Product Reviews: Everyone Wants A Piece Of The Market, But PowerReviews May Get It - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/04/08/product-reviews-everyone-wants-a-piece-of-the-market-but-powerreviews-may-get-it/ <comment><USER2> :-) I'm glad this got posted on here. We are building a product review site & I was super tempted to leave a comment on techcrunch. Alas, our site isn't far enough along, nor is it prepared for that kind of attention.

PowerReviews/buzzillions has a pretty clever business model. Essentially its creating Sheep that $hit grass. It is a step beyond it's competition iNods, which is two steps beyond ViewScore, which are both only marginally more useful than just searching google to find reviews.

But what I (we) think would be a lot cooler, is building a community around and for this tech consumer market.

Our site ( <http://revvu.com> ) uses a user-driven model for centralizing consumer electronic reviews on the web. Users can submit reviews that they find, or blog, or want to share. Then the community can vote reviews up or down (based on value) per each individual product page. (sort of reddit style)

Votes on reviews effect the weight of ratings, forming a dynamic review score that reflects the opinion of the masses.

We just launched on Monday, so karma is not yet visible. Also, our social network aspect is not in place yet. That aspect will be the key to creating a strong community, creating an addicting user experience, and creating a way to share (read: show off) the things you own & are interested in.

I think PowerReviews is a cool concept, and will probably work for some retailers... but they (like everyone else in this space) don't get "it" yet. Aside from the arbitrary use of tagging, their site isn't really reflecting any of the advancements or evolutions of the way people use the internet today. They have found a business model that seems feasible and built an idea around it in a market that NEEDS improvement. What they lack is a carrot to attract users (those seeking reviews) to care, return, or get involved. Which might be fine for them, if thats not what they want. If thats the case though, suggesting that PowerReview (or buzzillions) "may get the market" doesn't sound very likely.

Anyway, we'd really appreciate feedback on our site. This is a very sharp community. We would certainly be interested to hear from, or chat with, anyone who has feedback/suggestions for us.

<comment><USER3> your sheep analogy is terrific. just... brilliant.

I think PowerReview has an interesting strategy in that, aside of your sheep analogy, they aim for corporate partnerships; they are closer to the "B" in B2C. revvu's strategy, if I'm not mistaken, is much closer to the "C." And in this aspect I would think the "it" for the B-approach and C-approach are different.

A more immediate competitor for you might be epinions.com?

<comment><USER2> Sure epinions would be a closer comparison to us, because we do allow user reviews.

Our approach though, is mostly to let people submit links to outside reviews. There will always be CNet & engadget (and these will be submitted), but what we're hoping for is a place to help people find reliable reviews from lesser known sites like audioholics, i4u, GSM arena, or the hundreds or thousands of tech blogs like digitalconsistency.com that pop up all the time.

Forming a user-driven centralized hub for consumer electronic reviews from all over the web.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Product reviews help common people lookup and see what are advantages and short comings of the product. But i have seen quite a lot of them biased. One such example being movie reviews, its alll hyped and tampered with. Be it movies or products/services, that kind of trust and credibility is need of the hour. There is no guarantee to see and find out if its being rigged. So a better model will be to allow reviews with good and bad points. Allow users to speak up with proof if good features are indeed hyped or to provide a proof which shows its indeed bad feature. As proper proofs come into play, there may be clearcut credibility in the process

<comment><USER5> This is what our site(revvu) is aiming to do. Much like reddit, users are afforded the opportunity to vote reviews up or down, giving more useful reviews more weight and reviews of less value a smaller amount of weight. Eventually users will build karma and legitimize their opinion throughout the community.

<comment><USER4> What will happen if people form a cartel and hike up or lower karma? How do u plan to take care of this mischief?

<comment><USER2> Simply not displaying who rated you up or down (just like on here) is the first step towards that.

That is definitely something that has been a consideration since day one though. Epinioins was widely disqualified as a reputable source because people formed such "cartels" to take advantage of their paid review model.

<comment><USER4> But still people can open multiple accounts or ask their friends to log in and hike up the karma? They can manipulate the reviews and swing it in their favour</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Data science for urban planning tips - <AUTHOR> There is an urban planning open contest in my city for the improvement of the train station quarter, now degraded because of uncontrolled migrants roaming and making it a no-law-zone at night. I have a plan to mess with data science, smart city paradigm and low cost solutions already, but a proper HN brainstorming would be much appreciated. Any tips? Thanks. <comment><USER2> Having predetermined that a community of 'outsiders' are the cause of a local problem, the historical data regarding municipal planning by lay people does not usually result in a story that reflects well on the municipality.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for this. More than a pogrom, something favouring the encounter would be the nice approach here and the aim of this contest. The point is to make that quarter modern and attracting enough while spending next to nothing. I am pretty sure many are gone for good from that quarter, but youngsters may still find a way to integrate and coexist. Hipsters they are not, more open to contamination than parents and grandparents though. Aggregation spots and green areas may do half the trick, the other half being in rejuvenating the very old buildings in the proximity of the train station.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> > now degraded because of uncontrolled migrants roaming and making it a no- > law-zone at night

I feel like the data science part is worth a discussion, but I, and I assume others, am bothered by your reasoning for why the city needs improvement.

<comment><AUTHOR> Unfortunately that is the exact reason why locals are relocating in mass from that quarter, there comes the contest.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> What is the city? I work in the city tech space, we have a platform cities can use to deploy really good streaming open data APIs, wondering if it's worth reaching out to them.

<comment><AUTHOR> It is a 160k city in Southern Italy named Foggia, the aerial map picture of the quarter involved is here: [http://www.nukepep.com/2017/02/14/ds-1-foggia/](http://www.nukepep.com/2017/02/14/ds-1-foggia/) . They are calling for ideas from architects and engineers. No chance there will be the opportunity to do it for real any soon, but a way for them to stimulate the mayor.</comment></comment>


Implementing the Human Brain: Exploring Convolutional Neural Networks - <AUTHOR> https://distillery.com/blog/implementing-human-brain-exploring-potential-convolutional-neural-networks/ <comment><USER2> Flagged (clickbait), as it doesn't contain anything interesting about the human brain, just a short text about convolutional networks.</comment>


Show HN: ContactOut – Find Anyone's  Email and Phone# - <AUTHOR> http://contactout.io/ <comment><USER2> I know this is just using what's publicly available but I do feel mildly creeped out. But since I'm not the target market that's probably an endorsement.

</comment><comment><USER3> This just looks like the same address-scraping that spammers have been using since the 90s, plus some half-assed attempt to link them to real names. People who want to be contacted will make it easy to do so; those who don't, won't.

Are you actually proud of having created this thing?

</comment><comment><USER4> Can you tell us a bit about how it works? Or what has changed over the last year since you first deployed it?

<comment><AUTHOR> we crawl the web and index emails, then link them to names / social profiles. Have gotten 3x more emails since we initially launched last year.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Nice app and website, but I don't see the benefit of using a Chrome extension versus a normal browser web app. I understand that you can use it to find the phone number of a person on your current webpage, but I think it should be secondary to the web app.

Especially since you're targeting business users, you should create a polished webapp for them.

Also, I think many HN users would agree with me on the issue of privacy. In order to use the extension, I need to grant it permission to read and write data on all websites that I visit. Not saying you're evil, but this means (in theory) you could sell by browsing history, my interests, or even my data (again, not talking about you, but in general).

<comment><USER6> Get ready for GDPR.

1\. You need consent to handle PII (doesn't matter that you scraped it) 2\. Massive fines for data breaches

Good luck!

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Wow, that's super creepy

This looks like dream tool for stalkers

</comment><comment><USER8> Where is the opt-out?

</comment><comment><USER9> I just tried 3 random contacts using a premium account, no dice on the email or phone number.

</comment><comment><USER10> Its a bit scary, but totally useful. I tested it with people I know, and looks like people who use different emails for fb/linkedin tend not to have as much info available. But the number of mobile phones you have on there is crazy.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> lol much controversy</comment>


Gathering weak npm credentials - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/ChALkeR/notes/blob/master/Gathering-weak-npm-credentials.md <comment><USER2> "In total, there were 66876 public packages from 15495 accounts directly affected — about 13% of the whole npm ecosystem.

Taking dependencies into an account, to my estimations about 52% of the ecosystem was affected — i.e. that number of packages install affected ones along with them through dependency chains."</comment>


Infinitely Beta has launched paisa.com - uses Clojure and Python - <AUTHOR> http://www.paisa.com/

<comment><USER3> Tech. co-founder of Paisa.com here. This is a bit earlier than we expected :) I was going to post it on HN myself a couple of days later.

Anyway, I would be happy to answer questions and resolve issues. Thanks!

<comment><USER4> Interesting from a technical standpoint, but how is it different from/better than, say, google finance?

<comment><USER3> May be right now it isn't. But we are going to roll out some interesting features soon. Also, I think we care about usability more than most Indian finance sites.

<comment><USER4> Indeed. This is more usable and uncluttered than the other Indian finance sites like moneycontrol and the like.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think you could make it clearer as to what the site is about. "Stop guessing, make informed decisions" - how are you going to help me do that? Is it just another way to look at charts? Can you explain why it is better than Google Charts, or Yahoo?

I would also worry about reliability and how up to date the data is. A page that addresses such concerns would be one of the first things I am looking for.

<comment><USER3> I agree, that part is slightly half-baked. We are working on the "tour" part of the site.

We are taking data from a reputed provider (as mentioned on paisa.com/terms/).

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Great looking website. Hopeful that you guys will be rolling out ideas beyond the decent price-portfolio offered by moneycontrol in India.

<comment><USER3> Thanks. Indeed, we have plans to go beyond just a stocks research/portfolio site. Please stay tuned :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Very nice site , quite fast.

One question - Is it a policy not to have the BSE or NSE not there, i could not find them under Asia.

My thinking is i would come to a site called Paisa.com looking for insights into the Indian markets - may be thats not the focus.

<comment><USER3> Paisa.com is geared towards the Indian stock markets. BSE/NSE prices/stats are all available. For the current status, take a look at the chart on top right corner.

The Asia dropdown shows other markets in Asia since it's in the world markets section.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> zaph0d - Is this the same team that launched the google calendar - <USER2> integration a year ago ( <http://imnotspacy.com/> ) ? What happened to that idea ?

<comment><USER3> Yes, it's the same team. Imnotspacy was done just as a weekend hack. We didn't think we were providing much value, so we killed it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> killer domain name :)

And the site looks nice too. Good luck.

<comment><USER10> I agree. The site looks chic :). Please don't spoil it by adding 'ugly' Google ads banner. Even if you do, please add it in a non-obtrusive manner (which is as easy as solving P=NP? challenge).

<comment><USER3> We are not going to put any ads on our site, at least not in the foreseeable future.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> layout looks wrong in safari: <http://i35.tinypic.com/2e4bvwx.png> (everything below the screenshot looks ok)

<comment><USER3> Works ok here. Can you tell me what your screen resolution is? Thanks!

<comment><USER11> 1920x1200 (Safari 5 on OS X) My font settings are Helvetica 12 for the Standard Font, and Monaco 10 for the fixed width.

<comment><USER3> We can reproduce the issue. It doesn't happen with the default font settings. We are trying to fix the issue.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> which parts of the site are python and which are clojure?

<comment><USER3> The frontend is in Python. It talks to the Clojure backend via a REST api.

All data heavy lifting is done in the Clojure side.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I like this site. Very well designed and superfast

</comment><comment><USER14> looks weird on chromium with the 'what is paisa' being slightly occluded by 'charts'...

edit: looks ok on firefox.</comment>


My first product, SightReadingMastery, launched yesterday - <AUTHOR> http://sightreadingmastery.com

<comment><AUTHOR> I've been working on this for a little over a year now, and full time since January. Just wanted to share and see what people here think!

It's for musicians who need help with music sight reading, and music teachers who want to help their students with it. (Only piano supported right now, but more instruments coming.)

One issue in sight reading is that you constantly need new music to practice. The way I'm dealing with that right now is kind of fun but expensive/experimental: I hire professional composers to write the pieces. Then I monitor usage by my sight readers to see when anybody is soon going to run out of pieces at their skill level. At this point I order a new batch of pieces from my composers.

I have a few dozen people on free trials now and will find out in a few days how many convert to paying customers. I'm hoping that this product will be able to support me soon so I can continue working on it full time. It could grow slowly though... in the worst case, it's been a great learning experience.

Thanks for checking it out, I'd love to know your thoughts on the idea or how you think I could run it better. And if you're a musician or music teacher, would love to know if you'd consider using it!</comment>


Abstract software patents struck down by Supreme Court - <AUTHOR> https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/06/bad-day-bad-patents-supreme-court-unanimously-strikes-down-abstract-software <comment><USER2> >We will work to ensure the Federal Circuit—the court that hears all patent appeals—diligently applies the new filter on patentability.

Doesn't the Federal Circuit have something of a history on cases such as this, where they essentially say 'fuck it, we're not listening to the SCOTUS', and continue to rule as they please? What's to stop them from just doing business as usual in defiance of the Supreme Court?

<comment><USER3> Chief Justice Roberts will send Justices Kennedy and Ginsburg around to make an example of one of the Federal Circuit justices.

Kind of like how the Mob do business but will gavels instead of baseball bats.

"Ya know, that's a really nice bench ya got there. It'd be a pity if something were to happen to it..."

PS: I think the premise of the Supreme Court justices enforcing their judgments, Mafia enforcer-style, would make a great graphic novel. I can see Ginsburg going all Tommy DeVito on some Federal Circuit judge's ass and burying the body in the Rose Garden.

<comment><USER4> One of my favorite Onion videos to date is "Supreme Court Rules Death Penalty 'Totally Badass'." Complete with court sketches and everything.

<comment><USER5> It is indeed totally badass: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hyph_DZa_GQ&feature=kp](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hyph_DZa_GQ&feature=kp)

<comment><USER6> Awesome

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > the Supreme Court reaffirmed that merely adding "a generic computer to > perform generic computer functions" does not make an otherwise abstract idea > patentable. This statement (and the opinion itself) makes clear that an > abstract idea along with a computer doing what a computer normally does is > not something our patent system was designed to protect.

This opinion gives me hope that reform is possible & that the U.S. government still works with reason.

Now the question is are patents still relevant in today's world of internet, rapidly accelerating innovation, and evidence that free/open source research reduces costs?

<comment><USER8> Each generation of CPU design or gas turbine design or wireless baseband design, drug design, or nuclear power plant design still takes more R&D money than the last. And nobody was working on a competitive open source LTE baseband last I checked.

"Accelerating innovation" is something which, if it exists, touches only a few areas of engineering. In most areas of engineering, innovation has gotten more expensive, not less. Very few things are amenable to a distributed group of hackers working on it. Jet engines are still best designed by a roomful of PhD's. And those cost lots of money.

We can argue about how necessary patents ever were, but I don't think they're any less necessary today.

The question, in my opinion, isn't whether patents are still relevant. Its whether we can draw lines better to leave out less useful ones while keeping that exception from swallowing the patent system. E.g. if a power control module for an LTE radio is patentable if implemented in an ASIC, should it become unpatentable when you implement it in a DSP? If not: how do you allow those patents while invalidating Amazon's One Click shopping patent? To a certain extent, its tempting to just say: "its too hard to draw the lines, its not worth the trouble." That's easy to say if you're not Qualcomm and don't have a dozen companies who'd love to use your work for free.

<comment><USER9> _Jet engines are still best designed by a roomful of PhD 's. And those cost lots of money._

Possibly the wrong example for your argument :) Jet engines can now be designed by a team at SpaceX rather than at NASA, and the team can 3D-print them. That seems like reduced-cost innovation compared to decades past.

[http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/06/02/elon- musk-m...](http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/06/02/elon-musk- makes-3-d-printing-history.aspx)

(PS - I definitely don't disagree with your general point, but it might be becoming harder to know which areas need patents and which don't.)

<comment><USER10> I'm not quite sure what difference you're pointing out. Why does is matter if the PhDs are at SpaceX or NASA?

<comment><USER9> Yes, I'm aware they aren't delegating the rocket design to the marketers. Smaller team, faster to market, cheaper. The discussion is around accelerating innovation and SpaceX perfectly demonstrates this, despite "rocket engines" being the earlier example given for how it's not true.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is about the same thing that's already on the front page with 70 comments, including a great one by grellas. I'd go there if you're interested in this: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7916160](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7916160)

<comment><USER11> That post was just a link to the actual Supreme Court decision. This article explains what it's about in language that's easier for people who aren't legal scholars to understand, so I think it serves a useful purpose.

<comment><USER12> > This article explains what it's about in language that's easier for people > who aren't legal scholars to understand

I really strongly disagree with this. Supreme Court decisions are usually quite readable and will give a you a nuanced overview of the legal background and justifications for the ruling. They're usually very accessible and not nearly as crammed with legal jargon as you might guess. I try to read as many important decisions as I can and I have no legal training at all. I only occasionally have to look up a term. I would say they're easier, on average, for me to read than a CS paper. And after reading a few Scotus papers, you'll have a much deeper understanding of how our legal system works, and of course a great deal more about the individual decisions. You'll even read news articles about a decision and say, "That's not what the decision was about at all!"

Supreme Court rulings are, of course, quite long, and there's nothing wrong with a summary article like this one. But my point is that you shouldn't fear the legalese.

<comment><USER13> > Supreme Court rulings are, of course, quite long

Interestingly, judges such as Richard Posner think recent opinions are too long.

[http://www.law360.com/articles/455840/posner-says- justices-s...](http://www.law360.com/articles/455840/posner-says-justices- should-cut-bs-from-opinions) (Ignore the linkbait title; the article really is quite good.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> This is great ammo for all the jack-wagons I encounter in daily life who counter my position on patents with the genius position, "What if someone came and just took your house, or your car away. That's your property and you wouldn't like it, would you?"

</comment><comment><USER15> while the decision is pretty tightly tailored, it seems like it's SCOTUS' way of opening the door for subsequent arguments regarding pure software patents. take google's page rank patent[1]. one could argue that assigning scores to, say, academic papers based on references cited and then doing that repeatedly is an "abstract idea" and google's recitation of "apply[ing] it" using a computer is not enough to enter into patent eligible subject matter. if you read/listen to the oral argument, the counter argument that doing so on a massive scale is impracticable was flatly rejected. indeed, a million monkeys counting the citations of scholarly pubs could probably perform that method on a decent sized corpus. is the method therefore inherently abstract? will be interesting to see if Alice alters the analysis (albeit slightly) for these types of questions and whether we'll see a pure software issue (without the negative financial/business method clouds in the background) sooner rather than later.

[1] [http://www.google.com/patents/US6285999](http://www.google.com/patents/US6285999)

</comment><comment><USER16> What exactly is an abstract idea? Is it possible for an idea to be concrete?

From looking at examples, "abstract" seems to mean trivial. By trivial, I don't mean obvious or silly, I mean small; i.e. an idea that can be reduced to one or two sentences, like "e-commerce shopping cart."

Otherwise it's pretty hard to distinguish ideas about software from ideas about hardware and explain why one is more patentable than the other.

<comment><USER17> An abstract idea isn't physical. You can patent a machine, or a drug. You can't patent a method for dividing two numbers. However, a _machine_ for dividing two numbers—assuming it's novel, not obvious, etc.—is fair game.

<comment><USER16> Ok, but what's actually protected is the idea behind the machine, right? A different machine that employed the patented idea would infringe the patent.

Maybe what is meant by "abstract idea" is really "an idea in the abstract," i.e. an idea that is not used to make a machine can't be patented; it's the employment of the idea that is patentable.

<comment><USER17> You're getting confused by the word "idea." You patent a machine, not an idea. If you insist on saying that you patent the "idea" for a machine, then what you _can 't_ patent is an "idea about an idea." Ideas about machines are good. Ideas about ideas are no good. Make sense?

<comment><USER16> I think I understand patents as well as any average non-lawyer. What I'm trying to do is make sense of the language used to describe patents. It's clear that people can't agree on what they are, because the Supreme Court keeps needing to step in and refine the definition. The language seems not to make sense, which would help to explain why people can't agree on what they are.

Ok, you patent a machine. But that statement is vague and ambiguous at best. If I patent a machine that I built, then how could the patent apply to a different machine that I didn't build? Yet, that's the whole point: they apply to classes of machines, including machines that haven't even been built at the time that the patent is granted. The class would seem to be inherently something abstract.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> My favorite part about this is that it shows how idiotic USPTO is for approving such patents in the first place. Hopefully, this will make them reconsider whether they should be approving other types of patents, too, before the Supreme Court puts them in a bad light again, but I'm not holding my breath.

<comment><USER14> They do not care.

<comment><USER19> They can't care. They don't set policy, Congress does. They just act out Congress' laws.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> "Admittedly, the Supreme Court did not offer the clearest guidance on when a patent claims merely an abstract idea, but it did offer guidance that should help to invalidate some of the more egregious software patents out there." Where can i find this guidance?

</comment><comment><USER21> Despite EFF syndrome, patents are a tool, they are not evil, patent trolls are evil, patents are just tools.

<comment><USER5> This was always going to be the case eventually (a task that was already performed, this just invalidates adding "on a computer").

It's much harder for the law (I would say impossible) to actually judge stuff that is obvious. For example wavelet patents in certain video codecs are absurd - improving fourier transforms in a very very obvious way - but it won't be obvious to a judge or a jury and certainly isn't covered by this supreme court decision.

The more specialised people become in certain fields the more 'obvious' discoveries become. The law has no means to understand what rights it's protecting, and for how long they should be protected, which means it will never police the patent's system effectively, no matter what this judgement says.

Given how fast software patents and technology change and that the law can't judge them effectively I would suggest that instead of all this mess can we not just have software patents that last a maximum of 5 years.</comment></comment>


Rr 4.5.0 Released - <AUTHOR> http://robert.ocallahan.org/2017/02/rr-450-released.html <comment><USER2> I've used RR to debug some tricky crashes, and it's an absolute joy to use. Being able to work _backwards_ from a crash to the underlying problem can vastly reduce debugging time for some of the trickiest bugs.

</comment><comment><USER3> Had to follow a few links to get a better idea of what "Rr" does: [http://rr- project.org/](http://rr-project.org/)</comment>


Survey: What does it take to be a good data scientist? - <AUTHOR> https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSewBPUgX-0hAn4LbDtN94I_Tvohrb6ha_AzBgBu3isBgtf_ag/viewform <comment><USER2> Last question 'City' only lists cities in India. That's surprising and might anger people who filled out all the other questions. Please add "India" to the title.</comment>


Bruce Shapiro's Mesmerizing Kinetic Sand Drawing Machines (2015) - <AUTHOR> https://www.thisiscolossal.com/2015/06/bruce-shapiros-mesmerizing-kinetic-sand-drawing-machines/ <comment><USER2> There's a product called kinetic sand that I thought this was about:

[https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B019K8KIUY/ref=mp_s_a_1_3?ie=...](https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B019K8KIUY/ref=mp_s_a_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1526130688&sr=8-3&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=kinetic+sand)

It's not the same for people who haven't read it.

</comment><comment><USER3> > _It appears the artist is currently working on a tabletop consumer version_

That's good to hear!

I wish the article covered how the machine works underneath. How many of us here, right now, are trying to reverse engineer it, or figure out how to build our own?

<comment><USER4> I'd put a big magnet on a two-axis carriage built on extruded aluminum bars. Simple! There might be a better solution, but I'm the wrong kind of engineer to work it out.

<comment><USER5> One axis radial, the other linear?

Like an indexable stepper-motor, with another stepper attached that uses a belt-drive, like an inkjet printer?

<comment><USER6> Looks like it does use one radial axis and one linear [0]

[0] [https://sisyphus-industries.com/about/](https://sisyphus- industries.com/about/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I saw these in-person at Maker Faire a few years back. The sculptures were beautiful and captivating, and Bruce was warm and friendly.</comment>


Microprocessor March Madness (Embedded.fm) - <AUTHOR> http://embedded.fm/blog/2017/3/7/march-micro-madness-2017 <comment><USER2> Apple ][e is going all the way this year!</comment>


Frosted Glass Effects — Why I switched to Android after all these years - <AUTHOR> http://blog.agoeldi.com/2013/08/02/frosted-glass-effects-why-i-switched-to-android-after-all-these-years/

<comment><USER2> I get the author's point, but he has decided that frosted effects have gone out of fashion and uses this as a litmus test for whether or not a platform is in decline.

The crux of this argument is that "pointless" features are a result of stalled innovation. I'm sure if the author was to look more closely at his Android phone he would see a great number of pointless features; especially in OEM skins like Touchwiz.

If the author was trying to convince me that Android is a superior platform when it comes to innovation (which it may well be) then he has failed to provided any evidence other than "because frosted effects".

<comment><USER3> But he does give more evidence than that when he reports that he was using mostly non-Apple replacements for lots of his standard apps. I'm not sure whether the apps he lists are more "innovative" on Android, but apparently he found them more comfortable to use than the iOS built-ins.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Vista isn't given enough credit. It was a huge overhaul from XP. A lot of the improvements were of the under-the-hood variety, but there were some notable improvements in UI, such as search integration. Win7 was basically Vista with intelligent defaults (and funky backgrounds) while Win8 is Vista with Aero ripped out and Metro added in.

Aero wasn't meaningless eye-candy added to Vista to distract from a lack of innovation. It was MS taking skeuomorphic design so seriously that they were willing to sacrifice a lot of performance to implement it. Aero was doomed once MS started gravitating towards flat, colorful UI's that eschew skeuomorphism, and finally decided to try to run a desktop kernel on tablet hardware.

One thing I find strange about iOS 7 is that it doesn't seem to be well suited for older hardware or budget hardware like the iPad mini or the rumored budget iPhone. Does iOS 7 perform better than this added eye candy would lead one to expect, or will it simply run in a compromised mode on weaker hardware?

<comment><USER5> I've been running the iOS 7 betas on my iPhone 4 (the oldest generation that iOS 7 will support). It definitely disables some of the features: a lot of the transparency is gone, the parallax is gone, and it's missing a lot of features like Siri and stuff. In beta 1, the performance was terrible, but it's gotten much better recently.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Author here :-) I'm not mad about anything in iOS 7 (yes, betas have bugs, and that's totally fine). I can live with gimmicky visual effects and useless features (Android has plenty of those). Obviously I don't literally care about frosted glass, it was just a metaphor.

The problem is not what turns me off in a platform but what turns me on. I just think that on balance iOS until recently had a stronger combination of user experience and innovative features. But that has changed, and iOS 7 doesn't show that Apple has the fundamental capabilities (particularly in online services) to keep the platform interesting going forward.

Overall, Android is right now simply the more _useful_ platform. There's almost nothing that iOS does better than Android, but plenty of areas where Android is stronger.

I'm also not trying to convince anybody. I was just stating why I switched. And I will keep my iOS devices, not least because my extended family is locked into iOS and expects me to call them on Facetime...

</comment><comment><USER7> > A few minutes after installing the IOS 7 beta I just knew I needed to switch > to Android ... [iOS 7] feels a lot like Window Vista.

Yeah, iOS Beta 1 and Beta 2 were ugly and buggy pieces of shit. Beta 3 and 4 are a lot nicer.

In my opinion, the UI still needs work but I'm willing to forgive the guys in Cupertino since it's ... you know ... a beta.

TL;DR Guy switches to Android after using pre-release operating system on his iPhone.

<comment><USER8> I think he isn't mad about bugs, but about the gimmicky nature of the "innovation" in IOS 7... but maybe I misread him.

<comment><USER7> I couldn't tell what he was mad about, his premise seems to be an iPhone is not able to hold enough Goog-kool Aid for long trips in the car or something.

> I have found myself using more and more Google apps on my iPhone over the > past 18 months or so. Google Maps ... Gmail ... Chrome ... voice search > through Google's search app ... Google's services are not only much more > powerful but also very neatly integrated. The amazing Google Now is the best > example for that.

> ... real progress can only be made in Internet-based services that integrate > seamlessly with a smartphone OS. Google's superiority in information > services and Android's general openness are perfect for that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> With every new iOS release consumers _don 't_ get to see the most important, innovative updates to the OS.

It's all in the developer frameworks. Just look at stuff like TypeKit this time around. Every release of iOS has great new and improved frameworks that will lead to a better generation of apps.

Once the API diffs for each new major release stop being interesting is when I'll worry for innovation on the platform.

</comment><comment><USER10> I honestly think, and I think you should think so, too, that the point made in this article is a terrible point because...well...it just it. iOS 7 added a frosted effect, and Windows Vista had a frosted effect...so because Windows Vista was somehow a signal of a product in decline, iOS 7 must be, too? That's the case in point? Eh, it's really far-fetched and kind of a silly association to make.

</comment><comment><USER11> I'm curious what the author thinks about Windows8 now that Windows no longer has the frosted glass effect?

<comment><USER8> Windows 8 is still gimmicky, though...

<comment><USER12> But despite it's gimmicks - Windows 8 is still a massive improvement.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Haven't tried 7, but picking up a iPhone 5 after using my Nexus 4 feels like a big leap backwards. It is what my Blackberry bold felt like after using an iPhone for the first time.</comment>


We can't forget John F. Kennedy's assassination - <AUTHOR> https://www.salon.com/2018/11/22/we-cant-forget-john-f-kennedys-assassination/ <comment><USER2>
      The assignation (sic) of President Kennedy was a blatant affront...

Wow. Nice editing, Salon.

Nowhere in the entire rant is any reasoning as to what conspiracy is being championed here.</comment>


Too hard? - <AUTHOR> http://izhack.com:12345/

<comment><AUTHOR> Working on a number of "gateway" challenges for a client.

Not sure if this is too hard with zero hints.

It's so hard to measure when you're the one who created the puzzle. I came up with a couple solutions but again how do you separate the personal bias of being the puzzle maker?

</comment><comment><USER2> A md5sum of the first thing you create and then use along with 'step 2' would be a nice way to see if you're on the right track. Otherwise... it's hard to say exactly where things are going wrong.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> A couple hints:

1) You most likely won't solve it in a browser

2) The actual text is NOT encrypted

3) It will take 4 to 5 connections together to solve the problem

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Updated to hopefully make it a bit clearer.

Also there is an alternate challenge at izhack.com port 12346 but you can't read it in a browser. :)

<comment><USER2> ... just because you get a RSA thing (ahem) out of it doesn't mean it'll work with your "Step 2". Those things aren't armored, so it's possible to corrupt it and have no luck getting anywhere.

Or did you intend for it to be straight-up frustrating?

<comment><AUTHOR> No it's designed as a challenge not designed to be frustrating. Think of reasons you think you see cipher text in it..

And there is nothing 'armored' about this thing, it's so plainly in your face I'm stunned nobody had figured it out yet.

<comment><USER3> Kator, have you read Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid?

<comment><AUTHOR> If you are trying to say I created a puzzle only I can solve you would be wrong. I have someone who solved it but they're into protocol analysis and crypto.

<comment><USER3> No, I think it's solvable and even easy (depending on definition). Beforing you gave the tips I saw that "scrambled" trimmed the response always at the same byte length. Then I saw everytime it returned something different. Then, doing a "for i in $(seq 0 50); do curl izhack.com:12345 | head -7 | tail -1 | cut -c 1-250; done; I could see the pattern.

Doing the same for the other lines, replacing head -7 with head -8, head -9, etc I grabbed the repetition columns for all 5 lines. Each line had different columns repeated.

Creating a 5x300 grid and marking the cells where repetition occurs you see there's a symmetry. The repeats 5 times, where at column 58 every line repeats and it marks the repetition.

This is where I left, I still don't know the meaning of the last line. When I first run, coincidentally the server returned "sAlt" :-)

I was only asking if you knew the book because you seem to like puzzles and me too. As I liked the book I thought you might like and was trying to start a conversation.

Sorry!

<comment><USER3> Ah, you need a 300-column terminal to avoid line breaks :-)

<comment><AUTHOR> I have a 254 column terminal :-)

That said you will want to use code to analyze it.. You're very close..

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> If are attempting it please post your thoughts here.

I will give more hints if nobody pops it.

<comment><USER3> rsa-155

<comment><AUTHOR> The instructions are not encrypted they are interspersed at repeatable intervals.

<comment><USER3> The pattern has a width of 57 columns. The decoded text looks like the beginning of a private key to me.

<comment><AUTHOR> If you decode it you will know. :)

<comment><USER3> Yes, I liked the challenge I'll take another shot tonight.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Is figuring out a passphrase part of the step 2, or did I miss something ?

</comment><comment><USER5> <http://xkcd.com/356/>

<comment><AUTHOR> Funny but this is a real challenge and it's solvable.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> A hint would be nice.

<comment><AUTHOR> See above for hits, it can be solved without any knowledge of the internal process used to display the free text.</comment></comment>


Juneteenth Conference (June 19-20) - <AUTHOR> https://juneteenthconf.com <comment><AUTHOR> > The Mission of JuneteenthConf, Unl. is to provide a space that celebrates > Black Excellence in technology for Black people in tech to learn and grow > and to amplify their voices. We aim to be a counterbalance to the biases, > implicit or otherwise, that hold our industry and our society back.

> Juneteenth Conference is a free virtual tech conference made for and > featuring Black people in Technology. The conference celebrates Black > Excellence and promotes community for Black people who are severely > underrepresented, overlooked, and underutilized in the tech industry. We > welcome anyone and everyone aligned with this goal to come and listen to the > conversation.

</comment><comment><USER2> I have been enjoying this conference so far. The presentations have been great.

Many thanks to the people who put this together in such a short timeline.</comment>


1$ car rental - <AUTHOR> http://raccooncars.strikingly.com/ <comment><USER2> They are backed by a substantial insurance company

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

definitely a good partner to have for this kind of venture.

</comment><comment><USER3> You should fix the page. It says "Un petit slogan" many times.

<comment><USER4> I got "Entrez un email valide." on a perfectly legal email address.

That obnoxious moving image almost made me leave the site without trying.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Why don't homeless people from SF move to another city? - <AUTHOR> I'm not from US and I am not very aware of what's going on in San Francisco.
But I've been wondering why homeless people from SF don't move to another city where with a regular job they can afford a normal life.
At least this is what I would consider in their situation.
Sorry if the question is stupid. <comment><USER2> I volunteer at a homeless shelter for the last 10 years.

* people can be mentally ill in some way or another.

* physical disabilities.

* just acceptance that this is their fate, why change it.

* they just can't see any plan that leads them out of the situation so why try

* they wouldn't be sure how to function in society if they re-enter as a member of the "working class".

As a country, I don't feel we do anywhere enough for not just the homeless, but those that are simply down on their luck. Some people just need guidance and advice.

Example: I am a foster parent of 2.

The birth parents don't know how to cook, pay bills, take care of babies, etc. But do classes exist that make them practice and practice and practice. No. I've tried to get cooking classes like this offered saying I'll pay for all the food and donate my time but nobody takes me up on it. If we can teach who are inexperienced at cooking and house keeping and personal hygiene they may stand a chance of improving their lives by believing in themselves. What a bootstrap.

Maybe my perception is wrong and education doesn't help either. I feel like it would.

<comment><USER3> Sadly we've been eliminating Home Ec, Woodworking, and Shop classes in high schools for the last 40 years, which would have been another route for people to learn some of those life skills if they didn't (or couldn't) from their parents. I agree it's hard to know if people would respond to 'remedial' classes on the basics, but it does seem like it might at least make them feel like someone cared.

<comment><USER2> I graduated high school in _cough_ the mid-nineties and I had to take Home Ec, Woodworking and Shop.

My oldest son graduated in 2015 and had to take Home Ec only.

My daughter will graduate in 2021 but only had to take Home Ec.

My youngest son also graduates in 2021 and hasn't had to take any.

<comment><USER4> I graduated from high school in 2001. There was no shop class offered. There was home ec, but that was an elective and not required. I really wish there had been things like this required.

<comment><USER5> Graduated high school in 2003. No home ec available, no shop available, and they got rid of their computer programming classes after my freshman year. The only option anywhere close to these lines was Ag. I didn't live in a farming town.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> 1\. The weather in San Francisco is nice (so you won't freeze to death).

2\. The laws are friendlier towards homeless people.

3\. San Francisco is liberal, so the people will be friendlier on average to the homeless.

4\. America's public transport systems are terrible, but you can go quite a distance on BART and the city buses and it's easy enough to ride for free.

5\. If you're stuck begging in order to live, better to beg from rich people.

If you're homeless in America, it doesn't get much better than this.

<comment><USER7> Most importantly, you forgot the wide availability of hard drugs.

Downtown SF is an open drug bazaar, probably the biggest in the USA if not the world. Police do not go after the sellers and the city has for years maintained and enabled this nonsensical anything-goes policy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Well, you can put this same question to most of the larger cities on the West Coast, and the answers are pretty similar: 1) Decent weather: Most west coast cities have fairly mild weather, so you most likely wont freeze to death. 2) Lack of law enforcement: Most cities on the West Coast have taken a hands off approach to most of the homeless, so no need to worry about getting arrested. 3) Drugs: I'm gonna guess it's easy to get drugs here, being closer to Mexico where a lot of it comes from. 4) Sent there: A lot of other states/cities have been putting their homeless on buses to these areas with one way tickets. They are told either go to jail there, or go to $west_coast_city and not jail.

<comment><USER9> It would be helpful to share evidence on assertion #4, it is a claim that often appears but usually without proof.

<comment><USER10> This Guardian article is a good summary and starting point to look up stories about the cities featured. [https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng- interactive/2017/dec/...](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng- interactive/2017/dec/20/bussed-out-america-moves-homeless-people-country- study)

You're right it's not as well publicized as it should be.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Not a stupid question.

The problem is that a lack of money is but a proximate, and not the ultimate, cause of the homelessness. For something like 85% of those on the streets of SF, the issue is mental or physical disabilities (I'm gonna be generous and classify a penchant for antisocial behavior as a 'mental disability') or substance problems that directly impact the ability to have a job and a dwelling or any sort of normal life.

If you are in that position, finding a warm-ish place with a well-developed support infrastructure for vagrancy as well as proximity to a wealthy population for panhandling from is a really good deal.

</comment><comment><USER12> When you are broke, live on the street (which is a very tough life everywhere in the world), and possibly fight with mental illness or addiction, moving to a more affordable place (which will still be unaffordable for you, esp. in California) won't magically solve your problems. Without the right support, it will be difficult to find your way back to a normal life.

</comment><comment><USER13> From a family member of mine who is heavily involved with the homeless community in his city, some activities of life are made up of 5-10 separate steps, any of which may take days or weeks to complete.

The first problem in the OP's question would be just having the funds to go to another city.

Once you arrive and are looking for a job, you will need a permanent address/place to stay and probably a bank account of some sort. In order to get those things you likely need proper identification and/or work history.

Some forms of identification might require additional documentation like social security card or birth certificate. If you don't have those you will need to make multiple trips to various offices to acquire them and they often have fees associated with them.

But don't forget that if you were born in another state and need a birth certificate you have to work with that state over the phone to acquire them.

Plus where will they send them when you may not have a mailing address.

Completing the entire list of items with no problems is time consuming, difficult, and if any of them fail the entire process grinds to a halt.

</comment><comment><USER14> It's got nothing to do with the possibility of getting a job and affording a normal life. Most homeless people just want to be left alone. Mild weather and lower rates of confrontation make cities like SF ideal.

</comment><comment><USER15> Another reason many unhoused people don't want to move is that they have some family, friends, or existing support systems in the area. Moving away would mean they no longer have these resources.

Would you want to move away from your friends and family when you have little else? Some food for thought.

</comment><comment><USER16> Not a stupid question to think on. You should consider offering a burger or a coffee to a homeless and ask them this question - you'll hear a more realistic answer.

</comment><comment><USER17> In addition to other pertinent points being made here:

1\. People who have lived someplace a long time and love that place may not want to leave. They may want to try to resolve their problems where they are.

2\. Once you are homeless, relocating can be extremely challenging. You may not have the money to pay for bus or train tickets, you may have no means to line up a job elsewhere first, etc.

3\. Big cities are where the services are. If you are completely destitute, being in a big city can help you stay fed and clothed.

So it only makes sense to leave the big city if you have some unearned income that will go further if you live someplace cheaper. If you are unemployed and destitute with no prospects, the big is a better answer than a small town because you can at least get a free meal regularly.

</comment><comment><USER18> A few reasons:

1\. Weather in most northern states will cause death

2\. Transportation for poor doesn't exist in the US

3\. If one can't find jobs in SF, forget about being able to find them in Tulsa. Reasons vary from number of employers, lack of transportation, lack of education, felony record, divorces/child support.

I think the easiest way for someone to imagine this would be to think os the US as a dense jungle. The bounty is plentiful but there are death traps everywhere. Only the death traps are man made.

You need to find the patch of this jungle where you are likely to survive. Which means living under a rock in region A is better than dying in a barren desert in region B.

</comment><comment><USER19> You can dig up periodic articles where many cities have a policy of shipping homeless people out of their city to others where there are "more" services - and ignoring there are more services often because there are more homeless. I have a feeling the California cities are more often the destination of such policies than the originators. (Though I know LA for example does allocate budget to rounding up homeless and moving them around the city too).

</comment><comment><USER20> A lot of homeless I've spoken to in sf are from sf or have lived there a long time before being priced out of their home, and don't have family or friends who can help them, or just don't want to leave the only place they know well.

</comment><comment><USER21> There are a lot of reasons. Moving can be expensive, and they probably have no idea what they'd be moving into. I also knew one homeless person who stuck to a major city because he knew he'd have continued access to money, food and drugs in good weather. I don't blame him for that decision because he didn't have a lot of other options due to mental illness.

</comment><comment><USER22> I think the premise of your question is wrong - you assume that homeless in SF would prefer to be or not be homeless in another city, I would actually ask the question as "what makes SF so appealing as a homeless person" or "what is it about San Francisco that creates/allows so many homeless people"

</comment><comment><USER23> Many homeless are that way due to situations in their life beyond their control. Mental illness, physical disabilities, age, ect. Most people that do not have these problems could fairly easily get an entry level job and scrape by until they can get back on their feet.

</comment><comment><USER24> Most are too sick/debilitated to move around searching for better places to live. And in the move they risk losing all (including their lives), because living on the streets is a real risky bet.

</comment><comment><USER25> I think most of them have fallen so low already that they are unable to pull themselves up any more.

The solution, of course, would be to not let people fall that low. Provide them with some minimal housing and food BEFORE they become drug addicts.

But hey, apparently that's a waste of money and for communists.</comment>


Indian government to intercept, monitor, and decrypt citizens' computers - <AUTHOR> https://venturebeat.com/2018/12/21/indian-government-to-intercept-monitor-and-decrypt-citizens-computers/ <comment><USER2> And here is the natural born right to privacy that Americans have, as well as the rest of the world in my own opinion:

Bill of Rights, amendment 4:

 _" The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."_

<comment><USER3> It's a nice right in theory, but in reality, stop-and-frisk, border control, parallel construction, 'I smelled weed in the car', 'I had a hunch', 'the drug dog gave me a signal', 'we got an anonymous tip (from an illegal search, via parallel construction)' all exist, and are regularly employed in the United States.

They also tend to be disproportionately targeted at particular, inconvenient, segments of the population.

<comment><USER2> I consider stop-and-frisk to be in direct volition with the fourth amendment. Boarder control is a little different. I have the intention of extending these rights to all humans, so the boarder shouldn't change the rights of humans. Becoming aware of substance abuse (while say operating a vehicle) has potential for being "reasonable cause" for search... Though I'm not sure I'd entirely buy it.

I'm convinced that since citizens don't know their rights, that the government doesn't think we care about them, and uses that against us when we try defending them. It's the idea of... If you don't use them, you lose them.

<comment><USER4> >I'm convinced that since citizens don't know their rights, that the government doesn't think we care about them, and uses that against us when we try defending them. It's the idea of... If you don't use them, you lose them.

Alternatively, some people are willing to give up some rights for a feeling of security.

Or some people are willing to curtail some rights because it hurts people they don't like a lot more than it hurts them.

Or some people imagine gutting rights they don't regularly seem to need will never come back to bite them. People aren't going to defend things they don't care about.

Or some people seem to imagine that if a certain right doesn't seem to benefit them directly that it's not worthwhile to defend.

Or some people seem to think that maintaining the status quo is a right that they need to defend, no matter how many people are harmed by the inequality in the current landscape.

I mean you're not wrong. But that's certainly not the only issue issue causing the erosion of liberty.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> As someone on /r/sysadmin has correctly remarked - if you are outsourcing to India, you should assume that all data they have access to it is now also freely accessible to the Indian government.

<comment><USER6> Don't get me wrong, but I feel the /r/sysadmin folks are extremely pissed off at Indians, probably because of all the outsourcing. I find it amusing that they blame it on shitty coding by Indians whenever there is a breach or a website down incident, but keep quite on the nationality when the outage/breach has nothing to do with outsourcing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Things like this is why I think India has a very flawed political system, the executive is having too much power, and the Constitutional guarantees to citizens are flimsy, and courts including the Supreme Court are temperamental and inconsistent.

Civil law protections are insufficient as they are presently. Govt can put you in jail on flimsy grounds, but you can't sue for damages on wrongful imprisonment, etc. Most things are governed by criminal laws, where only remedy is punishment for the convicted, instead of having a strong tort law, where the aggrieved parties can extricate monetary damage claims.

<comment><USER8> NSA has been doing this for decades.

<comment><USER9> This is more like the FISA courts and NSLs. Not the dragnet stuff.

Though usually the lines are a bit blurry, sometimes secret warrants are issued to access already dragneted data. But those warrants are very far from real oversight.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Slightly off topic, but this order kind of defines the state of India. Whatever the issue is, there are always two sides both of which try to shape the narrative in their favour. One side arguing through twitter and some of self owned websites, what the implications could be, and other saying that the order already existed, and this is limiting the scope to only 10 agencies and doing it to curb terrorist activities, as if that makes it all ok.

The issue is that while this order is passed, there is no remedy for the citizens if their privacy is breached in any sense. The power is given to the home ministry, who at this point, think of themselves more as campaigner for next election, rather than an elected govt body, and hence it will be bad for political opponents in elections due in 2019. Since they made it concerning National Security, it is not covered under Right to Information either.

(The order and notification says that the interception and monitor could only be for certain citizens, or group of citizens, if they are deemed a threat for national security. Even Apple might be asked to break the encryption in this case.)

</comment><comment><USER11> In less than decade both USA and EU will take lessons from these developing experiments (India, China, Russia, Australia) and will introduce the same locally. At first societies will be educated to stigmatise any resistance and ease the law change. Hiding data from govt will be like tax evasion or act of terrorism.

<comment><USER12> Nah. There has been pretty strong backlash against FB. GDPR is (as imperfect as it is) a thing. I don't see the West going down that road, disregarding catastrophic failure modes.

<comment><USER13> What do you call NSA surveillance? Pretty much all your life is online and NSA can get its hands on it in transit.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> It's very worrisome how things have been going on in India, more so in the last two decades. Regardless of which party is in power, mass surveillance is increasing, and ways to preserve privacy have been under attack (the government tried to force Blackberry to allow interception of all messages when BBM was a thing; now it wants the same with WhatsApp and other platforms; and then there's the whole biometric based, unchangeable and irrevocable unique ID called Aadhaar...the list is long).

Unfortunately, most politicians here don't understand (or don't care about) the impact of any of these even to protect themselves from attack or suppression by authoritarian and untrustworthy people in power. Most states also have laws that allow them to detain people without a court order or presenting them in a court of law for up to a year, and the police can also make several laws and enforce them.

It's just a matter of time that immigration officials and police will start asking people to reveal their social media passwords, go through their personal and private information, etc.

For all the positives that India as a country has, it has a lot to learn from other countries when it comes to privacy, freedom, freedom of speech, etc.

I believe big technology companies have a role to play in India and around the world to help defeat such dangerous (and often futile) moves by governments.

</comment><comment><USER15> In India people call this "Mitron"

MITRON

1\. A large group of unsuspecting people, about to be hit by something they will take a long time to recover from.

[https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=MITRON](https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=MITRON)

<comment><USER16> Not to ruin the joke, but I'll just clarify that "mitron" is actually Hindi for "friends" and is used by our Prime Minister a lot (especially in speeches).

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> As an Indian, this is scary. In the name of national security, this can go either way.

<comment> y-c-o-m-b > In the name of national security

This is detrimental to national security. It's irresponsible and negligence at best. There is no such thing as bullet-proof cyber-security measures and all these data leaks in the last several years are evidence of that. The more data that is mined, the more information for intruders (foreign and domestic) to have access to. For example Russia could have penetrated America's NSA and used the data mined there to create profiles of people they could effortlessly manipulate in America's 2016 elections.

<comment><USER13> > For example Russia could have penetrated America's NSA and used the data > mined there to create profiles of people they could effortlessly manipulate > in America's 2016 elections.

How do you know they haven't already done exactly that?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> The article was vague. How does this law compare to other countries? Is it NSA or Hemisphere level data dragnets, is it Australian style "Australian law > mathematical law", or is it something different?

<comment><USER19> Atleast in developed countries individual rights are well enforced, so NSA atleast requires permission from secret court & Australian anti-encryption law at least was passed in their parliament (or equivalent).

In India govt just used a loophole to give several government aagencies to access any computer without limitations or hurdles.

I certainly believe this is intended for data analysis for elections & for abuse of people critical oof the government; especially journalists.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> First, it was Aadhaar and now this. Somehow Indian Govt wants to track every citizen and build their dictatorship.

<comment><USER21> > build their dictatorship.

I highly doubt any Indian government wants or even thinks they can do this.

India in all its diversity, consists of a huge number of separate factions. The Government only works due to a mutual compromise from enough factions to form a coalition. Also, the Indian judiciary and parliament hold genuine power and exercise it too.

It is nearly impossible for a single person to gain enough momentum to even start being dictatorial.

Admittedly, Modi's government has consolidated more power in one person than most of India's past governments. But, even then it only in comparison to the nearly dysfunctional mega coalitions of the INC.

<comment><USER22> While dictatorship is obviously absurd, what about Indira Gandhi and the Emergency?

<comment><USER23> Indira Gandhi's shenanigans led to the the establishment of the Basic Structure Doctrine of the Indian constitution, which I hope will prevent anybody else from exploiting the same loopholes

<comment><USER22> That sounds like a good lesson was learned.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I wonder what the implications will be for Western companies outsourcing there, anyone care to chime in?

<comment><USER6> I don't think Western companies really outsource important stuff to India. Its mostly brain dead work. Some of us call ourselves cyber coolies if we are working for the outsourcing companies. American companies are actually careful about employing Indians and other foreigners even in US. I remember one Indian colleague telling me how his US employer had to get approval from the US govt before hiring him full time in US. The employer had to show paperwork that he wouldn't have access to important information (trade secrets and the like). This employer makes things for agriculture. So I wonder have cautious the US govt would be for defense and related industries. I know they don't even allow non citizens to work in defense related projects even inside US.

So, unlike the Chinese, we (Indians) don't really get to learn much from outsourcing, other than may be lessons on keeping the end customer happy by exploiting the employees.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Oh my! Who can imagine living in an environment where the government is known to be intercepting, monitoring, and decrypting your digital activity as their perfectly acceptable MO!?

</comment><comment><USER26> Does using an app like cloudflare 18.104.22.168 protect us from this ?

Cloudflare app link - [https://blog.cloudflare.com/1-thing-you-can-do-to-make- your-...](https://blog.cloudflare.com/1-thing-you-can-do-to-make-your- internet-safer-and-faster/)

<comment><USER19> Using cloudflare DNS over ISP is definetly better, but you definetly need VPN/ToR or both to stop govt snooping on your online activities.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> This will be an unpopular opinion, but I personally like highly oppressive and intrusive governments trying to impose their will on the internet and technology.

Usually when this happens, it results in substantial innovation around privacy, security and awareness. Such movements will ultimately force many people underground and into various forms of VPN's, non standard operating systems and custom hardware.

To be clear, I am not condoning India's actions and I have no doubt many people will be hurt by this. I am merely pointing out that there will also be many unintended consequences and I personally believe that their government will ultimately lose more trust, control and visibility than they gain.

<comment><USER28> This is why I don't like laws like these.

They're utterly ineffective at their stated goals. The targets are largely unaffected.

However, the average person is affected. And can be deeply affected.

<comment><USER29> Yeah because the real purpose of these laws is to control the citizens, as ever more unrest in future is a given, for just about any country. Nothing except physically shackling every human being is going to stop crazy terrorists from ploughing through a crowd in a vehicle, but mark my words, you'll find western 'democracies' employing technology in literally every sphere of life to ostensibly control these 'terrorists' although the end result will be a dystopia of totally controlled citizenry that will find it impossible to break their chains unless they're prepared to die.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> It is easy to task authorities with intercept and decryption duties; actually doing it successfully is another matter entirely. Mathematics works both ways, friends.

<comment><USER31> >> _It is easy to task authorities with intercept and decryption duties; actually doing it successfully is another matter entirely. Mathematics works both ways, friends._

Actually if Apple, Goog, FB etc are forced to surrender the key--at the penalty of being excluded from 1.x billion people in India--math works only one way...

<comment><USER32> they can't surrender keys they don't have (e2e). the only issue is that they may be forced to do a key change. one way around this would be to show a prominent notice if your peer changed keys, which would make it immediately obvious what was going on.

<comment><USER33> The idea that showing a warning makes it immediately obvious what is going on is ridiculous.

It would take a large-scale public education campaign to teach people what it means when they see a warning message that reads "Peer key changed. Are you sure you want to proceed?"

If you need to be convinced, go ask your mom or dad whether it's immediately obvious what is going on when they see an insecure connection warning in their web browser. In my experience everyone just clicks through to "proceed anyway" without comprehending it at all.

<comment><USER34> That's why most browsers now make this difficult to do.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> I am surprised they are not simply mandating a keylogging software in all laptops/phones and get it over with instead of trying to decrypt.

</comment><comment><USER36> Every country who can afford to already does this. They're simply admitting a little more about it than most.

</comment><comment><USER37> [http://www.linuxliveusb.com/](http://www.linuxliveusb.com/) \+ [https://prism-break.org/en/all/](https://prism-break.org/en/all/) can insulate you.

</comment><comment><USER37> The Indian journalist jailed for a year for Facebook posts

[https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia- india-46631911](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-46631911)

<comment><USER38> People getting jailed for Facebook posts happen frequently in India. Looking at the arrests they have made so far, there are 3 categories of people whom you shouldn't criticize or make fun of in Facebook: politicians, religion and women.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> In 2014 Modi campaign promised honest/progressive govt.

Now,

        50% ministers in his cabinet are facing corruption/criminal charges in courts

        fulfilled just 9% poll promises http://www.electionpromisestracker.in/governments/central-government

        and utter contempt for truth and knowledge https://www.huffingtonpost.in/entry/smriti-irani-to-sharad-yadav-8-most-bizarre-statements-from-politicians-in-2018_in_5c18d2dfe4b08db990575cfc

</comment><comment><USER39> As far as I know elections work quite well in India and Australia (which is moving in the same direction), so how do things like this happen? Do the people consider government spying on them Ok?

<comment><USER29> Majority of the people in India are too busy making ends meet to know or care. This may change as the relatively more educated/affluent younger generations replace the older ones, but for now there are other bigger problems on everyone's minds. Of course govts all over the world use precisely this strategy to push through draconian laws... if the people aren't too stressed out/distracted to care, the evergreen excuses of terrorism and national security are trotted out.

We have general elections next year and the main deciding factors will probably be stuff like demonetisation, rising prices/taxes, perceived arrogance/authoritarianism etc. This issue will go almost unnoticed except by the techically aware minority, just as the wholesale decimation of India's environment by the current govt is also going unnoticed except by the small 'green' minority.

<comment><USER40> > This issue will go almost unnoticed except by the techically aware minority, > just as the wholesale decimation of India's environment by the current govt > is also going unnoticed except by the small 'green' minority.

Would you care to expound to here? The last I checked this government has done more on renewable energy front than any other government.

<comment><USER39> In general "the renewable energy front" is also a kind of populism. I would strongly prefer my government to invest in nuclear power plants maintenance, upgrading and building and in research in the nuclear area than in what is generally considered renewable.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Frankly whether we agree or not, nearly all the government's are actively spying on it's citizens.. Buzzwords like Right to Privacy is just like that only a buzzword. So , if a government needs someone's data, they will somehow take it.

</comment><comment><USER42> If you want to see where the USA will be politically in 10 years look no further than China and India with these draconian policies. We are in competition with them.

</comment><comment><USER13> This is basically part of a smear campaign against the government in power (NDA). The law was designed under the previous government and has been in existence before this government came to power. Nothing new was introduced since 2008.

As far as constitutional protections go, Indians have a right to privacy which has been held up in the courts as recently as this year. This has been affirmed several times in the recent past. So, no, India does not have weak protections for its citizens.

Finally, India is a place where mere WhatsApp forwards on the basis of rumors or made up stories cause people to go out and riot. Communal violence can be instigated using such means. So such laws are essential to track down the perpetrators.

NSA, CIA also silently spy on Americans without much oversight in the name of security. In fact it is done at a mass scale.

<comment><USER43> Denial, justification, and appeal to "everyone else is doing it" are a lot less compelling when used in the same breath that when deployed separately.

"Uighur detention camps don't exist and also aren't that bad."

<comment><USER13> Nothing in my post was even close to "Denial" or that everyone else is doing it. I was pointing out that my western counterparts are barking up the wrong tree when their own government is guilty of mass surveillance on not just their own people but everyone on this planet while India has stronger protections that have been held up in court.

People in glass houses should not be pelting stones.

<comment><USER44> Your Western counterparts also complain when Western government does this.

You have a really huge chip on those shoulders.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> The first few lines of the story make it clear that there is not (necessarily) some physical seizing of computers going on here; it is the _data_ that are being intercepted, monitored, and decrypted.

<comment><USER46> ...and 7 years of prison if the service provider does not hand the authorities the encryption keys...

MITM for iMessage, Whatsapp etc seems to be guaranteed here.

<comment><USER47> > Whatsapp etc seems to be guaranteed here

It is end to end encrypted

<comment><USER48> Which means that authorities can force the providers to inject public keys into the directory services, thus allowing the authorities access to the cleartext. End-to-end is a buzz word. What is important is key distribution, which is set to be subverted by governments everywhere...

<comment><USER49> Don't think they will deploy great firewall for blocking telegram which operate from offshore.

<comment><USER48> I dont know why people bring up telegram. A vast majority of chat messages is sent directly in the clear to Telegram servers. Telegram can spy on your conversations. If they can, anyone can. It is NOT an encrypted messenger. It is a crappy plaintext messenger that has an encrypted feature that nobody uses. Also - Stop using telegram. IT IS NOT ENCRYPTED LIKE YOU AND YOUR FRIENDS THINK IT IS.

<comment><USER49> It does have secret chats, which are supposed to be E2E encrypted

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> This is much worst than what we saw in Australia, current Indian govt headed by right wing political party with track record of human rights abuses have passed this order without passing through Parliament using a loop hole in the IT ACT.

This is likely aimed at upcoming elections for data analyses via ISP & to target journalists critical of the current govt in India.

But I feel that the International community isn't going to rally up for India like they did for Australia; I doubt even if expats would.

<comment><USER13> Spreading FUD about India?

<comment><USER19> No,stating opinions based on factual information on the present Indian govt.

<comment><USER50> "Current Indian govt headed by right wing political party with track record of human rights abuses have passed this order without passing through Parliament using a loop hole in the IT ACT". It's your opinion without any fact. The law was introduced by UPA.[https://m.hindustantimes.com/india-news/in-arun- jaitley-s-st...](https://m.hindustantimes.com/india-news/in-arun-jaitley-s- stinging-counter-on-snooping-order-a-reference-to-upa-s-2009-rule/story- Qofgl1aJ7J6RZX2Nn9JnxO.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> All governments do it. Some just do it in the open.

</comment><comment><USER52> TL;DR This is a a decade old directive . This was a 2009 directive, if at all anything that has changed now it is instead of open ended notification in 2009 which said any company can access the data, this directive limits the number of companies to specific 10 agencies that can access that too after getting necassary permission. Details in [https://www.opindia.com/2018/12/fact-check- congress-lies-mha...](https://www.opindia.com/2018/12/fact-check-congress- lies-mha-circular-access-to-computers-says-bjp-wants-to-snoop/)

<comment><USER19> To western readers clicking on the above 'opindia' article, it is a right-wing media outlet like 'Breitbart'.

It is well known to propagate fake news in support of the ruling right wing political party.

<comment><USER38> Is FirstPost rightwing?

>The Ministry of Home Affairs on Friday clarified that its recent order authorising 10 agencies to snoop on any computer in the country in the interest of national security is based on the UPA-era IT Act and the IT Rules 2009 that allow for surveillance by a competent authority and said all cases of surveillance will be placed before a review committee headed by the cabinet secretary.

[https://www.firstpost.com/india/mha-says-snooping-order- base...](https://www.firstpost.com/india/mha-says-snooping-order-based-on-upa- era-it-rules-no-new-powers-conferred-on-any-security-agencies-5771621.html)

I know for sure that "give password or spend 7 years in jail" is not a new rule. It was there for at least a while.

>Section 69 of the Information Technology Act, as amended by the Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008, empowers the central and state governments to compel assistance from any "subscriber or intermediary or any person in charge of the computer resource" in decrypting information. Failure to comply is punishable by up to seven years imprisonment and/or a fine.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_disclosure_law#India](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_disclosure_law#India)

>A major amendment was made in 2008. It introduced the Section 66A which penalized sending of "offensive messages". It also introduced the Section 69, which gave authorities the power of "interception or monitoring or decryption of any information through any computer resource". It also introduced for child porn, cyber terrorism and voyeurism. It was passed on 22 December 2008 without any debate in Lok Sabha. The next day it was passed by the Rajya Sabha. It was signed by the then President (Pratibha Patil) on 5 February 2009.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_Technology_Act,_20...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_Technology_Act,_2000)

UPA ruled India in 2008.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> Room 641A

</comment><comment><USER54> Modi.

<comment><USER55> BJP

<comment><USER15> Mitron

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> Even if I take the headline with grain of salt and assuming it's meant to capture reader's interest, it is rather surprising the Nation involved is not your run-of-the-mill authoritarian/repressive nation but one that bills itself as the 'World's largest democracy'.</comment>


Ask HN: Do HN's "saved stories" list only items less than 100 days old? - <AUTHOR>

Hello! I tried hn-profile [1] to download my saved HN stories (i.e., "saved stories" under my profile). I was thrilled to have finally found such a tool, but disappointed to see only stories less than 100 days old (<102, to be precise). Is this a well-known fact? Is this information indeed lost/purged?<p>Thanks!<p>[1] https://github.com/bsandrow/hn-profile <comment><USER2> I can readily look up HN stories older than that. You are just using the wrong tool. With site-restricted Google search, or with search by user and keyword through HN Search, you can find such gems as

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171>

from 1379 days ago with pg's opinion about using downvoting to express disagreement with comments.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for your reply. I can see my wording is confusing: I know the actual stories are kept, but I was referring to the "saved stories" under your profile. I have rephrased the question, hoping it's now clear.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I went 554 days back through my saved stories before I got bored of clicking next. So no, it doesn't.</comment>


Ask HN: What's the article about eating half a cookie? - <AUTHOR> There was an article earlier today about trying to eat half a cookie, and the agonizing decision making process.<p>Does anyone have a link to it? It seems to have disappeared from the front page but it was a really great blog post and I'd like to read the rest of the blog. <comment><USER2> Was it this?

[https://apxhard.com/2019/09/21/how-it-feels-to-eat- exactly-h...](https://apxhard.com/2019/09/21/how-it-feels-to-eat-exactly-half- a-cookie/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes! Thank you</comment></comment>


GitHub: "BUG: Government occasionally shuts down" - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/WhiteHouse/fortyfour/issues/3

<comment><USER2> My favourite comment so far:

      ell0ell0 commented 2 hours ago
      I think I found the error...

      allowing the <money> variable to modify <speech> is
      negatively impacting the <congress> function

</comment><comment><USER3> Bug?

Orrrrrr feature?

<comment><USER4> I think this qualifies as one of those features users never use therefore it can be deprecated and removed.

<comment><USER5> I don't know. I think that the current version has created a lot of zombie proceses that only live from it. But these also happend in all the forks that mantain other countries.</comment></comment></comment>