Quadratic voting (2014) - <AUTHOR> http://ericposner.com/quadratic-voting/ <comment><USER2> This is fascinating, as I've done some work with weighted voting systems in the past.

If I understand correctly, some emergent effects would occur.

1\. The poor would collectively have less voting power.

2\. The poor would likely become less poor due to distribution of voting funds. This would be roughly proportional to the amount of voting power lost.

3\. The middle class, assuming it still exists the way we know it, may or may not have increased collective voting power.

4\. Upper-middle class will gain proportionally more collective voting power than what middle class gained, but they are fewer in population. The 1% will gain even more, but they are only 1% of the population. Each social class (aside from the poor) will have more representation, while the poor will receive money (and a tiny amount of representation).

5\. More passionate voters will pay more, and polarizing or strongly motivating issues will create a less-predictable situation at the polls. This could be a very good thing or a very bad thing, I don't know. Perhaps this is where the magic happens.

6\. Political groups will form voting coalitons to vote certain ways, and may be paid to do so, beyond the voting fees, unless legally prohibited. However, this may prove to be not the most viable use of resources.

I think that this could work in positive ways. However, I wouldn't bet on it, as there are as many things that could go wrong. When dealing with complex strategy or architecture choices with unknown consequences, it is a hard sell to willingly go with one that brings significant risk. However, one can argue, especially with the current political climate and lack of faith in the system, that not switching to this would be the bigger risk.

I'm interested in finding smaller scale applications of such a system, as a crude proof of concept.

</comment><comment><USER3> I accept that this is a superior voting system to one-person-one-vote. However, for it to succeed, it should not merely be superior, it should also appear superior. The trust the voters put into the system is paramount. And for that to be true, the vast majority of the voters have to understand exactly how it works. Unfortunately, and, yes, I'm a cynic, I don't believe we are close to having a voter base that is capable of understanding, and hence accepting an outcome of such a voting system.

Disclaimer: I'm not a US citizen.

<comment><USER4> How is this a superior voting system? It just seems to be a way for those with more money to have more influence in the voting process. We've got enough problems with money in politics as it is, we don't need any more of them.

<comment><USER5> Your post is actually extremely important and spells out one of the primary weaknesses of such a system. As long as the budget obtained for the vote does not have an opportunity cost with the rest of a person's wealth/budget (and I can't think of any practical way to make that happen in reality), what the voting system will in effect create is increased voting power by the wealthy, as they suffer comparatively less marginal loss from expending their entire voting budget goals towards their agenda, irrespective of their strength of belief: the downside comes from their lack of any real real-world budgetary pain.

Unless one can come up with a way to inflict the same budgetary pain on each individual for each vote-expenditure, I don't really see how you would argue for its implementation/superiority in practice (against the other forms of voting out there I mean, not necessarily contrasted just against first past the post...).

Though this all depends on what one means by "optimal voting" or "efficient", since I don't believe there can be an objective definition of such.

<comment><USER6> As I understood it, "buy" does not have to be money. It could be hashing ability as in Bitcoin or maybe everyone gets X voting credits every few years which they "buy" votes in local and national elections.

I could be wrong, but I prefer the possibilities of such a system not directly involving money. The distribution of wealth is so imbalanced that I cannot see buying votes to have any kind of positive impact.

<comment><USER7> Yes. Perhaps the voting currency should be hours, not dollars. Make the first vote free. But N-1 more votes costs you N^2-1 hours from your "registered community service" account maintained by the government. No overdrafts allowed: the hours must be credited before they can be debited.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Is this a fair system? It looks to me like the very wealthy get there own way.

Let's say I'm a very wealthy person, and I have $4M to spend. It looks like I can buy 2000 votes. However, money is very fluid. So I decide I'm going to find 10,000 "budget-constrained" voters and give them each $400. I'll say, "Here's $100 for buying 10 votes, and keep the remaining $300 for yourself." Now I've just purchased 100,000 votes.

Ah! ZenoArrow ([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15206589](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15206589)) beat me to it. Well done.

<comment><USER9> If we have a system that allows you to buy votes from other people, how is that any more of a flaw than simply using our current method of voting and allowing the same type of vote buying?

It sounds like you are saying that a system that allows you to buy other people's votes skews toward rich people. We don't outright allow that today unless you count advertising. With the quadratic system proposed, rich would have to choose between advertising or putting more money into the voter pool (is distributed to everyone and thus increases the voting power of the poorer majority).

<comment><USER10> In this system rich people have the opportunity to buy a couple of extra votes for (e.g.) everyone who has been a member of Party X for four or more years. Unlike the present one-man, one-vote system, they can swing the election in favour of their cause without changing a single person's mind.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> > Majority rule based on one-person-one-vote notoriously results in tyranny of > the majority–a large number of people who care only a little about an > outcome prevail over a minority that cares passionately, resulting in a > reduction of aggregate welfare.

Calling the majority tyrannous and assuming fringe interests to be naturally benevolent reeks of an agenda.

<comment><USER12> That's a phrase, well-accepted and very famous in this domain. [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority)

Please don't insinuate bad intent where there needn't be any.

<comment><USER4> The suggestion being made is that the unwashed masses don't know what's best for them, and need to be guided by the enlightened minority. The problem with this is that there isn't a minority that's fit to lead. No one group fully understands the needs and wants of a society. That's why, as imperfect as it is, it makes sense for every citizen (of voting age) to have an equal say in how a society is run.

<comment><USER13> The phrase "tyranny of the majority" does not usually refer to an unenlightened majority making suboptimal decisions for itself (and therefore requiring the rule of a more enlightened minority).

It more often refers to settings where a majority and a minority have conflicting interests, and in which the majority is inclined exploit the minority in ways where the damage endured by the exploited far outweighs the benefit to the beneficiaries. The phrase has been uttered: "Democracy can be like two wolves and a sheep deciding what to have for dinner."

      EG:

     - A majority of city-dwellers will vote to destroy the homes of the forest people to improve the development of their cities, however slightly.

     - A majority of old people will vote to tax the young more heavily to achieve a transfer of wealth, even though the gains of each beneficiary is smaller than the loss of each loser

     - That same majority of old people, finding that their preferences in nearly every domain are different from those of the young, might vote to raise the voting age.

     - ...

<comment><USER4> > "It more often refers to settings where a majority and a minority have > conflicting interests"

Look beyond the surface level. If you can't trust the majority to make the right decisions, who do you trust to do so? The only reason to bring up the tyranny of the majority is to imply that another (smaller) group could do it better.

<comment><USER14> Good question, but although I'm too stupid to come up with an answer, I hope there is one, because the whole majority-exploiting-the-minority scenario sounds awful.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Why would you ever pay for an additional vote yourself, instead of giving the money to someone likely to vote in your favor? If you want 50 votes, just give 3$ to 1/p * 50 people with a p probability of voting for the thing you want. 1/p * 150$ is almost certainly massively cheaper than 2500$.

<comment><USER16> Because the people you pay could just take the money and then cast the (secret) vote the other way. Secret voting is what prevents buying votes today.

<comment><USER17> Could. With a better choice you can get a better chance: 1\. Take an organization working for your cause, 2\. identify a subset of org members you assume to be zealous enough for your taste 3\. give all of them some money

Now: Your vote can be bought once Then: Your vote can be bought arbitrarily often with diminishing returns.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Hmm, but what if "a minority that cares passionately" are nazis or religious fanatics or some other extremist group? They fit the description pretty well, and just being a minority doesn't validate your ideas or views automatically. This system would, as a side-effect, effectively give more political leverage to all extremist groups out there, too.

In many European countries ethnical minorities are given a few guaranteed seats in the parliament to ensure that their voices are heard. The same could be done for a wider spectrum of minority groups that are of interest to society, selectively boosting their political influence, but still filtering out the crazy ones. Problem with this is that it's not as stable as giving everyone the same rights unconditionally, as it's much more prone to manipulations, like cutting deals with minority representatives who got elected without voting and making wide coalitions with them in order to take over the power, against the will of the majority.

<comment><USER19> I think you actually have it back to front at least in the most extreme example. Suppose group A strongly wish to do horrible things to group B, expel/exterminate/incarcerate, whatever. A might care passionately, but B's lives are at stake, they care even more about the issue. A wouldn't actually get their way unless they are the majority.

As long as one group's actions are considerably detrimental to another, that other group will care.

<comment><USER20> A could be a big enough threat that B will buy a lot of votes.

In a way, A can blackmail B, because the money gets distributed later (A will get a lot more back than they put in, because B bought an unnecessarily high amount of votes).

Is this scenario acceptable?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> The real problem is that there is a tyranny of sorts involved, whether by the majority or the minority is not really all that important. Consensus building should be the norm, not to ram your view down other people's throats because you can.

<comment><USER22> We can't have genuine consensus until people reason with arguments and facts, instead of emotions. And emotions are currently extremely manipulatable. The entire media ecosystem is built around doing just that.

<comment><USER4> That's why school subjects like media studies and civics aren't bullshit wishy-washy ones, they're essential for getting us out of this rut. We should teach the young how to be better citizens than we are by equipping them with the tools to see through propaganda and to help them set the direction they see as best for their country.

Also, there should be room for both rationality and emotion in public debate. Emotion is a key part of the human experience, making decisions based on rationality alone will stop us seeing why certain rational decisions should not be followed.

<comment><USER22> I'm fine with that as long as they're not used for indoctrination. I.e. Every single issue and previous decision by society needs to be "re-decided" by the children in the civics class, without influence by the teachers. If you're not doing that, you're reinforcing previous generations' biases in the form of indoctrination. It's a very precarious line to walk, and a very important one because you're dealing with innocent and impressionable minds.

<comment><USER4> Yes, it would be best to let the students explore the subjects with only a minimum of guidance. I'd suggest that for this reason it'd make sense if these subjects were not graded.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I didn't read the whole article, so maybe they address this, but instead of letting people buy votes with money, which favors the rich, why not allocate an equal number of special credits to everyone that they can apportion among different issues (still using the quadratic system, if that there are reasons to think that is optimal)?

<comment><USER9> Interesting idea. The difference I see is that with the payments, the money goes back to the voting pool. So a rich person buying lots of votes for something they care about, gives money to everyone else which increases everyone's ability to vote with more weight on things they care about.

<comment><USER23> I suppose, although with the money system it seem like there is this crazy hyperparameter of how much a single vote costs. Plus, if you want to make things more economically equal (which is something we should want), you can do that with redistributive taxation. There are pragmatic considerations of what can get passed, but the same is true of voting reform. (Many people will make their decisions based on whether it will benefit their causes. This is why, for example, we have gerrymandering and left-right polarization on issues like making voter registration easy or allowing felons to vote or electoral college reform. General principles take a backseat, perhaps even rightly to some extent, to what one believes will lead to good outcomes.)

<comment><USER24> Vote cost is not a crazy hyperparameter: it's only an arbitrary unit of measure. If votes "cost twice as much" everyone buys sqrt(Xi/2) votes rather than sqrt(Xi), by spending a fixed sum Xi that depends on the utility of winning the vote. Results are unchanged.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Take note if you're thinking:

> Hmm, but what if "a minority that cares passionately" are nazis or religious > fanatics or some other extremist group?

Then they cause an outcome by _paying all the people that are not in the minority lots of money_ , and then next election the majority uses that money, more effectively per voter, to reverse the outcome.

If you think the median individual is rational enough to be allowed to vote at all (I don't), then the passionate minority still has to keep the majority happy or else they transfer large sums of money and therefore a larger sum of distributed-voting-power onto that group for future elections.

Understanding the quadratic effects and that _the money is returned per capita_ is absolutely key to the beauty of it. Imagine 10 rich voters buying an election out of 1000 voters. They spend $10 million to do so. The next election, those 990 (now unhappy) voters, with the proceeds of the $10m money they received, can all buy _many more_ distributed votes than the 10 voters were able to buy, and reverse the decision overwhelmingly.

So if you're really worried about this (and think voters are rational), just allow snap elections or votes of no confidence if there's enough protest, and the majority with their new dollars can right the ship very quickly.

</comment><comment><USER26> I'm not sure the tyranny of the minority that we have now is any better.

<comment><USER22> Yeah, the minority of elected officials and bureaucrats. It's kind of sad seeing how little say the voting-populace actually has. Not only are they fragmented per-issue, but the entire establishment is built around not actually getting things done. E.g. Look at how Trump is not actually able to do any of the things he was voted in by the voting populace to do. What is the point of voting him in then? Either you want all of what he platformed on, or you want some of it and you're hoping that that "some" thing that he manages to do is the thing you actually want?

It's all bread and circuses, with the media running the circus. Just spend 10 minutes watching one of the big networks and you quickly realize it's all just rhetoric and bias, sprinkled with facts. No one reasons or argues, it's all just emotions and word-juggling. E.g. the recent "undocumented citizens" and "dreamers" double-speak when referring to illegal alien children under DACA. They're children, they're illegal aliens, it's not that hard.

Edit. Grammar.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> If you think of the market as another democratic institution (albeit with another set of principles for what's considered fair), could this be a step towards addressing both? (A market is afer all just another way to try and select preferences fairly and effective)

I've long found it an interesting idea to allocate limited capital assets (aka land) in a similar manner, select best use (aka owner) through highest bid (aka vote), but offset the opportunity cost, and rent extraction, by expressing said bid in a rent paid as a public dividend.

Perhaps when discussin public policy decision by means of voting with your wallet it opens the door to also discuss market decisions as a democracy implementation.

(Oh well, I have a 58-page paper to read to see if this comment was entirely of topic)

</comment><comment><USER28> The real problem is the winners take small American electoral system and the lack of mandatory voting.

Fix either one, preferably fix both, and I suspect people will stop proposing brain dead ideas like this.

</comment><comment><USER29> _> Weyl and Lalley prove that the collective decision rapidly approximates efficiency as the number of voters increases. By contrast, no extant voting procedure is efficient._

I'm assuming they're working within some mathematical formalism where efficiency is defined in some manner, but I can't access the linked paper. Can anyone explain what efficiency means in this context or provide some links to the mathematical framework for this stuff?

<comment><USER30> Efficient usually refers to Pareto efficiency. Sometimes (rarely) Kaldor-Hicks efficiency or "no deadweight loss" efficiency

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> At a cursory read, this is similar to Demand-Revealing Referenda / Revealed Preferences, I think? [http://stumblingandmumbling.typepad.com/stumbling_and_mumbli...](http://stumblingandmumbling.typepad.com/stumbling_and_mumbling/2007/03/trident_how_to_.html) [https://rwmj.wordpress.com/2014/03/27/half-baked-ideas- deman...](https://rwmj.wordpress.com/2014/03/27/half-baked-ideas-demand- revealing-referenda-applied-to-fedora-features/)

I love that there are so many better ways to vote, and I hate that we still use FPTP.

</comment><comment><USER32> Does anyone know whether this has any effect on Arrow's Impossibility Theorem? Or does it violate some assumption, making it a separate (but related) issue? (Of course a theorem is a theorem, so it's not going to invalidate it...)

I'd assume that this paper is written by someone who has intimate knowledge of AIT, just looking for some perspective.

<comment><USER33> AIT applies to:

\- Votes with at least three options. A simple majority vote between two options does in fact satisfy all of Arrow's fairness criteria (if only vacuously).

\- Ranked voting systems, i.e. ones where voters only give a rank ordering of their options, not any more information.

Quadratic voting is neither of those: It applies only to binary decisions, but for those decisions, it tries to be more fair than Arrow's criteria call for, by getting out not only information about which option voters prefer, but how strongly they prefer it. Whether it could be extended to more complex votes than binary ones, I don't know.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> One question that remains for me other than whether this is fair to groups with income <x>, is: how do you decide which proposals to vote on? Otherwise, there'd be incentive to submit ridiculous proposals that greatly disadvantage the wealthy, who would then have to pony up to keep those proposals from being implemented.

</comment><comment><USER35> Allow me to shine some light on the title:

What does the general population think if aristocracy is about to buy back it's way to power?

</comment><comment><USER10> HN thread from two years ago, featuring participation from the paper's authors:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9477747](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9477747)

</comment><comment><USER36> It only favors extremists and extremely rich over the normal democratic process. But since the US is already an oligarchy, it makes sense for them.

And it's of course a cheap take on the tragedy of the commons.

</comment><comment><USER37> How does it work?

If there is say - Aerith and Bob running for president, say there are Charlie and Drako that want to buy two votes each for Aerith.

Do they each pay 4 or do they pay 16?

<comment><USER38> They each pay 4.

Otherwise, a marginal vote purchased by a different voter would change the total price of prior purchased votes. If votes were tallied per candidate, voters would bid without knowing how much they owe until after the election.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> So basically a basic income scheme financed by people with financial interest for the law to be one way or another.

</comment><comment><USER3> I would like to see how this compares to exponential voting.

</comment><comment><USER40> This is certainly an intriguing and creative proposal.

But as the paper notes, it is mainly around referendum voting. And referendum voting can be viewed as opposed to representative democracy. Voters will happily vote yes on one referendum for higher benefits, and yes on another referendum on lower taxes, and the end result is laws that don't make sense. This can be seen as an example of the Condorcet Paradox [1]. But the point is, referendums are generally a terrible way to make decisions.

So on page 45 of the paper [2], the authors discuss that democracies are generally run according to representation, not referendums. So first they suggest using QV to elect candidates. Yet when given a choice between 2 (or even a handful) of candidates, do we really expect QV to make a difference? Republicans and Democrats are both extremely passionate, so I'd call it a wash. There's such a mix of social and economic issues large and small, QV doesn't seem to help untangle that.

The second thing the authors suggest is for representatives to "put their constituents' money at stake" when voting on laws. The authors wisely don't go too deeply into this, because it's clearly nonsensical when representatives are from a district which contains significant members of both sides. They actually admit as much ("QV in representative assemblies would probably make more sense in a parliamentary system than in a presidential system") but actually get their terminology wrong -- it would make more sense in a _proportional representation_ system than in a _first-past-the-post_ system. (Presidential/parliamentary refers to the relationship between the legislature and the executive, which this proposal has nothing to do with -- which reveals their amatueur-ish level of analysis in this case.) At least they're honest in saying "many details clearly need to be worked out".

But I have an even more basic question, even for deciding referendums: who determines the base price of a vote? If a single vote cost $0.10 or $100, I imagine that could drastically affect outcomes, and I don't see them address this question anywhere.

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

[2] [https://poseidon01.ssrn.com/delivery.php?ID=2871141120741160...](https://poseidon01.ssrn.com/delivery.php?ID=287114112074116088083081078093027028127035061037007087028124077125100068075086098105101029122061103047118074117001004065016074013074027021053114119097009025082072058089039087066113081004111112107026019118092094008080003119026104024028079005074103100&EXT=pdf)

</comment><comment><USER41> What's the reasoning behind choosing the power of 2 for this?

It could be tuned to a power of 1.9 or 2.1 or 3 or 1.5.

Aside from being a round number, how do we know 2 is best? What would be the pro/con of a higher exponent? What about the pro/con of a lower exponent?

<comment><USER42> As the paper's abstract states, "Quadratic cost uniquely makes the marginal cost proportional to votes purchased". The full paper shows their proof and the assumptions behind it, such as "an individuals' value for votes is likely to be approximately linear in the number of votes she casts so long as her utility is driven by the impact she has on the vote total, as argued by Mueller (1973, 1977) and Laine (1977)".</comment></comment>


"Sheep hacking" for Australia Day - <AUTHOR> https://www.facebook.com/possumworks/videos/211750135835161/ <comment><AUTHOR> This is a post from a friend and collaborator, Jack Hurley - probably one of the most Australian people who you have ever met. He lives on the borderline of the outback, his garage is filled with inventions and hacks, and he has recently opened up an outback entrepreneurial community - the Possumworks.

For those of you who don't know cricket - one of the ways to get your opponent out is to knock off the bails (two pieces of wood) from the three wooden "stumps" that they are balancing on.

Cue Jack's rendition of cricket in the outback!

And for those of you who don't know possums...</comment>


Ask HN: Recommendations for outsourcing UX/design? - <AUTHOR>

I'm looking for advice and recommendations for outsourcing the design of a webapp.  I can do the coding but, unfortunately, don't have the design abilities to make pretty web 2.0-looking screens.  The money is there... just not the design skills.<p>Any information about experiences with specific companies, common pitfalls, or other tips are greatly appreciated.  Feel free to plug yourself if interested. <comment><USER2> Can you do the mockups? (see: <http://www.gomockingbird.com>)

If so, why not try getting one or two screen done at a crowd-sourced place like <http://www.99designs.com> or <http://www.crowdspring.com></comment>


Deepest water found 1000km down, a third of way to Earth's core - happy-go-lucky https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg23231014-700-deepest-water-found-1000km-down-a-third-of-way-to-earths-core/ <comment><AUTHOR> It would be more accurate to say: deepest minerals with hydroxyl groups found 1000 km down.

Never at any stage will there be a fluid that can be described as free water at these depths. Breakdown of minerals with OH- such as hydrous ringwoodite at the top of the lower mantle results in dehydration melting. The melts/fluids produced will have many 10s of weight percent solutes, but in a mol. percent sense these melts/fluids are dominantly H2O, given how low the molar mass of H2O is relative to the other components. If some of this melt gets trapped inside a growing diamond, it freezes during ascent and forms minerals with structural OH-, e.g Mg(OH)2.

There is ambiguity regarding what to call melts/fluids at these pressure and temperature conditions as many bulk compositions will be above the second critical end point where there is complete miscibility between H2O and 'molten rock'.

Last paragraph of the paper:

Our data support the idea that dehydration melting generates volatile-rich fluids/melts at the top of the lower mantle, yet being a key process for diamond genesis and for transportation of water across the 660 km discontinuity.

</comment><comment><USER2> > Jacobsen thinks that this water may help explain why Earth is the only > planet we know to have plate tectonics. "Water mixes with ocean crust and > gets subducted at convergent plate boundaries," he says. "Introducing water > into the mantle promotes melting and weakens rock, likely helping out the > motions of plates like grease."

I am completely befuddled by plate tectonics. In particular, every drawing I've seen of the plates shows the surface of the Earth as kind of like a jigsaw puzzle, with the pieces being the various plates, and everyplace being part of some plate.

I don't see how there can be any significant relative motion of the plates. For instance, take this plate diagram, found on Wikipedia: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plate_tectonics#/media/File:Pl...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plate_tectonics#/media/File:Plates_tect2_en.svg)

That looks like it should be pretty much locked up. For anything to move, something else would have to give way, and for that to move, something else would have to give way, and so on, and you'd end up at most just being able to make the whole assembly move as a unit.

For there to be significant movement, it would seem that the plates would need to be changing shape in addition to moving. Is that something they do that is simply left out of the popular science explanations?

<comment><AUTHOR> Do an image search for "subduction zone", you will get some images that show you what is going on, schematically in cross section.

A simplified summary: New oceanic crust is created at mid ocean ridges, but since the earth is not expanding, when you create new crust, subduction must occur elsewhere. For instance, new crust is created in the pacific, and subduction is occurring beneath Japan in the east and the west coast of north america in the west. Once the oceanic crust subducts far enough into the mantle, minerals that make the oceanic crust change to more dense forms in response to the increased pressure, (basalt to eclogite transition) and the resulting rock is more dense than the surrounding mantle, meaning it wants to sink further and further, providing a "slab pull" component to subduction (as opposed to "ridge push" due to new crust formation at the mid ocean ridge). Oceanic crust will almost universally subduct beneath continental crust due to density (~2.3 g/cc for continental, 2.7 for oceanic, >3 for mantle). Continental crust is too low density to subduct into the mantle, so you make mountain ranges like the Himalaya when continents colide.

After new oceanic crust is erupted at mid ocean ridges, it remains hot, and experiences sustained interaction with seawater forming new minerals with structural water/OH- (i.e. chlorite), as well as accumulating a veneer of sediment that includes clay minerals also with structural water. When that oceanic crust then subducts back into the mantle, it heats up, the hydrous minerals are no longer stable, and they release their H2O into the overlying mantle. This addition of water lowers the melting point of the mantle such that it will melt under the ambient temperature conditions, this melting is ultimately manifest as volcanic arcs, such as that that extends from the andes, north through central america, mexico, the cascades, the aleutians , kuriles, japan, philippines, indonesia, new guinea, solomons, fiji, down to new zealand. These volcanoes are characterised by high H2O contents, leading to explosive eruptions, in contrast to the style of eruption seen in places like Hawaii.

Not all the water (structural OH-) is released when from the subducting slab, and makes its way deeper into the mantle, and aspects of the ultimate fate of this is the subject of the article.</comment></comment>


Alt-right attacks Macron in last ditch effort to sway French Election - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@DFRLab/hashtag-campaign-macronleaks-4a3fb870c4e8 <comment><USER2> It baffles me that the right actually has to convince leftists not to vote for Macron, never mind the means used.

Macron is a Rotschild banker, personally responsible for anti-employee law changes [1]. He advanced as an international investment banker in a very suspicious, rocket trajectory straight to the top ... while making deals with government-owned banks [2][3].

Now I'm not saying he HAS to be dirty ... but ... euhm ... yeah actually I am. Unless someone can explain to me how to career like that fairly.

[1] [https://blogs.wsj.com/briefly/2015/03/09/5-things-about- the-...](https://blogs.wsj.com/briefly/2015/03/09/5-things-about-the-macron- law-2/)

[2] [https://www.ft.com/content/9bd62502-12cf-11e7-b0c1-37e417ee6...](https://www.ft.com/content/9bd62502-12cf-11e7-b0c1-37e417ee6c76)

[3] (they de-emphasize this, so let me quote from the FT article: "On the Atos deal, Mr Macron "had a fairly junior role at the time — he would be asked to redo the financial models on Excel, the basics," recalled an adviser. But a few days after the deal was announced, Mr Macron was made a partner. A few months later, he stunned colleagues and rivals by winning a role in Nestlé's purchase of Pfizer's infant food operations.")

</comment><comment><USER3> I don't understand why Le Pen is being called "right" or "ultra right." Even a cursory review of her policy proposals -- specifically economic policy shows her closer to Melanchon than the free market "right" orientation of Fillon's proposals.

She's national socialist more than anything -- ultra right socially, ultra left economically. I consider myself "on the right" \-- but Le Pen is the worst of both worlds; the totalitarian racist zeal of Hitler with the industrial protectionism fervor of the worst socialist. By the way, when I say socialist, I don't mean the Democratic Socialism common in Europe -- I am referring to the statist socialism of the Soviet era.

<comment><USER4> Like national socialism, you cannot label it "left", for it's mostly appearances and ways to get votes than real convictions and engagement.

<comment><USER5> Exactly. By the way, national socialism is exactly what lepen is doing : backing defense of the weak ones on nationalist views. I've had many discussions with people lately who were arguing that yes, it's nationalism, but it's also leading the social fight (I'm french). Each time, they were mind blown when I replied : "Yep, and that's called national-socialism". For some reason, they don't see the similarities by themselves. I guess we failed to explain clearly what nazism was, and now people think it's only about racism and don't detect it when it raises again.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This thread is a good reminder that dangerous thinking has infected a not small group of younger computer engineers. Quite frightening.

<comment><USER7> Many new accounts, there appears to be some brigading going on. I'm surprised actually, I doubt brigading hacker news is going to have a lot of weight in the outcome of the french election...

Staying away from the political side of things, it's impressive how many people are willing to spread obvious disinfo if it serves their agenda. I'm sure many of these alt-righters realize that those documents are most likely fakes but it doesn't matter, whatever hurts the opposing party.

Look at the Cayman document leak from yesterday, one of the laziest montages I've seen lately. Didn't stop it from being plastered everywhere on "alt- right" websites with big VERIFIED tags.

It's just the strategy of drowning actual information in a sea of lies so that nobody bothers to look for it. The worst thing is that an actual leak about Macron's tax evasion could be released now and I probably wouldn't believe it. It's just all noise.

<comment><USER5> > I'm surprised actually, I doubt brigading hacker news is going to have a lot > of weight in the outcome of the french election...

It's about all they have left :)

There's a law in France saying that media can't discuss campaign anymore two days from election, the idea being that debate time is over and it's now time for each citizen to take a step back from the heat of the campaign and calmly decide what they think is the best for the country (this is obviously something that doesn't work as well now we have internet). So far right activists only have foreign discussion threads as a mean to spread.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I hope the French don't fall for this like we did.

<comment><USER9> The campaign is over so the leak will have no influence on the results. Macron has mathematically won already. But if he fails during his presidency, the far right will ultimately get the job. The truth is Macron is the candidate of the status quo, his party likely won't have the majority in the french house so he will have to compromise with both the "socialists" and the conservatives, he won't achieve much for 5 years.

<comment><USER10> Isn't that the intention of these far-right wackos? The "official" campaign is over, so they can attempt to influence the results without worrying about the Macron campaign being able to deny the rumors?

Twitter needs to decisively put a stop to these bot armies. It can't be that difficult to detect them through ML. The bot armies are not only responsible for propagating outright lies, they also frequently target people for online harassment. I've heard from many people that were almost unable to use Twitter due to information/message overload once they were targeted. Twitter seems to not only allow the harassment, but requires users to wade through the post spam. I would imagine at some point the usefulness of having a Twitter account approaches zero for many of these people that have been targeted.

<comment><USER11> >It can't be that difficult to detect them through ML.

Show us the code.

>far-right wackos

It's also a mistake to put Le Pen in the same box as the likes of Trump. For one, she's a highly educated, and secondly, the far right in France has a rather long history of being the only party to say _anything_ substantive on the topic of immigration and security. (It's worth noting that the immigration situation in France is very different from the US). I'm not a huge fan of Le Pen, but dismissing her as a "wacko" is exactly why she has maintained a growing electorate; each time media in France has tried to label her as a nutcase, they've essentially refused to address the very real concerns that motivate her electorate.

<comment><USER12> > the far right in France has a rather long history of being the only party to > say anything substantive on the topic of immigration and security.

That is the sad part about European politics. The (champagne) Left is so enamored by the notion of EU as a peace project, that they can't see that they are undermining their very voting base (the working class) in the process.

This has left the doors wide open for the far Right to wrap their xenophobia in terminology that claims they worry about workers rights and livelihood, when they really want to see every last "foreigner" (anyone with enough skin color or other feature that makes him stand out from across the street) tossed over the border (at best).

<comment><USER11> >they really want to see every last "foreigner" (anyone with enough skin color or other feature that makes him stand out from across the street) tossed over the border (at best).

Frankly I was with you up until this point. I think this attitude is essentially the same as the one you're condemning, albeit on the topic of immigration rather than the EU project.

To use your turn of phrase, the (champagne) Left is so enamored by the notion of the "friendly foreigner" and "global society" that they can't see that they are undermining their very voting base in the process. More specifically, said Left is unable to engage in a serious discussion about border security and immigration without accusing everybody of racism.

This has left the doors wide open for the far Right to monopolize the conversation on immigration. The net effect is that anyone who cares about security and identity politics has only one party to turn to.

I mean no disrespect, but this attitude is a large part of what got us here. Wanting to reduce immigration and harden border security is not equivalent to xenophobia.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Alt-right? How did a term made up on 4chan get so popular and taken seriously (/pol where I saw this term used for the first time). It really has no meaning at all only to find a opposite alternative to (the also misused term) regressive-left. Before last year people did not even identify as such. People that now do identify as such do not even seem legit and behave like actors (the same feeling I have with people like Alex Jones).

Now even people I would call moderate / left-leaning are now called alt-right (a term they do not use for themselves).

<comment><USER6> IMO younger 4channers (18-23 set) that I have met in person strongly identify this way.

It's odd cause 10 years ago 4chan trolled in the exact different direction. Would love to read a book about political reckonings that come from this tiny dark corner of the net.

<comment><USER13> But as far as I now the timeline is as follows (cannot find the 4chan threads anymore, so no proof this time):

\- Aug/Sep 2016 (or a short while before that): People made up thr term "alt- right" to be used as the opposite of "regressive-left". People there did not call themselves that.

\- Oct 2016: 4chan was mostly busy with all the Wikileaks stuff and I did not see the term used that much.

\- Oct (end)/Nov 2016: Some people (not even on 4chan started to call many things that are pro-Trump or "tried to be" objective (non Trump or Hillary) alt-right.

The general message that started to come up at that time: "The alt-right are spreading fake news".

\- Dec 2016/Jan 2017: People suddenly started to identify themselves with alt- right.

Update:

Google trends timeline: [https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=today%2012-m&q...](https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=today%2012-m&q=alt%20right)

<comment><USER6> alt right is from waaaaaay longer ago than September. It's all an out growth of "gamer gate" nonsense. Milo and Cernovich were both "gamer gaters." Bannon ran gaming message boards before Breitbart, where he met Milo. He figured out how to use messaging like his to target these people for less savory purposes.

<comment><USER13> I know the whole movement that got Trump elected started from this but at that time it was as far as I know not called alt-right (because I remember the thread on 4chan were they actually made it up).

Yes, the division between groups (pro/anti) created while gamergate was going on were about the same. On one side people calling for social justice on the other side the people that in a way are against social justice + the ones that did not want to choose a side.

At the beginning gamergate was just about ethics in journalism (mostly in gaming).

<comment><USER6> Gamergate was never about ethics in journalism(games reviews being journalism is a whole other thing, but, cmon). It was about being mad because you were undersexed and lonely, and someone offering you a way to channel that desperation into misogyny and a false feeling of control* and community*.

<comment><USER13> Yes I agree. It did not take long before it started getting into a fight not being about game journalism anymore but about more diversity in games, misogyny, racism etc.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> As a side note, I'm always surprised when I see the word "alt-right". When did that happen? I still use the word "fascists", although I understand it can be too strong a word for many, but those can use "far right".

<comment><USER14> Because alt-right carries carries more information and is more accurate.

Even though "alt-right" is less precisely defined, it is in many cases more accurate a term than "facist" or "far right".

To me, alt-right is a combination of anti-establishment Republicans, fascists, libertarians, internet trolls (& governmental operatives trying to influence foreign elections).

To me the grassroots part of alt-right is more a reaction than ideology; something born out of the financial crisis and its' aftermath.

If you want to view them purely as fascists, that's your prerogative, but using THAT word would be less accurate and would lose a lot of nuance.

<comment><USER5> > To me the grassroots part of alt-right is more a reaction than ideology; > something born out of the financial crisis and its' aftermath.

Indeed, there seems to be something of historical importance, here.

Although, I think there _is_ something that acts as an ideological bound rather than being just a group of "anti" people. In France, there's historically always been two right wings, even without considering the far right : the liberals (mainly interested about economics and free market) and the conservatives (mainly interested about authority).

Could it be a distinction that exists all over the world, the liberals were dominant and they're losing ground? By the way, we call here the authority focused ones "bonapartists" (this is not seen as pejorative or insulting, although slightly disturbing).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> TLDR:

\- Post goes out of its way _not_ to deny authenticity of the leak.

\- Post can be traced to the Atlantic Council [1].

[1] The Atlantic Council (AC) is a core ingredient for US soft power [2] projection on other countries. Example members of AC leadership: Chuck Hagel, Susan Rice, Richard Holbrooke, General Eric K. Shinseki, Anne-Marie Slaughter, General Brent Scowcroft, Jon Huntsman. Cf [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_Council](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_Council)

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

<comment><USER6> one thing Wikileaks does is give credibility to their leaks basically by putting their stamp on it that it's all authentic. This dump happened quickly and with no organization oversight - impossible for now to know which is real and which is fake. I was told 4chan put in some obviously fake bank documents, but that the emails seem real. It's something that willl play out for months now.

<comment><USER15> Agreed. Wikileaks has a sterling record regarding the authenticity of their own leaks.

Given that the Atlantic Council is for all practical purposes an arm of the US government, and it's "Digital Forensic Research Lab" is extremely well-funded and well-connected, it is noteworthy that they go out of their way not to deny the authenticity on the leak.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> This is a tech news article about hacking.

This is a core topic of Hacker News.

It must be unflagged.

@dang

</comment><comment><USER17> Just like the silent majority spoke and elected Trump, the same will happen to Le Pen. Also, I highly doubt it was the alt-right doing 'hacking', it's more plausible for it to be a determined patriot trying to stop corruption. My 2cents.

<comment><USER6> Trump lost by 3 million votes. I do not think the term silent majority if accurate.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Of course, more mainstream media BS. When someone hacks one of their precious "candidates" who loves "freedom", "liberty", and "rights" it's ALWAYS Russia or they frame Assange as a Russian spy. My god I hope the world governments burn. This trash system can't persist anymore.

<comment><USER19> The thing that I don't understand about this "mainstream media BS" critique is this:

You say that the media is biased in its reporting, beholden to special interests, and doesn't abide by journalistic standards. Given that, the reasonable solution would be to create a media outlet that makes a conscious effort to be less biased, more open about its ties to any industry or other backer, and more stringent about its journalism.

When I go to Breitbart (or any other alt-right news site), I don't see any of that. I see a new breed of media outlets that are even more blatantly biased, even more covert about who's paying them, with no semblance of journalistic integrity.

It's like the alt-right looks at a problem and says: "They are doing X, and we oppose that. We must start outdoing them in X!"

By the way, that approach is typical of organizations that strive simultaneously for both ideological purity and brutal pragmatism. The Bolsheviks did essentially the same. "We hate the Czar's secret police. [One year later...] We need a stronger secret police than anyone else." (Maybe the overlap in methods is no coincidence. Steve Bannon reportedly said he is a Leninist who wants to destroy the state.)

<comment><USER20> > _You say that the media is biased in its reporting, beholden to special > interests, and doesn 't abide by journalistic standards. Given that, the > reasonable solution would be to create a media outlet that makes a conscious > effort to be less biased, more open about its ties to any industry or other > backer, and more stringent about its journalism._

Not the person you're replying to, and aside from the issue of alt-right news sites (which I know is the main thing you're talking about), lets not forget that (aside from government-run media) the media is a business, and has to do things that are financially viable. They can't just do whatever they'd ideally like to do.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Let's hope the french are smarter than the americans. But anyway what's the deal with this in the mainstream french media ? Are they reporting this stuff ? Making a fuss over it ?

<comment><USER3> They aren't allowed to: it was released too close to the media blackout deadline.

<comment><USER22> Does this affect say, French social media sites?

<comment><USER7> No, only TV and radio. Internet and newspaper can say what they want. A lot of misunderstanding (or downright lies) about french laws and politics in this thread, take everything with a grain of salt.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Well - it is a global fight against the globalists :-P

I don't have any opinions on French politics other than it is an entertaining spectacle to watch. And I think it is already given that Macron wins as le Pen is still to harsh to swallow.

Here is what's going on over at the "donald":

[https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/69ikwt/whoa_guy...](https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/69ikwt/whoa_guys_were_truly_living_in_a_censored_world/)

I don't know if it is true; but if it is then it is kind of amazing just how fast services we all take for granted can be censored (github and internet archives).

<comment><USER24> If it's from the_donald, it's most likely NOT true.

<comment><USER25> Oh really? How about when the CEO of Reddit (/u/spez) was personally editing people's comments?

EDIT: Here's what I'm referring to: [https://www.reddit.com/r/announcements/comments/5frg1n/tifu_...](https://www.reddit.com/r/announcements/comments/5frg1n/tifu_by_editing_some_comments_and_creating_an/)

<comment><USER26> That was cheap for the cesspool T_D is

It's a private website and it's their prerrogative to do that

<comment><USER25> The point is that they're not always crazy and they've also uncovered quite a bit of actual conspiracy. Both in the ninjas edits by spec and the reddit scoring manipulation to suppress that subreddit.

Yes it's a private website and both are within their rights, but you can't claim to be promoting free speech and expression and then edit the speech of others or rig the system so it doesn't appear in front of others per the rules of the game. The worst part of it is doing it without any indication that an edit was made.

<comment><USER26> "Free speech" has limits, completely unimpeded "free speech" gets drowned by hate and noise (see: voat)

(In the same way a completely free market is anything but)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Watch drones form StarTrek logo over london - <AUTHOR> http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-57576030-1/led-quadrotors-form-star-trek-logo-over-london/

<comment><USER2> Is it illegal to mount fricken lasers to drones and fly them around?</comment>


Show HN: Bluebook – API test management and execution - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/bluebookrun/bluebook <comment><AUTHOR> Author here! I've been working on this idea for running api/e2e tests. Please check it out and leave any questions/suggestions.</comment>


Man can't change climate, only God can - <AUTHOR> http://boingboing.net/2015/01/28/man-cant-change-climate.html

<comment><USER2> Great. One idiot with the non-scientific view that the HCGW theory is unproven get's all the headlines, but scientists with real scientific skepticism are ignored.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's astonishing to me that people would even believe, given the tremendous changes humankind has affected on the planet, that humanity hasn't already had a massive impact on the way global climate systems work.

Just because climate change has happened in the ancient past without human intervention doesn't mean we can't be the cause of it now. All of that carbon that was sequestered underground for millions of years is now being injected into the atmosphere - how can you believe it won't have an impact?

<comment><USER2> >how can you believe it won't have an impact?

For one, that's not how science works. Science isn't about belief, it's about proof.

Two, because you're not considering the scale of the issue. You're so focused on the absolute tons of CO2 humans produce that you've completely discounted how much is naturally produced.

If you want to think about global warming more scientifically (skeptically), I suggest a site like [http://www.nipccreport.org](http://www.nipccreport.org).

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, of course. I recognize that science is not about belief - my point is simply that this joker is making claims based on belief - how could he not even consider that humanity would have an impact on the global climate?

I picked CO2 as but one of many changes humanity has wreaked upon the earth. The list is of course vastly longer than just that.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Fresh Prince's Alfonso Ribeiro Is Suing Fortnite Over the Carlton Dance - <AUTHOR> https://kotaku.com/fresh-princes-alfonso-ribeiro-is-suing-fortnite-over-th-1831158303 <comment><USER2> Apparently dance can be protected by copyright [0]. However, wouldn't this be work for hire for Fresh Prince? In that case he doesn't own the copyright, whoever own the show's copyright owns the dance as well. just like it owns the copyright for any lines the actor spoke. Seems like the case will be dismissed on grounds that Ribeiro lacks standing. Whoever owns the copyright for the show could sue though.

[0] [https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/how-to-copyright-a- dance](https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/how-to-copyright-a-dance)</comment>


How China Is Locking Down Half a Billion Citizens (Feb 21) - <AUTHOR> https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/02/21/806958341/restrictions-and-rewards-how-china-is-locking-down-half-a-billion-citizens <comment><USER2> I still wonder how much of China's reports are true. We still have to factor in that they still want to look good on paper.

<comment><AUTHOR> If they were lying in a big way then they wouldn't have been able to hide the bodies from WHO inspections.

Iran is way behind them and can't even hide the mass graves from satellites!

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Given that China managed to reverse the epidemic, it is worth seeing how they did it.</comment>


How to save the output of a console.log(object) to a file? - <AUTHOR> http://stackoverflow.com/questions/11849562/how-to-save-the-output-of-a-console-logobject-to-a-file

<comment><USER2> Ironic that some of the chrome guys posted information about this yesterday ([https://plus.google.com/+AddyOsmani/posts/jBS8CiNTESM](https://plus.google.com/+AddyOsmani/posts/jBS8CiNTESM)), even though the question is from a few months back

[http://bgrins.github.io/devtools-snippets/#console- save](http://bgrins.github.io/devtools-snippets/#console-save)</comment>


FLOPS (19.6B to 0.72B) of Machine Learning models - <AUTHOR> https://discourse.opengenus.org/t/floating-point-operations-per-second-flops-of-machine-learning-models/1681/ <comment><AUTHOR> One interesting thing to note is that ResNet152 is deeper than VGG19 but has less number of FLOPS</comment>


How I Reimplemented My Shopping Cart To Sell More Software, w/ Code - <AUTHOR> http://www.bingocardcreator.com/articles/developing-shopping-cart.htm

<comment><AUTHOR> Hiya guys. I recently redid the shopping cart for my business. Then I spent a few hours writing it up for folks, with the hope somebody can use something.

Article includes:

\+ Results of my A/B tests with previous ways of presenting software for sales to my customers.

\+ How I use lightboxes to make a good deal of money

\+ An AJAX cart I have used to good effect

\+ How I went about designing and reimplementing a cart, in JS, to give the feel of the AJAXy one but improve its speed and UI

\+ Code for everything, which I put in the public domain. Go nuts.

<comment><USER2> >So your shopping cart needs to be willing to continue the conversation with your customers.

Great advice, I like your insight into how users interact with shopping carts. I'll be taking this with me on my project!

FYI: the link to e-junkie at the end of the page is broken. It points to: <http://www.e-junkie/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Maybe I've missed something, but it seems like you could completely eliminate the security flaw of letting your user's decide how much to pay for your software very easily. Just have the server send the price with an HMAC, check the HMAC on return, and voila.

<comment><USER4> This is a neat idea, but there is at least one subtlety: you need to make sure that it is not possible to cut-and-paste HMAC'd prices from one web page into another. Otherwise the user could ask for a page for an item with a price of $1, receive an HMAC on "$1", and paste that into a page for a different item.

Two possible ways to do this:

1) Use a different HMAC key for each page you generate. 2) HMAC the pair (price,nonce) where nonce never repeats from one page to another. The server has to keep the nonce, as well, i.e. is not obtained from the web page.

<comment><USER5> A simple one-way hash will provide sufficient security for most cases. Assuming you're representing items for sale in a Javascript array, you might send data like this to the browser:

      var forSale = {
        "book": {"price": 19.95, "description": "a book", "checksum": "c6da835c1fd2ee98d68eee3912dd199e41c82a32"}
      }

The value for 'checksum' is just a SHA1 hex digest of the ('book', '19.95', 'secret'), joined by tab characters. It can be included as a hidden form field or invisible element within your page; it doesn't matter so long as you can capture it and POST is along with the item + price.

In your order-processing logic, just check that the hash verifies with your secret key ('secret' in the above), and you know with a reasonable degree of certainty that the original page was one generated by your server.

<comment><AUTHOR> That would work, but I don't do order fulfillment. e-junkie does. They get to keep the IPN and Google payment notification interfaces, an email server to send out registration keys, bunches o' reporting code, and integration to the company that stamps CDs for me.

The cart posts directly to them, so hypothetically assuming I generated a secret and passed it over, they'd process the order anyhow and then tell me "By the way, your website passed this secret with the order -- do whatever with it", after which point a) the customer would have a registration key and b) if they ordered a CD, it would be scheduled to ship already.

Which is a long way of saying "There are ways to make this setup more secure but they'd involve me having to rewrite large portions of my business processes." Like I mentioned: it would cost me a lot of time at a very minor increase in security.

Probably illusory, actually. No amount of securing my cart will protect me from this attack: buy the software, write me an email saying "You offer an unconditional guarantee. I'd like a refund." And there is absolutely nothing that anyone could say or do which would make me stop offering that unconditional guarantee, because it is practically a license to print money. (To anyone who produces a low-marginal-cost product or service: if you do not have a guarantee, start A/B testing one. Its the closest thing in life to free money.)

<comment><USER6> I remember reading one of the "hacking exposed" books (the exact one I can't remember now), where there was an incident where an online store used values in the webpage itself to handle the prices of goods. In the example in the book, the hackers had replaced $45 list price with $1 giving huge discounts to the purchasers. And to make things even worse, some of the hackers would order dozens of shirts (at $1 each) and then return them for full price.

It might have been an earlier edition of this one, but I do remember the bright red cover: [http://www.amazon.com/Hacking-Exposed-Web- Applications-2nd/d...](http://www.amazon.com/Hacking-Exposed-Web- Applications-2nd/dp/0072262990/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Um, I'm not sure I'm reading this right but you hard-code your prices in JS to cut down on an AJAX call.

Why not just print your JS from server-side - i.e. you can still have your prices in your JS but have the server generate these?

<comment><AUTHOR> Easy, fast, and clean all in one little packet of geek joy. I like this suggestion a lot. Thanks. (The whole code-generates-code thing is still taking me some time to get used to... even though I spent several hours yesterday writing code-generates-code-generates-essay.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> _Accordingly, the fact that the same URL rewriting trick that lets me change the price to give users discounts could be used to reprice my software to a penny... really doesn't worry me that much._

Is this an invitation to get a 1 penny trial version of your software?

</comment><comment><USER9> > _"Originally posted by monkeyfish at Hacker News: "_

Should be mechanical_fish I think.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'll fix that once I get back home. Good eye.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Does your cart fail gracefully if javascript is turned off, or is that not a concern for you?

<comment><AUTHOR> Did you try it?

It should fall-through to e-junkie's traditional non-Javascript cart hosted offsite. I personally think the experience is decidedly suboptimal next to either of the JS carts but, honestly, I think the Internet is moving away from assuming that Javascript is optional.

(I would have a different opinion if I had to support a range of mobile browsers but, well, I sell downloadable software to elementary schoolteachers. Most of them don't think "Ooh great I loved this downloadable free trial! Let me write down the URL, get out my iPhone, type in the URL, then order a copy!")

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Good work, I admire your approach.

</comment><comment><USER12> How I SEOed my website to make more sales!

<comment><AUTHOR> The main reason it is on the website, as opposed to my blog, is because I am making _extensive_ use of Rails as the world's most over-engineered templating system to write that. It wouldn't be interesting at all without the cart to play with, now would it? I'm all about avoiding sucky user experiences and "I am going to extensively discuss a feature of another website. Please open that website in a tab and follow along" is a sucky user experience.

But yeah, to the extent that people find this article as valuable and link to it, Google will see my site as more trustworthy and send me more frazzled teachers trying to get ready for fourth period.

I really don't have a problem with that: they get their prep work done, I get money, the rest of the world gets a few hours of engineer time writing what I hope was a useful article as a result of the cross-subsidy. The notion is quite similar to OSS. Its a win for everybody.

<comment><USER12> Don't get all defensive bro. It's cool to get paid.</comment></comment></comment>


"...it has also been my observation that a majority of all entrepreneurs have Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, or AD/HD." - <AUTHOR> http://add.about.com/cs/workplaceissues/a/entrepreneur%20.htm <comment><USER2> Actually in my case, my start-up actually took me OFF my ADD-type symptoms. I realized that I had too many ideas that were keeping me from actually working on ANYTHING including school work. Soon as I settled on ONE startup idea, I could quit thinking about potential ideas and started work on that ONE idea.

After starting work on the startup, all of a sudden I was short of time and naturally forced to plan my day better.

</comment><comment><USER3> adhd and add are overrated. so many people have it. i was even diagnosed with it. its just so easy to fit into the DSM/IV description. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DSM_IV>

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Also, see:

<http://www.windeaters.co.nz/publications/innovation_entrepreneurship/Adhd2_web.pdf>

<comment><AUTHOR> And this:

<http://www.entrepreneur.com/magazine/entrepreneur/2005/september/79342.html>

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Haven't read it yet, but my first impression strongly agrees with the premise of the article.

<comment><USER4> Ok I read it. The article loses some credibility for almost completely being an advertisement.</comment></comment>


Magnetically Actuated Micro-Robots for Advanced Manipulation  - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uL6e3co4Qqc

<comment><USER2> Absolutely amazing. So many possible applications. But how on earth does it work?

<comment><USER3> > But how on earth does it work?

from reddit-user dunkietown: [http://www.reddit.com/r/geek/comments/23p4ea/swarms_of_tiny_...](http://www.reddit.com/r/geek/comments/23p4ea/swarms_of_tiny_magnetic_robots_can_be_used_to/cgzqumy)</comment></comment>


For alleged Russian hacker, a visit to Amsterdam is a costly trip - <AUTHOR> http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/for-alleged-russian-hacker-a-visit-to-amsterdam-is-a-costly-trip/2015/01/30/1e240c96-a33c-11e4-9f89-561284a573f8_story.html <comment><USER2> > "We have a 99.6 percent conviction rate in cybercrime"

I'm sure he sees absolutely nothing weird in that. The Spanish Inquisition managed to get similar rates. I'm _very_ surprised the Dutch (as in: _my_ ) government is agreeing to this extradition. It's very well possible that this is in part because of the current animosity between Putin and the rest of the world.

It's quite possible the guy is guilty but Ari Baranoff is on the record as having said that he will not be given a fair trial.

<comment><USER3> > I'm sure he sees absolutely nothing weird in that.

If this were a discussion of Japanese conviction rates based primarily on (coerced) confessions or something like that, then yes, a 99.6% conviction rate would be suspicious. But you have to remember two things here:

(1) 99.6% is not _that_ much higher than the usual federal prosecution rates (I think they get a net of ~96% when I looked it up a few months for a different discussion),

(2) and when Baranoff says "We don't build our cases on one piece of evidence. Our cases are built on evidence that is curated over many years. We take our time to build these cases to make sure we have them right." (the part you didn't quote), he's not kidding. That's exactly what they do with cyber-crime cases. They spend years investigating an organization or figure, flipping people, running markets or forums, extracting records from ISPs and Amazon and Google, and so on and so forth. Look at the whole tangle of carding cases in the 2000s with cardingplanet/shadowcrew/etc. For that matter, look at the Ulbricht Silk Road case right now - the agencies involved spent years busting random vendors, looting people's emails (eg Ashley Barr's Gmail was searched on only the vaguest possible suspicion), flipping multiple employees... Read the trial transcripts if you have a few days to spare.

If anything, I'd say that a rate of 99.6% says bad things about them, but for an entirely different reason than you: because it implies that they're inefficiently overdoing their cases, goldplating them & gilding the lily.

<comment><USER2> Is there any substantial difference between coerced confessions and plea bargaining as practiced in the US?

<comment><USER4> I think you are letting your hatred of the US cloud your judgement. Plea bargaining is mostly a cost saving measure, going to trial is very expensive.

<comment><USER2> Justice should not be about cost.

<comment><USER5> A system without plea bargains offers no incentive for any rational person to cooperate. It instead encourages everyone, guilty and innocent, to ruthlessly impose additional costs on the rest of society --- most notably on the innocent accused, who are allocated fewer resources with which to vindicate themselves.

<comment><USER6> What about truth? It is assumed that prosecution see you as guilty. But what if they got the wrong person? It's not like it never happened.

Besides, what is the downside for prosecution (as individual) for a wrongful convictions?

<comment><USER5> There is inadequate downside for prosecutors making bad-faith or risky cases. But the question I posed was practical, not moral: in the absence of plea deals, there is no disincentive for the guilty accused to grind the system to a halt with pointless litigation. The people who would pay the steepest price for that wouldn't be the citizenry at large, but rather _the innocent accused_.

<comment><USER2> Whatever happened to rather that 10 guilty men walk free rather than that one man be jailed innocent?

The innocent accused _are_ paying the steepest price today, they end up pleading guilty, lose their livelihood, rights, and lots more.

If the system would grind to a halt it would grind to a halt for everybody, not just for the guilty. And maybe that would allow for a better system rather than one where might makes right and the amount of money you can muster for your defense is the biggest factor in determining the outcome.

<comment><USER5> No, it does not logically follow that because the innocent accused face an unjust burden today, stupid decisions we make going forward couldn't make their burden even worse. There was a New Yorker story about a young defendant spending years in Rikers waiting for a trial that saw continuance after continuance; that's what happens today, in a system that relies heavily on plea deals to clear caseloads.

<comment><USER2> I can't make heads or tails of your position. The fact that the justice system is overloaded has no bearing on the plea bargain situation since it is not used to lighten the load on the justice system but rather to concentrate more power on the few remaining cases.

You make it seem as if the plea bargaining system is used as an efficiency gain where those that 'know they're guilty' are going to plead guilty and all those that know they are not are going to have their day in court. If that were the case I would not have a problem with it, alas it is _very_ far from the truth.

<comment><USER5> Sure you can. My position is very straightforward. The innocent accused already wait too long for their day in court because of an overburdened court system. They would wait vastly longer --- serving, as is the routine in places like China, the majority of their purported sentence in pre-trial detention --- if the courts were forced to pointlessly spend weeks on criminal cases in which neither party believes the accused has any chance of prevailing.

Increase burden on court system: decrease resources allocated to the innocent accused.

<comment><USER2> You are somewhat missing the point: the innocent accused are quite frequently accepting the plea, even though they are innocent.

So they serve a sentence they shouldn't be serving and they end up being branded convicts for life.

Have a read:

[http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2014/nov/20/why- inn...](http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2014/nov/20/why-innocent- people-plead-guilty/)

<comment><USER5> No, you've read my comment, made an orthogonal point, and then suggested that I don't understand that point. I do understand it; it's simply orthogonal to mine.

You're also very happy to mis-frame my point, repeatedly suggesting that I believe there's no meaningful injustice in the status quo. That is not what I believe. I've been pretty clear about the fact that there is a significant problem that urgently needs correction. It's just not exactly the problem you care about, and so you caricature my points to try to win the argument.

Once again: regardless of how often the innocent accept bogus plea agreements, _those innocent who choose to fight their cases_ are greatly harmed by a system that eliminates plea bargains.

<comment><USER2> Those innocent who choose to fight are _also_ greatly harmed by the current system of plea bargaining because as the linked article shows it's all about the conviction rate and not about the guilt or innocence of the accused and when the might of the state is brought to bear those innocent that decided to fight rather than to accept the plea are still convicted in suspiciously large numbers.

So plea bargaining as we see it at present does not appear to help those innocent who fight their cases. Because it's all about winning for the state, not about guilt or innocence.

<comment><USER7> The current system, which includes plea bargains, is greatly flawed. Prosecutors in the US simply have too much power as well as distorted incentives. If they did not have this power then they would not be able to abuse the plea bargain system as they do. But eliminating plea bargains would not be an improvement. Despite the abuses it does improve efficiency and if it did not exist it would not materially reduce prosecutorial power although it would reduce the number of convictions per year. Bad plea bargains are a symptom, not the cause.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> > "We have a 99.6 percent conviction rate in cybercrime"

AUSA Paul Fishman also prosecuted the famous Auernheimer "ipad hack" case, and then went on to watch judges in the appeals court reverse the conviction on procedural grounds and admonish the way that Fishman and his office handled the case.

I wonder if the statistic takes into account situations like that, or if weev's case wasn't considered "cybercrime."

At any rate it is nice to see that Fishman also obtains indictments against real criminals from time to time.

</comment><comment><USER9> I expect HN people to get their vocabulary straight and use the word "hacker" only for the people that build things. This story is obviously about a cracker.

<comment><USER2> Unfortunately nobody cares. So re-claiming the word hacker for the good guys is an exercise in futility.

<comment><USER10> And like many English words Hacker has several meanings and trying to go back to the 60's usage at MIT is I afraid a pointless exercise just Like King Cnut trying to hold back the tide.

<comment><USER11> The creative and transgressive meanings of the word "hacker" have been around about equally long and both go back to the MIT milieu. Its first appearance in print referred to breaking into phone networks. (Sorry I don't have links handy but this has been discussed many times on HN.) So it's not true that the word started out good and was corrupted by misunderstanding... but I bet that claim is also about as old as both usages!

Agreed about pointlessness in any case.

<comment><USER10> I thought that the MIT Model railroad club usage was well before phone phreaks and blue boxing - not sure when STD dialing came in in the states

<comment><USER11> This is what I was thinking of:

[http://duartes.org/gustavo/blog/post/first-recorded-usage- of...](http://duartes.org/gustavo/blog/post/first-recorded-usage-of-hacker/)

[https://web.archive.org/web/20060715031620/http://listserv.l...](https://web.archive.org/web/20060715031620/http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi- bin/wa?A2=ind0306B&L=ads-l&P=R5831&m=24290)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> "catchmeifyoucan"

I guess he got caught.

<comment><USER13> I think you're right. But the article is poorly edited. The final paragraph begins with the word "he", while the previous paragraph mentions both Drinkman and Kalinin.

So it's possible that "he" refers not to Drinkman, but to Kalinin, who has not yet been caught.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> what eedjits keep 130 million credit card numbers in a computer that is attached to the Internet. Gross negligence is not a crime?

<comment><USER5> I'm going to go with "the entire economy of the world" as an answer to that question. _Everyone_ does this. And there are much worse things attached to the Internet than the payment card information of virtually everyone with a credit card.</comment></comment>


In Hypercompetitive South Korea, Pressures Mount on Young Pupils - <AUTHOR> http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/education/jan-june11/koreaschools_01-21.html

<comment><AUTHOR> Hmm, apparently HN is auto-titling submissions now?

Anyway, saw this on PBS tonight and wow, they are hyper about education.

Somewhere between their extreme and the USA's low, has to be a better solution.

Also see this earlier coverage: [http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/speakout/world/jan- june11/...](http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/speakout/world/jan- june11/skoreaeducation_01-19.html)</comment>


Engineers' Corner: On COBOL and Legacy Systems - <AUTHOR> https://livingcomputers.org/Blog/Engineers-Corner-On-COBOL-and-Legacy-Systems.aspx <comment><USER2> Everything decays. The hardware that your software runs on dies and no one can find a replacement. The regulations covering your business change. Your vendor stops supporting SSLv2Hello. Your clients ask for a feature that your competitors provide. IBM raises prices on your contract that renewed last week to make up for flagging revenue. Suddenly 3-9s of uptime isn't enough for your clients and you need a second datacenter.

Once it starts costing more than $200 a person/hour to deal with things like this you are kinda hosed. Especially when it will take thousands of hours to make a change. Hence why everyone wants to move to cheaper languages like Java, Node.JS, etc...

Otherwise, you end up with a COBOL system running on a linux virtual machine that is emulating an IBM mainframe from 1992 that is nearly impossible to maintain because the developers have all died or retired and left no documentation. Your remaining contractors have billed a quarter million in costs and the change still isn't working.</comment>


This is what Apple should tell you when you lose your iPhone - <AUTHOR> https://hackernoon.com/this-is-what-apple-should-tell-you-when-you-lose-your-iphone-8f07cf73cf82#.rj7p70u3f <comment><USER2> This was submitted 2 days ago with a different host name: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12222135](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12222135)</comment>