Birds and Frogs (2009) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://www.ams.org/notices/200902/rtx090200212p.pdf <comment><USER2> If you're wondering what this is about, and whether the link is worth clicking, it's by Freeman Dyson and here's how it starts off:

> _Some mathematicians are birds, others are frogs. Birds fly high in the air > and survey broad vistas of mathematics out to the far horizon. They delight > in concepts that unify our thinking and bring together diverse problems from > different parts of the landscape. Frogs live in the mud below and see only > the flowers that grow nearby. They delight in the details of particular > objects, and they solve problems one at a time. I happen to be a frog, but > many of my best friends are birds. The main theme of my talk tonight is > this. Mathematics needs both birds and frogs._

</comment><comment><USER3> A classic!</comment>


Ask HN: What does developer enablement mean to you? - <AUTHOR> In the context of a large enterprise I'm working on defining what "developer enablement" means in terms of technology components.<p>What does "developer enablement" mean to you? <comment><USER2> Enablement means having choice. Choice means using open standards and not closed proprietary platforms.

Often I see developers feeling trapped when they are unable to choose the best tools for the job.

Allow developers to be creative, period.</comment>


Show and Tell: Image captioning open sourced in TensorFlow - <AUTHOR> https://research.googleblog.com/2016/09/show-and-tell-image-captioning-open.html <comment><USER2> Why on earth would they distribute this without a trained model? Several weeks of training time on a multi-thousand dollar piece of specialized hardware are required to actually run this.

Google clearly has many different trained versions of this network sitting around. It must have been a conscious decision not to release them. Is the point to artificially create a barrier to entry for hobbyists that might want to apply this research? If so, why bother releasing it at all? I'm really scratching my head here.

<comment><USER3> I feel the same. Maybe we should pool some money to train it on AWS. Is there a community where Machine Learning hobbyists can pool money to train models that are open sourced afterwards?

<comment><USER2> I haven't heard of one, but this is a good idea!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This network shows how it is possible to represent meaning into a vector of 100-600 real numbers, first from images to vectors, then from vectors to text. Philosophers have always wondered about the nature of thought, but this representation model creates for the first time the ability to work with sensorially grounded abstract concepts in AI. It's not so mysterious after all. It is possible to merge multiple sensorial modalities in a common meaning space.

In order to get full AI we need to add behavior and embodiment to these meaning vectors. They need to be trained by reinforcement learning, to learn the behavior that maximizes rewards. Meaning vectors are just a small part of the final system, equivalent to our ability to see and speak. The most difficult part is that of learning behavior.

<comment><USER5> I'd be much more hesitant to talk about "meaning" in this context. Are we working with abstract concepts? We're working with images and text, and creating connections between the two. It may be that this approach, ramped up in processing power and complexity, can completely mimic a human's response to images; we may also hit a wall where new techniques are needed to address what you'd call "meaning."

<comment><USER4> Yes, could be. Word vectors and other kinds of embeddings seem promising, a little too good to be true. There might be a glass ceiling we're not seeing yet.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Wondering if one can train TensorFlow to catch bugs in source code.

Train it from github.com's commits, logs - auto learn "what the SW bugs look like" and scan for new one....

<comment><USER4> There is something like this:

Automatic Patch Generation by Learning Correct Code

[https://people.csail.mit.edu/rinard/paper/popl16.pdf](https://people.csail.mit.edu/rinard/paper/popl16.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Very cool. I've been toying with the idea of using something like this or perhaps the cloud vision API to automatically generate image captions for screen readers (e.g. through a browser extension) but the cost to run something like an EC2 GPU unit is prohibitive for a project like that which I wouldn't want to charge for.

Running it locally on the user's machine would take far too long to train, especially as you would have to use the CPU in the majority of cases since many people don't have a separate GPU.

<comment><USER8> While you would never do this kind of training on your user's machines (which takes multiple weeks even with a powerful GPU), you should be able to apply the trained model to a single photo nearly instantaneously. So the real roadblock is mostly that they don't appear to have a included a completely pre-trained model with this release, and it will take you as a developer a lot of GPU time to train one. But your users would not necessarily have a problem captioning images on their machines.

<comment><USER7> I hadn't considered that (this is really out of my depth). Any ideas on what the actual size of a trained model would be to distribute? Taking 150G on the user's hard drive is out as well, probably.

<comment><USER9> Depends on the model and dataset, inceptionv3 trained on imagenet is about 150mb but you can quantise the weights to 8bit and prune it much smaller without affecting perf much

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> It would be much more useful if they released a pretrained model. Most people don't have the tech required to train their own- unless you want to wait months.

</comment><comment><USER11> This is super awesome! It would be nice if a pretrained model was also available to be able to play with this without spending weeks of training.

</comment><comment><USER12> Would it be possible to simulate this on a MBP or would it require significantly more amount of computing power

<comment><USER13> from their note on github page [1]:

> The time required to train the Show and Tell model depends on your specific > hardware and computational capacity. > In this guide we assume you will be > running training on a single machine with a GPU. In our experience on an > NVIDIA Tesla K20m GPU the initial training phase takes 1-2 weeks. The second > training phase may take several additional weeks to achieve peak performance > (but you can stop this phase early and still get reasonable results).

> It is possible to achieve a speed-up by implementing distributed training > across a cluster of machines with GPUs, > but that is not covered in this > guide.

> Whilst it is possible to run this code on a CPU, beware that this may be > approximately 10 times slower.

So, I assume it will take veeery long time to train it on a MBP, unless they publish their pre-trained data-set.

[1] [https://github.com/tensorflow/models/tree/master/im2txt#a-no...](https://github.com/tensorflow/models/tree/master/im2txt#a-note- on-hardware-and-training-time)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> If someone has the model running already, could you please share the captions generated for the images mentioned in page 25 of [http://cims.nyu.edu/~brenden/1604.00289v2.pdf](http://cims.nyu.edu/~brenden/1604.00289v2.pdf) .

</comment><comment><USER15> I wonder if as someone learning ML I should try to train it and run it on my pc.</comment>


The Gift of Powerlessness - <AUTHOR> https://leowid.com/the-gift-of-powerlessness/ <comment><USER2> Read on for the joys of 3D porn using VR goggles...</comment>


Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey Giving Third of His Stock to Staff Equity Pool - <AUTHOR> http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-10-23/twitter-ceo-jack-dorsey-giving-third-of-his-stock-to-staff-equity-pool <comment><USER2> [https://twitter.com/jack/status/657351519461707776](https://twitter.com/jack/status/657351519461707776)</comment>


Counter-intuitive lessons learned from start-up life - <AUTHOR> http://www.techvibes.com/blog/counter-intuitive-lessons-learned-from-start-up-life

<comment><USER2> _Everyone says more eyeballs are always better. Ignore them. If people like what you are doing, they will find you. Do not spend anytime thinking about PR_

I hear of startups launching in March and having 100,000 users by August. How do you do this without some marketing, even if your product is free?</comment>


California files suit against for-profit college - <AUTHOR> http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2013/10/11/california-attorneygeneralfilessuitagainstforprofitcollege.html

<comment><USER2> Steve Eisman, eat your heart out. [http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-01-24/big-short-eisman- vi...](http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-01-24/big-short-eisman-vies-with- goldman-sachs-in-value-faceoff-over-for-profits.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm interested to know if anyone on HN has been to a for-profit school What was the outcome?

<comment><USER4> I signed up for a law-over-internet school. I dropped it within 6 months - partly because I was unable to get any other students to turn up to study meetups, but mainly because the school's 'interactive' learning approach consisted of a book list, a to-do list to be completed at some point during the academic year (which consisted of nothing more than copying out a set of legal definitions from their study aid), and a couple of hours a week of Q&A that took place in a chat room that could only be accessed by an incredibly old and flaky edition of Blackboard software, and in which the Q&A was mostly from students to teacher. Going through a simple exam problem required a whole month.

I was (and reamin) furious with myself for dropping out, partly because it cost me a few thousand but mainly because I did and do love the subject and found the material itself easy and interesting - I am the sort of person who actually enjoys reading unabridged versions of judicial opinions and trying to 'reverse engineer' the judicial reasoning process. But I would have done just as well to purchase the books and sit at home reading them, the 'school' part of the experience was so bad that I actually felt more isolated than before I began. After attending a law student seminar where I was surrounded by hundreds of students from brick & mortar colleges my confidence took a complete nosedive and I stopped even logging on to the school's website.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> In theory even non-profit colleges will want more money but for profit ones have investors and CEOs that get paid based on this year's / this quarter's performance. So soon or later the obvious will happen: shady advertising, more students, less staff and resources for them and so on. It's not like they care much about the college's reputation 20 years from now.

<comment><USER6> The education market isn't magical.

You can make the same critique about any industry, but when we do so, the reality of the situation is that we are far better off with for-profit enterprises. As consumers, workers, and investors.

The government's complaint isn't that the for-profit enterprise is doing worse in comparison to some objective metric or an average of non-profit institutions.

It is merely that they don't like their advertising.

Would you like to provide some sort of evidence for this?

> more students, less staff and resources for them</comment></comment>


Show HN: Swipe-to-delete goodness for the mobile web - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/ankane/swipeout

<comment><USER2> Super cool. Small issue: if you swipe one entry, then immediately swipe another, it only cancels the first swipe. You have to swipe a second time to bring up the delete option. Seems like it should both cancel the first swipe and bring up the delete option at once.

<comment><AUTHOR> Right now, it's implemented just like the iOS mail app. Your suggestion sounds more intuitive though. I'm curious to hear if others feel the same way.

<comment><USER3> That was my initial reaction as well. Cool project!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'd hesitate on implementing this. What kind of discoverability does this have? Do er simple assume all our users have been trained in this technique by others?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, this assumes users are aware of the swipe-to-delete paradigm. I would still recommend adding a delete option in a more obvious place for each item.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Webkit only :(

Misses CSS rules and a transform (AFAICT) for Gecko, Presto (RIP) and Trident.

<comment><AUTHOR> My bad, updated it to include other browsers.

<comment><USER5> Tested on Firefox for Android Nightly and it seems to work great.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This is fantastic - feels native (iPhone 5, iOS 6.1). Semi related: does anyone know of a good js library for displaying side navigation(a la face books app) or detecting swipes from the edge of the screen?

<comment><AUTHOR> Glad you like it :) You should be able to accomplish edge swipe detection with Hammer.js <http://eightmedia.github.com/hammer.js/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Feels great on Chrome on Android. My only nitpick might be that the delete button is really close to the edge of the screen; a larger margin would be nice, I think.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, I'll play around with that.</comment></comment>


Modular C: Reusable and Maintainable Code Using the C Language (1994) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://metamodular.com/Computing/modular-c.pdf <comment><USER2> "System programming differs from application programming in that system programming emphasizes performance over reusable and maintainable code"

Maybe for sufficiently small systems. But on a large scale product (reusable and maintainable code == performance). Am I missing something. Seems like something one or our EEs would say to me to excuse their poor code quality

<comment><USER3> no, that's not true.. in C, extracting struct elements into variables, holding temporary values for longer, explicitly adding intermediate steps in a dense reference of references, would be examples of 'optional' contents that help readability and lessen potential ambiguity to a human coder. Each time data moves, clock cycles are used, at least.

For decades, compilers have looked for this sort of code and condensed it as an optimization, so the way the code is written is not always the way it executes at runtime, but the longer, verbose steps might add cycles, and therefore would be avoided when coding for 'systems performance'.

<comment><USER4> Optimizing compilers are good at optimizing obvious code, so this usually isn't a trade off. Many of the clever hacks you can find in books from the 80s are irrelevant now because the compiler can figure out what your naive code is doing and emit something optimized.

Modern processors don't even operate sequentially and will execute multiple lines in parallel when there are no data dependencies.

For most code, the performance killer is when you try to be too clever or have too many pointer indirections. The compiler has a harder time with this, and is also precluded from applying other optimizations like auto vectorization, because it cannot figure out if it would change the meaning of your code.

For true performance, you need to enter the land of intrinsics, manual vectorization, and cache-aware algorithms. Domains which very few engineers are qualified to work on.

So just keep it simple and trust the compiler. This also applies to algorithms, complicated ones with lots of branching will often perform far far worse in practice than the naive one, you can't trust the big-O alone. So profile when in doubt.

<comment><USER5> > So just keep it simple and trust the compiler. This also applies to > algorithms, complicated ones with lots of branching will often perform far > far worse in practice than the naive one, you can't trust the big-O alone. > So profile when in doubt.

I've found that optimizing for cache is usually the biggest gain when trying to be clever with algorithms. Eliminating branches and being naive in the algorithm itself is usually a better idea than trying to be clever with special cases.

In my experience.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This is old-fashioned (uses C89 instead of C99) and some of its "idioms" are questionable, like this one:

        list *p;
        list l = (list) malloc(sizeof(struct list));
        l -> val = val;
        for(p = &the_list; *p && (*p) -> val < val; p = &((*p) -> next))
          ;
        l -> next = *p; *p = l;

Here p is a doubly indirect pointer and I would personally think this is an unwarranted cleverness.

Furthermore this is the year 2019. Why would you still manually traverse a linked list? Oh right because C doesn't have parametric polymorphism (genericity) so you can't abstract out the traversal in a standard library.

Consider the C++ equivalent (although I chose to use a doubly linked list for better reusability):

        list.insert(std::lower_bound(list.begin(), list.end(), val), val);

See how the search for the location to insert is done by the library, and the insertion is also done by the library. This, to me, is truly reusable and maintainable code.

<comment><USER7> It's sort of funny that linus torvalds actually talked about why that sort of iteration is better: [https://youtu.be/o8NPllzkFhE?t=861](https://youtu.be/o8NPllzkFhE?t=861)

I think he puts it pretty well (although he them also goes on to say dumb little snippets like that really don't matter in the big picture). Essentially, by making a doubly indirect pointer you get to treat the first element exactly the same way you are going to treat every other element.

<comment><USER8> However, Linus would object to hiding the true type of list (it's actually a pointer) --- as do I, since I was a little confused by that fragment at first, wondering what exactly was doubly indirected about it. It looks very different from the usual implementation of a "virtual head", which uses a single- indirect pointer only.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The table of contents is the _last_ three pages. (Is that normal within some community?)

</comment><comment><USER10> Looks like this is written in TexInfo. Is there a HTML version or the texi source available?</comment>


GNU Unifont Glyphs - <AUTHOR> http://unifoundry.com/unifont.html <comment><USER2> Why has all the `0` been replaced with `Ø`?

As a Dane, I'm sligthly offended.

<comment><USER3> its one of two or three accepted solutions to the 0O problem

<comment><USER2> It's not really a solution, as it creates the 0Ø problem.

<comment><USER4> I haven't checked Unifont but generally, zero with a slash has the slash only on the inside of the zero, whereas o with a slash, as you, being danish, know, but others might not, has the slash extending beyond each side. If Unifont has the slash going outside, then I agree with you, that is offensive, but if it does not, then it's fine.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I have unifont installed on Linux. Ironically, when I set Firefox to disallow sites to choose their own fonts, and set unifont as my default, the unifoundry site text looks terrible, like the old days. When I allow sites to choose their own, unifoundry looks fine. And when I disallow, and use Verdana, unifoundry looks fine.

Similar with HN.

I'm guessing one of the goals of unifont is that I never see a box where I should see a glyph. Is there a way to fall back to unifont? Is it a per app choice?

<comment><USER6> One of the design choices of Unifont is to trade quality for coverage:

"Unifont is a creation of Roman Czyborra, who in 1998 lamented that seven years after Unicode's first release, there was still no single font that could display all Unicode characters. He suggested that if expectations of font quality were lowered to that of a bitmapped font, achieving coverage of Unicode would be easier."

So, if you render everything with it, it won't be very pretty. But it makes a great fall back option for missing glyphs.

source: [https://savannah.gnu.org/projects/unifont](https://savannah.gnu.org/projects/unifont)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I know with APL is, but what is a console frame buffer font?

<comment><USER8> _console frame buffer font_ is just a fancy way of saying _pixel font_.

 _console_ means that it is to be used with a console [1] or terminal emulator[2]. Traditionally terminal emulators used bitmap fonts, but modern versions support vector fonts as well. _frame buffer_ [3] just means that it is a bitmap font like the ones used in traditional frame buffer consoles.

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

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

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

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Looks very similar to these fonts, at least for the latin-1 part, but more complete and with more restrictive license: [https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/ucs- fonts.html](https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/ucs-fonts.html)

</comment><comment><USER10> What are the implications of a GPL'd font? In particular, does merely using it within a program invoke the copyleft requirements? Or does that fall under the document use exception per the webpage?

</comment><comment><USER11> Small typo in the title: should probably be GNU (not GUN).

<comment><USER12> The submitted title was "GNU Unifont updated to Unicode version 9", which was more informative and not misleading. Often I don't know why the titles are changed.

<comment><USER13> The titles are changed to be like the title is in the link. This is to prevent biasing by submitters. Unfortunately, the mods have to be quite ruthless to keep it fair and to avoid adding their own bias.</comment></comment></comment>


Device allows plants to Twitter - <AUTHOR> http://www.reuters.com/article/smallBusinessNews/idUSTRE52U42B20090331?pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0

<comment><USER2> Reminds me of a Far Side cartoon where they revealed what dogs were saying when barking (basically "hello" over and over).

</comment><comment><USER3> 08: [http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/25/diy-kit-lets- houseplants-...](http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/25/diy-kit-lets-houseplants- twitter-when-they-need-water/)

And flagged.

</comment><comment><USER4> It's way too expensive. I think you could build a cheaper one with Xbee instead of ethernet.

I've been tempted to hire someone to build a few of these things. Any arduino hackers around?</comment>


History of the entire world, i guess [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuCn8ux2gbs <comment><USER2> Those jingles are funny the first few times, but they get annoying pretty fast.

Anyway, happy to see this linked here. He also did a similar video for the history of Japan [0], quite entertaining.

[0] [https://youtube.com/watch?v=Mh5LY4Mz15o](https://youtube.com/watch?v=Mh5LY4Mz15o)

<comment><USER3> Agreed, those singing moments are annoying but the video is good, lot of research. I wonder how much time went into it.

<comment><USER4> The creator said it took him 11 months.

[http://www.billwurtz.com/questions/questions.html](http://www.billwurtz.com/questions/questions.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I like Bill Wurtz and all but I'm kind of surprised to see this on the front page of HN.</comment>


How do you identify Open Source projects to contribute to? - <AUTHOR> I'm looking around for Open Source projects where I could contribute to. There are tons of them with varying degrees of maturity, wild variance of tech stacks (and hype). It is a tough decision since my time/energy is limited and the opportunity cost weighs heavy in my mind.
I am personally working in the DevOps/CICD space so it would probably make more sense to invest time/effort in a project in that space. I was looking to  kubernetes -I want to get experience in Golang as well- but I was somewhat deterred by the complexity of it. Both functionally and -perhaps more importantly- the developing-experience complexity. Anyhow, I'm now at the 'paralysis by analysis' stage and I'm wondering how other people have dealt with this chaos of options.
Do you contribute to OS? How did you go about selecting where you'd contribute to? How did you get past the no-joy initial stages where all you got was a steep learning curve with little or no help? <comment><USER2> Pick some of the projects you are using. For most projects you have to understand the philosophy and what is the central idea, and it is very difficult if you are not using it.

Start with a small part. You are never sure if the maintainers are going to merge it, or if the maintainers are crazy or morons. So pick a small task that is useful but you don't be too sad if it not merged. I recommend to not invest more than two days initially, but perhaps two days is too much.

Also each project has unofficial rules about rebasing, code style, commit message style, test coverage, documentation. Try to follow the style of the project, but be prepared to make a few fixes.

The best time to start contributing to open source was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.

PS: (Just in case) Don't expect to make money for this. It is posible if you reach the Linus status, or you get hired to contribute to a project, but in most cases don't expect to get money.

PS2: Typos in docs, comments, and error message are a good starting point. It's easy, and after looking at the code you will understand it more and perhaps notice something you can improve.

PS2: Since you know CICD ... do you know how to run gcc with -ubsan in travis- ci? I tried to configure it, but I failed and gave up. Warning: it may be harder than you think.

PS4: Configuring the CI of some projects may he helpful. Perhaps try some project you are interested and they have a clear set of test but don't have the CI enabled.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the advice.

PS2: Haven't used C/C++ in our tech stack for quite a while now but from what I see it should work if you provide the relevant switch '-fsanitize=undefined' plus a gcc version that supports Undefined Behavior Sanitizer (gcc 4.9 and later).

<comment><USER2> I tried again, it was a problem with the -fuse-ld=gold flag. I was trying to set it as an argument from the build script, but the solution was to configure it inside one of the internal files. I don't understand the details, but IWOMM :). Now that it is working, let's hope that one of the main developers with more understanding of the internal parts of the build process can cleanup it before merging.

If you want to take a look [https://github.com/racket/racket/pull/2441](https://github.com/racket/racket/pull/2441)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I made a project just for this, here's a list of Go and Kubernetes OS projects with instructions and issues for new contributors: [https://www.sourcesort.com/?refinementList%5Blanguages%5D%5B...](https://www.sourcesort.com/?refinementList%5Blanguages%5D%5B0%5D=Go&refinementList%5Btopics%5D%5B0%5D=kubernetes&refinementList%5Btopics%5D%5B1%5D=golang&refinementList%5Btopics%5D%5B2%5D=go&page=1&configure%5BhitsPerPage%5D=36&toggle%5BhasContributionInstructions%5D=true&toggle%5BhasDocumention%5D=true)

That search turns up 32 results, but you could narrow that down more according to your needs using the other filters.

Things to check for: how long does it take for new contributors to get responses to their pull request? how many first time pull requests are accepted? (there's a filter for this too if you scroll down)

Before tackling an issue or getting involved, it's a good idea to give a heads up or introduce yourself. You might be able to do this on the GitHub repo or possibly on a mailing list, etc. if they run the project via a separate communication platform.

Good luck!

<comment><AUTHOR> sourcesort is really cool. Hope you have submitted it in 'show HN'.

Thanks!

<comment><USER3> I tried a couple of weeks ago but it went nowhere :(

I think repeat submissions are allowed for relevant projects that didn't get any traction on here so I'll try again soon.</comment></comment></comment>


Alternative Courtship: Matrimonial Advertisements in the 19th Century - <AUTHOR> https://mimimatthews.com/2016/01/04/alternative-courtship-matrimonial-advertisements-in-the-19th-century/ <comment><USER2> I strongly encourage everyone who is interested in this to carve out some time to read the old scanned newspapers at [https://news.google.com/newspapers](https://news.google.com/newspapers) Pick a time range, then follow along reading the paper in a kind of "this day in history" fashion from a variety of papers from the west to midwest to east coast, not just to see what was important then, but how accounts changed.

It is fascinating to read accounts from 120-150 years ago. These kind of "classifieds" are cool too--"situation wanted" ads where single women are seeking domestic employment, and cases where men are looking for odd jobs. And then reading about the accidents--deaths from train incidents, boiler explosions, freak deaths. It's easy to get lost in a different time while seeing connections to media and what interested people then and now.

<comment><USER3> I second this. It's been a hobby of mine for a few years and there are many instances when I've caught myself losing track of time while doing it. The only difference is I do it with foreign 'Hemerotecas' (news libraries). In fact, I'm keen to write a book about my findings.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> In India, these forms of advertisements are still a primary way by which millions of couples meet each other. The parents are often involved in pre- filtering alliances.

The electronic version of this (e.g. [http://www.bharatmatrimony.com/](http://www.bharatmatrimony.com/) and the like) are the original e-commerce successes on the Indian Web, and are still going really strong.

</comment><comment><USER5> It is interesting how up front they were about income. That seems much more efficient than trying to advertise wealth by buying "middle age crisis" style sports cars :)

<comment><AUTHOR> I think men stated their income to prove that they could support a wife and children.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> This still happens in India. Parents of daughters are direct about income requirements. Women want men who earn more than them, down to the rupee. Men want women who are young, beautiful and homely. All this is blatantly specified in the ads in newspapers.

</comment><comment><USER7> Can someone explain what "exchange of miniatures" means in this context?

<comment><AUTHOR> Miniatures were small painted portraits. It would be like exchanging photographs today.

<comment><USER7> Ah that makes sense! Thank you.

<comment><USER2> 19th century Snapchat, then?

(All the more reason to read old newspapers: to see what social constructs are timeless (and therefore possibly more fundamentally sound).</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Apple donates when you buy red products - <AUTHOR> http://www.apple.com/product-red/

<comment><USER2> I'm not sure why this is HN worthy news.

Every company that has (PRODUCT) Red products donate when you buy them. The whole range is here: <http://www.joinred.com/></comment>


A World Dividing: The International Implications of the Sino-American Rift - <AUTHOR> https://quincyinst.org/2019/12/04/quincybrief-01-a-world-dividing/ <comment><AUTHOR> Cogent arguments. The tragicomic slow death of American hegemony is lead by Donald Trump, in a episode right out of the Simpsons. Sad!

• The U.S.–China trade war is reshaping global politics, creating new patterns of economic integration and alignment.

• Rather than enhancing manufacturing or investment in the United States, the Trump administration's actions are expanding China's economic influence and spurring commercial activity in other countries.

• By announcing a new era of "great power competition," the United States is committing a mistake. It should instead focus on solving planetwide problems like climate change and sustaining economic and technological progress. All such challenges require some measure of cooperation with China.</comment>


Prevalence of Partially Hydrogenated Oils in US Packaged Foods (2012) - <AUTHOR> http://www.cdc.gov/pcd/issues/2014/14_0161.htm

<comment><USER2> tl;dr: _" Nine percent of products in the sample contained partially hydrogenated oils; 84% of these products listed "0 grams" of trans fat per serving, potentially leading consumers to underestimate their trans fat consumption."_

<comment><USER3> From the article: "...manufacturers are permitted to label products containing between 0 and 0.5 g of trans fat per serving as '0 grams' in the United States"

I'd like _that_ to be on the label

<comment><USER4> My favorite is Tic Tacs. They're basically pure sugar, but they say "Sugar 0g" on the nutrition label. Because the whole mint is less than 0.5g so they round to 0.

Edit: this is an FDA rule. The boxes I've seen include a note at the bottom explaining that there is some sugar.

<comment><USER5> My favorite is Triscuits. They break down fat content into (I think) saturated, monounsaturated, and polyunsaturated, or possibly some other trichotomy. The sum of the by-category numbers is quite far below the total for "fat".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Search page for "cis": no results.

Search page for "saturated": no results.</comment>


Show HN: SaaS Security 1000 – Security overview of the top SaaS companies - <AUTHOR> https://www.sqreen.io/opendoor/saas <comment><USER2> I suppose this list was created using automated testing? I'm in general a bit skeptical of the results of these tools, often they will have a very high false-positive rate and be more distracting than useful. For example regarding cookie security it's often the case that web apps use a mix between secure+HTTP-only cookies (e.g. for access tokens) and JS-accessible cookies (e.g. just for storing the login status so a web app can know if there's a secure access token cookie as well). Doing this usually poses no security risk but often gets flagged by automated tools anyway. Are you able to differentiate between the two cases? Similar arguments could be made about many other points on your list (e.g. mixed HTTP/HTTPs content, CSP headers etc.). Also, some of the things you mention like public key pinning and HSTS can carry operative risks themselves and should only be implemented with great care, slapping them onto a bullet list might give the suggestion that it's always a good idea to implement them (it's not) and is therefore not very helpful (IMHO).

I see that you do port scanning as well, which IP addresses do you scan against? In my experience many SaaS providers sit behind proxies like Cloudflare these days, so of course you won't find any open ports when scanning against their HTTP services, that doesn't mean that their real servers don't have any though.

I'm not complaining because we're not on your list (we're not), I just think if you really want to help companies to be more secure you should strive to explain the trade-offs and benefits of each point you mentioned instead of grossly oversimplifying an extremely complex topic. I understand the marketing value of this page but honestly I think it might be harmful to your reputation as a serious security firm. Just my 2c.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> At Sqreen, we love SaaS! We especially love making SaaS companies more secure :-)

The SaaS Security 1000, is a security overview of the world's fastest growing SaaS companies. We run a few basic security checks to identify network and application security issues.

No SaaS business has been harmed during that experiment ;-) (information gathered with fully passive & non-intrusive tests)

Have feedback or question?</comment>


How I missed an engineering interview after getting singled out by Münchner cops - <AUTHOR> http://vid.bina.me/rant/suspicious-profile/ <comment><USER4> In defense of the Munich police (which is not always friendly but mostly respectful), the current situation in Bavaria is quite unusual due to the refugee crisis and the arrival of thousands of unregistered people every day, which might cause some people in the police force to be a bit on the edge.

Being checked when entering Germany from the Netherlands isn't so unusual though, as there are lots of people trafficking drugs across the border (mostly on a small scale though). Friends of mine got checked several times as well even though they're "European looking", but I haven't heard from cases where people got taken to a police station for further inquiry.

As a German I'm sorry that this happened, because I actually think we got one of the most friendly and helpful police forces in Europe.

Concerning your dismissal at the police station: As far as I know you would have had the right to be driven back to your original location in Munich afterwards. My advice: Complain. In Germany, this is the best way to get what you want :D

<comment><USER5> Perhaps you think that police are friendly and helpful because of your experiences. So here is a guess: you are white, you have a standard hairstyle, you wear standard clothes.

Perhaps we could experimentally test your hypothesis of friendly police behaviour. Start wearing dreadlocks, put on baggy pants and some other more 'hip-hop' looking clothes. Put some colour on your face and make it look darker.

Do this for a year, and _then_ tell us what you think.

<comment><USER6> > So here is a guess: you are white, you have a standard hairstyle, you wear > standard clothes.

One can't help one's colour, but one can help one's hairstyle and clothes. How one presents oneself is one aspect of one's communication with others, to include the police. If one broadcasts the message, 'I am likely to be a petty criminal' to the police, one should expect to be harassed.

<comment><USER7> (1) All persons shall be equal before the law. (2) Except the person looks like a petty criminal

<comment><USER8> If I walk up to a police officer and tell them I'm a threat to them I expect to get extra attention I probably won't like. Pretending like body language and other forms of communication don't send the same message is disingenuous.

<comment><USER9> So, having darker skin makes someone a threat?

<comment><USER8> Darker skin does not equal threatening body language.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Regardless of weather or not the search was warranted in this case it often seems like much of the hardship and resentment could be mitigated by the tiniest amount of curtesy on the part of the police. I don't understand why cops are often (not always) such total dicks about this stuff. Does treating people like shit really further their aims? Is the thinking that some how they'll "smoke out the guilty" when their anger get's the better of them or something?

<comment><USER11> Bavarian cops are known to be absolute pieces of shit. When I was younger I used to travel to Munich from Poland via bus (because it was the cheapest way), and we got stopped and frisked EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. Imagine this for a second - I am a EU citizen of a country that signed the Schengen agreement, and yet I get my passport confiscated and my belongings searched every time I am in Germany. Not even a single "sorry" by the officers either.

<comment><USER12> Bavarian bureaucrats too. What's up with Bavaria?

<comment><USER13> _Bayern gehört zu Österreich... duda, duda._

<comment><USER14> Having a Austrian father and a sister who lives in Austria, I say: the Austrian cops are said to be more civil than their Bavarian counterpart (and I'd prefer to live in Austria than in Bavaria).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> It probably would have been worth trying to ask a question: "I have interviews for two consulting projects at X hours and Y hours. Is it likely that I will be able to make them in time?"

Possible benefits include:

\-- Getting a straight answer.

\-- Breaking the mental model whereby the police are dehumanizing you and/or lumping you into a certain profile.

\-- Getting a response so nasty it's easier to get them into trouble later on. :)

<comment><USER16> It appears you've never had a real encounter with Police.

I've actually worked with the Police. _ALL_ training is about asserting power when dealing with suspects (a suspect is anyone you stop or talk to - <USER2> matter what the circumstances; think about how many people reporting a crime actually end up being arrested themselves due to something they say which incriminates them, even in something tangential and unrelated to what they are reporting).

The moment someone tries to reassert control, training is to respond with additional aggressive responses to overwhelm resistance. Call in backup, draw a taser/gun/baton, physically take hold of the person etc.

Try pulling things like talking about your consulting projects and asking for a guarantee about making a meeting and you'll be lucky not to be face down on the ground in under 5 seconds and spend the next 24 hours sitting in a cell.

In all my years, I think I probably met less than 5 colleagues who could proportionately and reasonably interact with people, defuse tensions and remain in control (of both the situation and themselves). All the rest relied solely on the power assertion training and some couldn't even interact with other police officers without trying to assert power over each other. That always got nasty, especially when they did it to someone who, like them, didn't know how to back down or defuse a situation.

Unless you have a crack team of lawyers monitoring your every move, your best approach is to be compliant and non-confrontation. Remember as much detail as you can (especially names/numbers) and make a formal complaint later on, via a lawyer if possible, once you're out of custody (and preferably out of easy reach - remember the police are 24x7, they can expend huge resources to hound you out of sheer vexatiousness. You have to sleep. They don't.).

<comment><USER17> At the end of the day they are also people and they interact with other people in their day to day lives. When they go to the bank they don't arrest the teller. When they go to the supermarket they don't arrest the cashier. When they go home they don't arrest their wife and kids. Maybe they've seen the same movie you did last night. Maybe they are fans of the the same team. Maybe their brother went to school with you.

You can connect with anyone on a personal level but you need to have people skills. If you're confrontational and non compliant you're setting yourself up for this power contest you can't win.

<comment><USER18> Power tripping carries over into their personal lives. Their families have a much higher rate of domestic violence than the general population.

[http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/09/police-o...](http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/09/police- officers-who-hit-their-wives-or-girlfriends/380329/)

<comment><USER17> "police officers in Florida have an x2-x4 higher rate of domestic violence" isn't quite the same as saying all police officers are out there to beat up whatever person they encounter in their day to day lives. They're still people and they still need social skills even to be able to work with their bosses and co-workers. For example, I've met a pretty tough police officer in a Toastmasters club who I'm sure could under some circumstances be very assertive but at the same time can obviously interact with people like a normal person under other circumstances. I've also met plenty of non police with hot tempers and violent tendencies.

Anyhow my point is the outcome isn't pre-determined and you have some ability to influence how things go by using some people skills.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Münchner cops are the best. I was hit by a police car on my way home from work earlier this year (not my fault). Instead of calling the ambulance the guy spent 15min on police radio, he looked scared as shit. Eventually, an elderly lady that witnessed the whole thing called the ambulance and I was taken to the hospital. I'm just glad I wasn't seriously injured, still I had to wear crutches for a few weeks which was extremely annoying.

Made for a fun punchline when explaining the "bus factor" [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_factor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_factor) at a talk I gave at a company conference later on.

</comment><comment><USER20> I can tell you from second hand experience that this also happens to white people. I was with friends heading by car from the Netherlands to Germany and our more than white driver got a ver special handling by the police because they thought he would be driving under the effects of weed (which was definitely not the case).

Apparently there was some sort of festival happening and they assumed we would belong to another group of people and our driver looked sufficiently like a druggie I guess.

But being polite and understanding of the situation you can get out of this usually without much of a hassle.

<comment> dao- So you have anecdotal evidence that the police once searched a white person. Cool. ;)

I'm afraid Racial Profiling is still real.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I witnessed something similar in mid-May this year on an ICE train between Nürnberg and München.

As is normal, everyone's train ticket was checked (including mine), but when they came to a group of Chinese tourists, there was a problem with one passenger - he'd pre-purchased 3 months prior with a credit card, but the credit card had since been stolen during their international trip. In Germany, Deutsche Bahn require you to present the exact credit card used to purchase your ticket as identification when asked.

The ticket inspector didn't believe the passenger, saying "If your card really was stolen, your replacement card will be the same number" and "If your credit card was stolen you would go to the police to report it." I spoke up at this point in support, explaining that in other countries (at least in Australia), you get a new credit card number so thieves can't use the old number online. But the officer was convinced card numbers were immutable. The passenger did have a police report, but the German officer said "This case number is for British Police, checking this is too difficult."

The inspector asked for the passengers passport - understandably the passenger was not about to surrender his main identification to someone else. The inspector said he could not assist if he did not see the passport, and the passenger then allowed him to _see_ the passport. But when he provided it, the inspector looked at it, then said "Thank you, I now take this, you do not get this back until the police arrive and the police will decide if they give it back to you."

The passenger was part of a tour group, and all of the other tickets had been valid. They asked if they would all be arrested, the inspector said no, but when they asked if they could accompany him to the police station, the inspector said "No, you are not allowed to, only he can go with the police." The entire group all got out at the next stop anyway, where the passenger was arrested by police. After an argument the police did allow the tour group to follow, at least through Munich Station for as far as I could see.

TLDR: the passenger had a successfully pre-purchased ticket, had passport identification that matched the payment details, bank & police statements to support his story of a stolen credit card, but he was still arrested by Munich police. And Munich was only a stop they were passing through during their train journey! I adore Germany, but seeing this left a terrible impression. That Deutsche Bahn card ID policy is crazy, and something is very wrong with Munich's authorities. I'll stick to Berlin next time.

<comment><USER22> France has the same weird credit card policy, and i, too, have been bitten by it. Luckily i got off with a _mere_ telling off by a very surly conductor, when it became obvious i wasn't magically going to produce another credit card. The insanity is on two levels though; using the card as ID but also the fact that they're so damned serious about it. You've got actual, state- provided ID that matches, a valid ticket, but they still give you lip. It's incredible.

"Luckily", i'm caucasian and i speak French, but god help me if i had been of north African phenotype (and for the uninitiated: we're talking about French- speaking born-in-France natives who still get treated like shit) — that's the favourite scapegoat in this part of the world :/.

EDIT: In fact, the whole idea of identifying myself on public transport gives me the shivers. I much prefer the situation where you simply buy anonymous tickets that are valid to the bearer. IMHO the rail authorities have no business knowing who i am, especially since in most cases you're not even crossing borders. And even when you are, they're more likely than not Schengen, in which case there's theoretically no place for the shake-down either. Compare the case where you're sitting in a car — checks are very rare in my experience.

<comment><USER23> > using the card as ID

> You've got actual, state-provided ID that matches, a valid ticket, but they > still give you lip. It's incredible.

So the identity check on the trains is more strict than on the planes (there one needs only national ID or passport with the name matching the name from the reservation). It seems to be the case in at least France and Germany. How come?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I have not had the exact same experience but I traveled very often by car through Germany (as a Dutch citizen) for holidays. My experiences are as follows:

\- Drive in a (new) Audi A3 on lease:

Get stopped every other time. Completely strip my car and luggage. Throw everything on the ground until everything was spread in a 3m radius around my car. Leave me to pick everything up and tetris it back into the trunk and instead start complaining about how the car is not registered on the same name as my passport.

\- Drive in a used Toyota Prius:

<blank>

</comment><comment><USER25> I used to get stopped, singled out and searched at the borders all the time, but the expansion of the Schengen zone put an end to that years ago. A young man, traveling on his own from Amsterdam (especially on a Dutch passport) is a red flag to these officious pricks.

It's disturbing that the Germans unilaterally decided to abolish the Schengen zone. Temporarily they say.

By now I guess I've aged out of the target group, so they leave me alone. And I don't look like the OP.

<comment><USER4> As you say, Schengen does not allow for large-scale border controls in Europe. Random checks are allowed though if they have the purpose of stopping illegal activity such as drug or money trafficking (e.g. from Luxembourg, the Netherlands or Switzerland).

The stricter controls that have been in place for the last weeks, which also only involve randomized searches on a slightly larger scale but only at several points of the border, are also legally covered under the Schengen accord and serve the purpose to get a better handle on the thousands of unregistered immigrants flowing into Germany every day (this year alone, more than 1.5 million regugees might come to Germany, many of them completely unregistered). Concerning the scale of the current crisis I think these measures are absolutely appropriate and not overly extreme.

<comment><USER25> I don't think this had anything to do with refugees. They busted the OP because they assumed they'd find drugs on him.

Young man - check. From Amsterdam - check. Dutch passport - check. Dark skin - check. Dreadlocks - <USER3>

In their mind this kid was going to have dope on him no matter what.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I wonder if the author has protested at any point (getting into an unmarked vehicle, not being returned to original destination, being ordered to take the clothes off (!?)). I also wonder if he was formally informed of the reason behind the detainment.

And finally: if ever faced with such a situation, does a person have the right to a) record everything that happens on the phone (including faces of the police officers + audio), and b) if asked to stop, would it be ok to say "i have the right to record all you do" or something similar?

<comment><USER27> Reading the article I wondered what you can do/say to the police. Due to this EU "Factsheet" it seems not much:

[https://e-justice.europa.eu/content_rights_of_defendants_in_...](https://e-justice.europa.eu/content_rights_of_defendants_in_criminal_proceedings_-169-ew- en.do?idSubpage=2&member=1)

edit: ah, that's only for "England and Wales", I misread. Someone's got link on actual EU law extract? (is there even any EU law for this?)

<comment><USER28> There isn't. Each country will have it's own law for dealing with the police, there's not much on the EU-wide level that you could use.

<comment><USER27> You're right. In the portal there are the rights in criminal proceedings described for each country:

[https://e-justice.europa.eu/content_rights_of_victims_of_cri...](https://e-justice.europa.eu/content_rights_of_victims_of_crime_in_criminal_proceedings-171-en.do)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I used to take these busses before because they were cheap going to and from Sweden from Germany. The only people ever questioned by the border police were non-white or eastern europeans.

<comment><USER30> "Is Germany a racist country? That is what a new documentary, Black on White, is trying to find out. Its findings are shocking. But, as Damien McGuinness reports, the filmmaker himself has been criticized by black Germans for his methods."[1]

[1] [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8347040.stm](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8347040.stm)

<comment><USER31> Racism is obviously very much alive, it's just no longer blatant. You can't say the n word and people rarely do (some people mistake racism with purely this blatant form of bigotry and ignore the rest), but racial profiling happens every day, even in small interactions with people. I can't count the number of times I'd get to finally know someone, consider them as a new friend, and they'd drop the 'I didn't think you were like this (like them), I thought you'd be like xyz (stereotype of my ethnicity)'. That's racial profiling and it affects a lot of things. Getting checked on an international bus or train is almost guaranteed for me, concerts or clubs? Checked, airplanes? Everyone gets checked but extra searches, taking your shoes off etc is reserved for us special few.

Anyway that doesn't even bother me, sure racial profiling for security checks are degrading but it doesn't affect me much personally in my life, it's a minor nuisance all things considered. What depresses me is, you recall that guy on HN who tried to find an apartment in Munich?

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8360390](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8360390)

> The conclusion from this little study, is that a girl with an italian name, > gets an 90% answer rate, a guy with an arab name and is younger than 25 > gets, 1% answer rate. The master of all, is the young munich guy who is > around 25

That's racial profiling, too. It's based on the same principles of racial profiling, that we judge people based on their ethnicity rather than as individuals who happened to have a certain skin color, and then treat people differently. And obviously it's not just trying to find a home to rent, it's jobs etc etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> While living in Munich I was approached twice by police officers later in the evening (around 10-11pm) coming out of U-Bahn stations.

On one occasion the seemingly plain-clothed officers flashed a badge and started rifling through my jean pockets in the same motion. I actually thought I was being mugged.

After the fact they were all smiles and conversation, but whatever the local laws are, they're badly missing the point of who they're trying to protect.

</comment><comment><USER33> "I've been raised to consider the police my friend. I understand the notion of them being in office to protect and serve the people and I have felt comfortable in the presence of the law as long as I can remember. Naive[sic] as ever I went into this experience just like that… with the police as my ally."

OP should write a nice thank you letter to the München cops for disabusing him of this notion. It was his responsibility as an adult to have learned long ago that the authorities are not your friends and the cops are not on your side.

Just imagine the nasty policies of total fascist police empowerment that he's probably been voting for with ideas like that. Maybe a little education will have straightened him out a bit.

Really, people who expect an encounter with the cops to be respectful, convenient, not humiliating, fair, decent, honest, voluntary, or inexpensive are a part of the problem. I'm glad OP is wiser and I hope he will now run his life with due consideration for how things are instead of some childish fantasy of how things should be.

It's imperative to memorize the rules of legal limits and rights you have with cops in any country you transit often. In those you visit just once, memorize the phrase "I demand to speak to my embassy immediately," but learn to be patient because it takes a very long time to work. In America, learn to say "I do not consent to a search," and "I want to speak to a lawyer," and "am I free to go," and don't say anything else.

I don't know the rules for Germany, but OP needs to.

So go look them up, OP. It's your responsibility now that you've been educated. Also, if there's a citizen grievance procedure, it's your immediate responsibility to file one.

<comment><USER34> Thats such arrogant drivel. Ever thought that your attitude might actually be part of the problem? If you approach any other group of people with contempt and suspicion, they will approach you the same and trying to teach people to 'toughen up' and 'learn some lesson' about reality will not improve the situation

Just because cops might have too much power in the states and sometimes get armed with former military equipment doesn't mean you need to generally expect cops to act in bad faith the way you describe. It's not some "childish fantasy" that it's not like that in other countries, it's reality in may that police are generally courteous.

There was a similar discussion on here recently about it being a 'rookie mistake' to approach work situations in good faith and that you should have everything on contractual basis and getting a lawyer. That's such a horrible approach to live and again, from what I hear it seems to some degree be an unfortunate reality in the states, but that does not mean that it should be accepted like this and that it's just an inevitable part of a society.

<comment><USER35> Victim blaming. They've got a job to do and if they can't, they should get a different job.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> "if the laptop ends up defective and I would have to setup a new laptop with all of my build environments and rewrite all the uncommitted code on my trusty old pal. I would end up losing days installing all of my tools"

Don't let yourself get into this situation, folks!

<comment><USER37> Every day is backup day.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> I was "controlled" once at Sendlingertor on my way to work one morning. As I turned a cornet, I noticed two large white cops ~20 meters away. I made the briefest of eye contact before looking away/putting my head down and walking with purpose to my exit escalators. They intercepted me and asked for ID. I answered 'um, I have to get to work'. One officer laughed and said 'that doesn't really matter'.

I handed my UK drivers license. They asked me if I had an arrest record, but with my poor German, I thought they meant if I was registered in Munich, so I mumbled an affirmative. One officer stepped back to radio in my details and check my record. The other asked me if I had any drugs. I said no. He asked me to show him the inside folds of my wallet and the contents of my pocket. He didn't actually actively search me himself, just made me show him that I didn't have any drugs squirreled away.

The whole thing was surreal and over in 3-4 minutes. Streams of workers walking by during the whole event. I was shaking with adrenaline and itching to protest against this unprovoked intrusion into my life. But I stayed calm and they moved on. It was a weird experience. I'm only glad that they didn't actively search me, it would have made the whole thing even more demeaning.

I assume I was singled out for three reasons: \- My baggy pants, loose tshirt combination \- My slightly not white enough skin color. \- The ridiculous and increased police presence that always seems to surround Munich a few times a year (usually around the time of the Munich Security Conference but not always: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munich_Security_Conference](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munich_Security_Conference)).

FWIW, I've never had problems with other Munich civil servants. They are usually just doing their work, and if you're polite/pleasant, it's usually reciprocated. The police on the other hand seem to have a bug up their ass (except during Oktoberfest, where they also seem more relaxed). I have a dark skinned friend in Munich who gets controlled every few months. Once while eating his lunch in tiny park in the heart of Munich on a sunny day surrounded by other citizens!

This Wu Tang encounter with Munich police sums it all up: [http://worldstarhiphop.com/videos/video.php?v=wshhAonAI6tetw...](http://worldstarhiphop.com/videos/video.php?v=wshhAonAI6tetwu4P6i8)

</comment><comment><USER39> "I still understand that the police does its job, but during the experience I felt an intense hatred for the office. After a multitude of such experiences it isn't far-fetched to imagine that the parties subjected to such treatment develop an enduring hatred for the office and everything associated to it. I guess the idea of being powerless is one of the many very frustrating things about this ordeal. Can I blame people for disliking the police if many of their experiences are as negative as the one I've had and probably often even worse?"

This realization doesn't seem to ever strike some people their entire lives. When harassment by authority is a common occurrence and a source of anxiety it's difficult to keep up appearances.

</comment><comment><USER40> I know a couple of cops, and as a cop you indeed do profiling on "random" checks.

You simply pick someone where common experience shows that a "hit" is likely. Like, in Munich if you search a black dude with his friends, chances are high that he's got pot on him. In other cities, being young, white and speak with "gangsta speak" and hanging out with your friends can be an invitation for the police to check if you got knives on you. Or if you generally behave nervous, check if the person has an arrest warrant open instead of just looking at the ID card.

There are no official quotas to fill like in the US, but it is definitely better if you profile and have a "good looking" checked person/hit ratio.

<comment><USER41> " _Like, in Munich if you search a black dude with his friends, chances are high that he 's got pot on him._"

Chances are high that a black dude has pot on him, or chances are high that a dude with pot on him is black? Those are actually two different things.[1]

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

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Do you have the names and badge numbers of the officers?

</comment><comment><USER42> Maybe the world does need wearable networked glasses. Press an "Alert" button to signal to your network that you want the m to watch.. feeds spread virally, the whole world watches..

</comment><comment><USER43> I suspect that he may actually have been singled out for his hair style (dreadlocks, if this photo is correct [0]), not his skin color. Now, this would _also_ be stupid and inappropriate, but it fits with the cliché, maybe due to Bob Marley or whatever.

[0] [http://en.solarswing.nl/wp- content/uploads/2014/07/portret_d...](http://en.solarswing.nl/wp- content/uploads/2014/07/portret_david-180x180.png)

</comment><comment><USER44> > This is what it feels like to get in touch with the police? Unidirectional > respect?

Yes. No matter how good a police force's reputation, once you're in their hands, you better make sure you make them feel respected if you want to get out of their grasp quickly. Otherwise, trouble.

That said, German police in general are pretty laid back and respectful in my experience :-)

</comment><comment><USER45> This kind of behaviour needs to be filmed. It must be getting pretty cheap to do a button camera?

I imagine the recent US cases of police impropriety will stir some changes. At least it held some attention for a while.

On another note, when I'm treated badly by the system, I tend to feel a bit sorry for the person on the other end eventually. It's dehumanizing to not be able to behave in the way you find reasonable, and I doubt most cops think it's useful to randomly stop people for no reason. Same goes with the bureaucrat who won't approve your passport because you're smiling in the photo. These people would most likely not like to do as they do, but they are as powerless as their victims. When you meet them, you tell yourself not to get angry; they are trained to do as they are told, not to think. And that sucks for everyone.

</comment><comment><USER46> Gave me shivers to read this, especially how helpless one must feel in this situation.

</comment><comment><USER47> This is abnormally stupid. There is absolutely no reason to do these searches. It helps no one. And it sucks really hard that you can't do anything about it. It's infuriating.

</comment><comment> guard-of-terra Police is influental enough to eventually get immunity from law, granted by lawmakers. After that they don't bother themself with any sort of politeness. If something goes wrong, they can always use force, blame the victim and get out of it.

This is a standing problem, not one of us is immune, we should be fixing it in the future.

</comment><comment><USER48> I had a similar experience when I made the mistake of telling the officer I was coming from Amsterdam, the drug capital of Europe.

</comment><comment><USER49> That sucks, but I think I would like to hear the other side of the story before I render judgement.

<comment><USER50> "We saw a person of colour on the bus and it smelled vaguely like weed so we forced them to get off and strip for us to prove they weren't a drug dealer"?

<comment><USER49> Is that the official statement?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> I can understand the hatred, and professionalism apart (which must absolutely be expected), how would the police be expected to act when dealing with a potential trafficker with a fake passport?

Just to be more clear, potential as probability higher than a certain value (not being 100% right)

<comment><USER52> Everyone is a potential trafficker, murder or criminal. That is what makes being a cop so difficult. _However,_ the magnitude of the potential is usually determined by things like _information_ and _evidence_.

> how would the police be expected to act when dealing with a potential > trafficker with a fake passport?

I mean, maybe he had an amazing fake passport and body cavities full of drugs but it is a bit difficult to roll the dice on those assumptions if 1) the passport is real 2) he didn't.

They didn't have evidence. I've dabbled in my fare share of narcotics as well, and if you could "smell" it. It was only possible to mean some sort of cannibus. What human could smell an oz of Coke inside another human? Seems like a pretty broad over reach here, either straight up incompetence or racism.

<comment><USER51> Yes, the smell was specified in the article, you can't smell anything else</comment></comment></comment>