store/c/walgreens-ethyl-rubbing- al...](https://www.walgreens.com/store/c/walgreens-ethyl-rubbing- alcohol-70-first-aid-antiseptic/ID=prod6056575-product)

And at most CVS's: [http://www.cvs.com/shop/health-medicine/first- aid/antibiotic...](http://www.cvs.com/shop/health-medicine/first- aid/antibiotic-antiseptic/cvs-70-ethyl-rubbing-alcohol-prodid-304659#/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Not sure what the answer is, but alcohol is involved in around 88,000 deaths in the US each year.

[https://www.niaaa.nih.gov/alcohol-health/overview-alcohol- co...](https://www.niaaa.nih.gov/alcohol-health/overview-alcohol- consumption/alcohol-facts-and-statistics)

Despite what the popular press says, Prohibition had some beneficial effects, and not all of the negative effects attributed to Prohibition actually arose out of Prohibition.

[http://www.nytimes.com/1989/10/16/opinion/actually- prohibiti...](http://www.nytimes.com/1989/10/16/opinion/actually-prohibition- was-a-success.html)

<comment><USER30> Lots of rotten prohibitions would have "beneficial effects." If we prohibit medical treatment for people over 65, the rate of Alzheimer's will go down. If we prohibit driving except to and from work, traffic accidents will decrease dramatically. Etc.

<comment><USER31> "Lots of rotten prohibitions would have "beneficial effects."

Yep.

Outlaw sex -> fewer STDs (use artificial insemination with tested sperm for reproductive purposes).

Make everyone wear hockey goalie gear all the time -> fewer concussions and other injuries.</comment></comment></comment>


Apple attempts to trademark the word 'startup' - <AUTHOR> http://zd.net/19YnKMR

<comment><USER2> This was just posted a couple of hours ago[1]. Some things to note that were brought up there:

\- Apple already filed for this trademark in 2011 in the US and China.[2] They were granted a preliminary trademark pending a routine examination period where people can object to the trademark. The objection window began in 2012[3] and objections were filed. In March of this year, the USPTO mailed a "non final action" to Apple, starting a 6 month window in which Apple gets to respond to the objections. That window apparently closes next month.[4]

\- The trademark filed in Australia is under the same international registration as the ones in the US and China filed in 2011: 1081614. The international registration is important to this particular case because it's Apple exercising its rights under the Madrid System[5][6], which allows companies to secure their trademarks in any Madrid Union member state by filing a simple application. Australia, China, and the US are all Madrid Union member states.[7]

\- It's specifically for "Retail store services featuring computers, computer software, computer peripherals, mobile phones, and consumer electronic devices, and demonstration of products relating thereto", indicating Apple intends to launch some sort of retail service called "Apple Startup" or similar.

\- With a few exceptions[8], trademarks are restricted to the areas covered in the application. Assuming Apple is granted the trademark, it does not mean that they now own the word "Startup".

[1]: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6288217](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6288217)

[2]: [http://www.patentlyapple.com/patently-apple/2011/04/apple- fi...](http://www.patentlyapple.com/patently-apple/2011/04/apple-files-for- mission-control-and-all-new-startup-trademarks.html)

[3]: [http://trademarks.justia.com/852/96/startup-85296886.html](http://trademarks.justia.com/852/96/startup-85296886.html)

[4]: [http://www.trademarkia.com/startup-85296886.html](http://www.trademarkia.com/startup-85296886.html)

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

[6]: [http://www.wipo.int/madrid/en/](http://www.wipo.int/madrid/en/)

[7]: [http://www.wipo.int/export/sites/www/treaties/en/documents/p...](http://www.wipo.int/export/sites/www/treaties/en/documents/pdf/madrid_marks.pdf)

[8]: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6288395](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6288395)

<comment><USER3> > Assuming Apple is granted the trademark, it does not mean that they now own > the word "Startup".

They already pretend they own the word "apple" and any logos of apples, even when they are not used by tech-related companies. I wouldn't put it past them to continue being a bully as they accumulate more words and symbols that they think they "own".

<comment><USER4> They have fought food stores for use of an apple. [https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111022/01124516464/apple...](https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111022/01124516464/apple- continues-to-insist-only-it-can-use-apple-logo-threatens-small-german- cafe.shtml)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Well, haven't they trademarked the word "Apple", which actually is just a name of the fruit? 20 years from now kids will think the fruit was named after the iPhone logo.

<comment><USER6> What is the world coming to when a company can trademark an everyday word. Next thing you know someone will trademark blackberry, palm, yahoo, android, oracle or amazon. Quick, to the outragemobile!

<comment><USER5> I prefer sarcasmobile.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> It appears that they want to trademark the term "startup" for some kind of service to help new Mac owners get started with their Mac, etc. Possibly a rebranding of their "one-to-one" service.

</comment><comment><USER8> I think I'm going to trademark "software".

<comment><USER9> Don't forget Code ®, Application © and Program ™

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> It would be ironic if the company that used to be the iconic "two guys in a garage" success story cheapened the word startup.

"I started working at a startup last week. _Before you ask,_ no, I don't sell iPads."

</comment><comment><USER11> Hello, Mr. Cook, yes, yes, your EA here. No, no, you heard me right, God, Sir Isaac Newton and John Lennon are on the line.

No, no. I don't know who reports to who. Do you want me to guess?

What's it about? uh, let me ask.

Ok. they say they've trademarked 'Apple' and want to talk about a license

Oh, ok. Can you ask them if Steve can also join the call?

</comment><comment><USER12> I hardly see a reason for panic. Apple having the trademark for the word "Apple" doesn't stop any apple seller from slapping the word "Apple" on every box of apples. As long as a word is used for descriptive purposes it is not violating trademarks.

No startup will ever use the word "startup" in its trademark.

<comment><USER13> 'No startup will ever use the word "startup" in its trademark.'

Says who?

<comment><USER14> Unless you're a company catering to startups, the association is a temporary one. You either become a grown up company (in which having 'startup' in your name is silly), you get bought out (in which the name disappears), or you go bust. There is no such thing as a permanent startup.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Are there laws that prevent legal entities from trademarking commonly-used words? I mean, if you invent some word for your product, you have the right to copy it. But "startup"? What would stop people from trademarking "the" and "computer"? I may be missing the point or interpreting the law incorrectly though - please correct me.

<comment><USER16> Anyone is free to _apply_ for a trademark for "the" or "computer". The applications would be promptly denied - well, promptly for a government bureaucracy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Perhaps Apple are launching a new technology/device/API called "Startup" on Sept 10? ;-)

This could be a defensive filing in preparation for one more thing...

<comment><USER18> The new Apple iStartup, just like every other online photo sharing startup, but now shiny, thin, and twice as expensive as Instagram or Groupon.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Can they even do this?

<comment><USER20> That depends on who reads the application. The history of patents, copyrights and trademarks demonstrates that the outcome is more a matter of circumstances than logic.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> is it possible to trademark such type of words?

</comment><comment><USER22> startups are FUCKED

</comment><comment><USER23> This is pathetic. Not going to happen, never, ever.

<comment><USER24> It's pretty specific to support services... I don't see how this is even contentious.

Who uses the term "startup" anyway? (in a business context)

<comment><USER25> StartupBus? Startup Weekend? Startup Riot?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Serious... :s

Are they even sane?

<comment><USER27> "yolo"</comment></comment>


How Mark Zuckerberg Hacked ConnectU - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessinsider.com/how-mark-zuckerberg-hacked-connectu-2010-3 <comment><USER2> Look at the other recent articles this guy has written.

<http://www.businessinsider.com/nicholas-carlson>

Are 3 articles about Facebook in one day really necessary? I guess if you throw enough stuff up there something will eventually stick.

Edit: Actually there's 4 articles this guy published in one day about Facebook/Mark Zuckerberg.

</comment><comment><USER3> Two-dozen unnamed sources for a one page article that doesn't nearly convince us of anything. Wow.

This article would make a great centerpiece on journalist ethics.

<comment><USER4> You make an excellent point, but just curious if you are this concerned when "unnamed sources" are the basis for hysterical headlines that inevitably end in some far flung land getting bombed and invaded.

<comment><USER3> Yes. Unnamed sources are a necessary evil of journalism. But they are abused too much right now, although some companies (i.e. the NYT) are claiming to be pulling that back with newly improved policies, after all the fiasco of the last decade or so.</comment></comment></comment>


ISIS - The Most Difficult Puzzle Ever - <AUTHOR> http://www.thetechbrief.com/2007/12/17/isis-the-most-difficult-puzzle-ever/ <comment><USER2> The Sharper Image is working on P=?NP.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Has anyone bought/seen this? Is it any good? Is it worth the money?

<comment><USER3> The sharper image is bankrupt.</comment></comment>


Google's $1B purchase of Twitch confirmed - <AUTHOR> http://venturebeat.com/2014/07/24/googles-1b-purchase-of-twitch-confirmed-joins-youtube-for-new-video-empire/ <comment><USER2> Assuming this is all true (the article is sourced poorly): Justin and team very much congratulated, that was a long road from justin.tv to twitch.tv and now an exit of this magnitude.

Hard-won, _very_ much deserved, also a case study for a successful pivot.

" We do know that Twitch investors who participated in past rounds are pleased that they will be getting significant returns that are multiple times the amount they originally invested. "

Suggests that it was one of the investors that leaked the story to venturebeat, pretty classless, and really not-done in those circles.

<comment><USER3> > very much deserved

Does anyone actually _deserve_ $1,000,000,000? (I know it's shared between investors but assuming he got a chunk of that)

<comment><USER2> Good question. Ask the billionaires. Then ask the rest of the world.

Some country in Scandinavia (Denmark?) at some point had a 100%+ tax rate, which meant that if you earned more than some ridiculous amount of money you lost more than you made.

I think any amount of money over and beyond what you need to live in whatever is considered luxury in the place where you live is probably wasted on you. But I guess for people at that level it's a way to keep score.

As far as Justin and Co having deserved this, they worked harder than most people ever will (especially in the early days), they have been diluted substantially and they'll be paying a fair amount of their take in taxes.

For the longest time it looked like the whole thing could still fold up and this deal is a gigantic pay-out compared to many other acquisitions. Even so, I think they really did build something of actual value, as opposed to some other recent acquisitions (far higher ones than this one) that I fail to see any value at all in. So as far as I'm concerned they deserve _some_ kind of pay-out, and since we're living in a capitalist society that is defined as 'what the market will bear'. In this case that appears to be $1B. So good for them. Wished I had not banned those gamers ;).

<comment><USER3> > As far as Justin and Co having deserved this, they worked harder than most > people ever will

When you say this, you mean harder than other people in western based office work?

Sorry not trying to pick on you, you seem reasonable and decent! I just think it's a shame that bestowing incomprehensible amounts of wealth on individuals should be celebrated as a deserved reward. Hard work = lots of rewards is not the reality for the majority of the world.

I agree they deserve a payout of course, that level of wealth just feels wrong to me, like everything feels a bit out of whack. And I know myself I would of course probably keep the majority of it as well.

<comment><USER4> _I agree they deserve a payout of course, that level of wealth just feels wrong to me, like everything feels a bit out of whack._

[http://paulgraham.com/gap.html](http://paulgraham.com/gap.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The (forced) merge of my YouTube account with Google account was one of the most painful experiences I've had to undergo and I still suffer from issues and annoyances that has brought about.

I can't be excited about this acquisition because all I can think about is how they are about to slowly and painfully destroy the Twitch experience. What can we expect? Forced merge of Twitch accounts? A forced G+ page for every channel? Some kind of horrible Hangouts integration? Real name policy and its reversal in 3 years? Share this stream with your circles? Pervasive ad infestation? Exceptionally annoying wiggling bell on top right that demands my attention just to let me know that some person I've never heard of has invited me to an event I've never heard of on Google+? A new "clean/functional/consistent" interface that changes often and only gets monotonically worse over time?

<comment><USER6> >The (forced) merge of my YouTube account with Google account was one of the most painful experiences I've had to undergo and I still suffer from issues and annoyances that has brought about.

I know people bitch(ed) about that but come on, it makes a ton of sense from both Google's and end-user's perspective to standardize all Google services under one account. Anybody (here or elsewhere) would have made the same decision.. Their fault is that they waited as long as they did.

Google+ also makes some sense because it does tie services like GDrive, blogs, photos, docs, videos (youtube), and chat together. The problem there was that they got spooked by Facebook and tried to copy it exactly (e.g. the real name policy, which was always stupid but they did it because facebook did it). It was a typical Microsoft thing to do; look where the puck is, and not where it's going.

<comment><USER7> Please do any or all of the above. The idiotic Twitch chat spam and moronic memes makes my iq drop every time I see it.

<comment><USER8> If it integrates well it could be a nod to a different strategy to fight Facebook.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> "In March, Twitch represented 1.35 percent of all Internet traffic"

Wow, I didn't realize Twitch had that much traffic. That's something to be proud of.

<comment><USER10> That's slightly misleading because their traffic involves live HD video streams for rather long periods of time. For example, 1000 Twitch users will represent orders of magnitude more traffic than 1000 Facebook users. Another impressive point is since the content is live it's not as easy to CDN like Netflix/YouTube.

It's still a ton of bandwidth. I'm sure they'll be happy no longer having to pay that bill.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Is this going to lead to a crack down on playing unlicensed, non-royalty free music on streams?

<comment><USER4> Playing music on streams isn't stealing music. If the people listening to the stream like the music they hear, they're likely to try to find out what it is they're listening to and go listen to more of it. That means more music sales, not less.

<comment><USER12> That's arguably true of a lot of music copyright infringement. I don't think it will stop the lawyers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> where the definition of confirmed = "an anonymous source says to a semi- accurate publication".

<comment><USER14> That's an _improvement_ over most recent confirmations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I am surprised that others concurrents let Google buy it considering it was the only "serious alternative" to some functionalities of youtube.

The monopoly of Google on video streaming is even stronger now

<comment><USER16> Monopoly? Do Netflix, Hulu, Amazon and iTunes all not offer streaming products? Not to mention their Asian market equivalents (pptv, tudou, youkou).

<comment><USER17> Try and get your cat videos on Netflix, Hulu, Amazon or iTunes. Their "streaming products" of those companies and Google have as much in common as as, say, the "transport products" of Ford and Boeing.

The only site still competing directly with YouTube in the global market is Vimeo, and, well, I doubt Google has much to fear from them.

<comment><USER18> What about dailymotion?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> What's going to happen to people streaming Nintendo Games? Are we going to have another youtube situation?

<comment><USER20> What's a youtube situation?

<comment><USER21> Content takedowns without the DMCA or any sort of due process.

(though, IIRC, Twitch does those already for pre-release game titles through agreements with various game publishers)

<comment><USER22> Aka "being Googled by Google"

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Congrats to team twitch. It was one of the first offices I walked into that made me wish I worked in a place like that. So much energy. So much fun.

</comment><comment><USER24> Let's imagine the worst case scenario:

Forced Google+ accounts with realnames. Because no-one uses an alias in gaming scene ever.

Automatic Content ID. Oh you played a bit of music even accidentally on background? Blocked.

Oh nintendo wanted to block your game stream ([http://www.zeldauniverse.net/2013/05/16/nintendo-cracks- down...](http://www.zeldauniverse.net/2013/05/16/nintendo-cracks-down-on- youtube-content-creators-with-new-content-id-policy/)).

This game is not available in your country!

I know these are exaggerations. But at least some of them will be eventually implemented. That means it's time to switch services. Anyone know of any good almost as easy to use one?

<comment><USER25> G+ ditched the real name policy recently: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nymwars#Expired_Google_policy](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nymwars#Expired_Google_policy)

<comment><USER24> I am aware of that. But considering how google has acted in recent years it wouldn't surprise me if they would reinstate that policy and try to force it to everyone because it worked with facebook etc.

Google has this bad habit of deciding something and then forcing it. Real name policy. OpenCL on mobile. The list goes on. If they don't get any traction initially they will at the very least attempt to force it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Will ycombinator receive anything from this as they initially funded justin.tv (where twitch spun off from)?

<comment><USER27> I assume they will.

It seems like a similar situation to Soylent- a spinoff of a ycombinator company, that is billed as a ycombinator company.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I was hoping for a Windows Phone Twitch app soon. I guess this kills any chances of it given how they refuse to make a Youtube App and even lawyered up a took down a Microsoft made one over a year ago with no sign of an official app still.

There is no place for Windows Phone in Google's ever expanding empire.

Google's Mission Statement: "To organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful."

They should tack on a ",except on Windows Phone" to that if they wanted to be truthful.

<comment><USER29> Windows Phone's market share in the U.S. is at 3.4% (and apparently isn't growing)[0]. Supporting your apps on another platform is expensive, so I imagine that Google doesn't support it because the market and users aren't there (relatively speaking). And, of course, Window's Phone users can still visit the mobile YouTube site, which (while I haven't tested it) I imagine supports Windows Phone fine.

If the market share increased significantly, I'd be surprised if they chose to continue not to support it. But for the time being, their decision makes sense to me.

[0]: [http://techcrunch.com/2014/07/03/windows-phones-market- share...](http://techcrunch.com/2014/07/03/windows-phones-market-share-in-the- united-states-isnt-growing/)

<comment><USER15> Personally on my wp I ever used the youtube site and it works perfectly. I can also have the controls of the streaming with the lockscreen on ( I usually hear some music video from my phone while going to work )

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I hope at some point down the line this leads to the adoption of streaming VP8/VP9 codecs and using an HTML5 player rather than the resource hog that is Flash.

<comment><USER31> And I have my fingers crossed for Chromecast support.

<comment><USER32> In the meantime Lakitu is a nice Twitch client with Chromecast support: [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.kwd.lakitu](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.kwd.lakitu)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> I'm tempted not to believe it since it makes sense to me :-) But more seriously, back when I played WoW I spent many hours watching some of the tougher boss fights on Youtube. Automating that process is a great way to unify those page views. And its a fairly strong 'you are a gamer' signal so probably a more valuable piece of advertising realestate.

</comment><comment><USER34> "You must be logged into Google+ to view this comment" spam will be returning to twitch chats....

Either way, congrats to the team. As a long time user, I can't help but feel that this will only hurt the twitch.tv experience in the long run though. Maybe the improved stability for other regions will be a large enough benefit to offset any other changes.

<comment><USER35> the new faux pas will be you streamning a game on twitch and it showing up on your gplus status, which also shows up on your gmail address that your boss happen to have.

<comment><USER29> Why would that happen? Google specifically opposes "frictionless sharing"[0] (I think that's one of the reasons Google+ doesn't really have a write API - they don't want apps posting "on behalf" of users). And Google+ emphasizes sharing things with the right people using circles. Don't spread FUD.

[0]: [http://googleplusplatform.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/google- plus...](http://googleplusplatform.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/google-plus-sign- in.html)

<comment><USER35> if you only agree to gplus account and does things in google owned services, you are sharing everything without even knowing.

create a new account. agree to gplus. comment on youtube or use hangouts on device X. pronto, it was so frictionless that you didn't even notice. not it is public that you are using device X and that you commented on some youtube video.

what you say may be true for non-google services, which twitch does not fall under anymore.

<comment><USER29> When commenting on a YouTube video, there is a checkbox where you decide whether to share that comment on Google+ as well [0]. Your choice is sticky - if you uncheck the box and make a comment, then that setting will be remembered and it will never post on Google+ unless you re-enable it. And you can choose whether you want to share that comment with the public or with particular people [1] (I can't think of any other commenting platform that lets you choose specifically who you want to share your comments with on a public page).

Where are you seeing which device you are using shared on Google+? The only place I've seen something like that is if you have someone you've accepted as a Hangouts chat buddy and you've opted into the "share which device I'm on" in the Hangouts settings (all that shows though is if you're on a tablet, phone, or desktop computer though, not specifically which device).

[0]: [http://i.imgur.com/H9nHctO.png](http://i.imgur.com/H9nHctO.png)

[1]: [http://i.imgur.com/YtnpjEb.png](http://i.imgur.com/YtnpjEb.png)

<comment><USER35> yeah google employer, go check in your code repository history

1\. how long my mentioned comment on you tube (for example) is tied to gplus

2\. when that checkbox was added.

you will surely see its at least a six month difference or more. now some doesnt even have that option yet... but hopefully you will get the point with just example

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> Sweet. That's another website on which I'll be fighting Google Accounts.

<comment><USER35> Also know as yet-another-google-account-for-spam.

google fought so well the spam on gmail, and then they become the spam equivalent.

i have one gaccount for main gmail, one for gtalk (dead), one for commenting on youtube annoymously, one for gvoice, one to have a different handle when on the phone (because circles do not work as promissed and I want to restrict people that can bug me while i'm mobile)...

all because they can't handle leaving the services work isolated by default.

of course that is good to them, because now they can say "7 new users for gplus! our product is awesome!"

<comment><USER6> >all because they can't handle leaving the services work isolated by default.

... because that makes no sense. First, because they want to build a cohesive and comprehensive service platform. Second, because a lot of users would prefer to have these services tied together. So what's left, either try to please everyone and complicate the service or provide a common vision for the platform. I think it's obvious that they would go for the latter.

Having said that, they did fuck up in places. Real name policy was stupid. Like I wrote in another post, their great sin was trying to make Google+ a facebook clone, as opposed to a unifying system for gchat, search, youtube, gdrive, gmail, photos, and blogs.

>i have one gaccount for main gmail, one for gtalk (dead), one for commenting on youtube annoymously, one for gvoice, one to have a different handle when on the phone (because circles do not work as promissed and I want to restrict people that can bug me while i'm mobile).

There you go. This kind of insanity is always an option to the insane. What's the difference between this, and 'services isolated by default'?

<comment><USER35> if they didn't force me to post all my youtube comments, app downloads and android game achievements under my real name googleplus I would probably only have one convenient google account.

it is the same with amazon. I don't want to have the same account that i have with 1-click purchase powers on every dumb and insecure TV (that even sends back to LG my files names, who knows about what i type?) just so i can watch amazon prime videos.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> As expected there's a ton of negativity towards Google in the comments here. Congrats to the Twitch team and I hope that Google and Twitch do some interesting things with this acquisition.

</comment><comment><USER38> I'm imagining that within a few months Google will buy the twitch.com domain name.

</comment><comment><USER39> Congrats to the Twitch team!

</comment><comment><USER40> Great, twitch is fucked.

</comment><comment><USER41> Maybe Google can fix Twitch not working in 32-bit Chrome on Linux now. Or better yet, introduce HTML5 video.

[https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=295984](https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=295984)

<comment><USER35> that was probably to drive the price down.

oh, you want that in money and not stocks? sorry, it does not work on chrome anymore.

:)</comment></comment>


Show HN: PDF.to - <AUTHOR> https://pdf.to <comment><AUTHOR> Hey HN, Been a year since I launched this, and just gave it a pretty decent redesign and added a few more features. Would love your feedback.</comment>


Neural net descriptions generated in realtime during a walk around Amsterdam - <AUTHOR> https://vimeo.com/146492001 <comment><AUTHOR> Andrej Karpathy's "NeuralTalk" code github.com/karpathy/neuraltalk2 slightly modified to run from a webcam feed. Kyle Mcdonald recorded this live while walking near the bridge at Damstraat and Oudezijds Voorburgwal in Amsterdam.</comment>