British intelligence hacked Belgacom then sabotaged investigation - <AUTHOR> http://www.brusselstimes.com/business/technology/12931/british-intelligence-hacked-belgacom-then-sabotaged-investigation <comment><USER2> The real mystery is this:

> However the Belgian government and security services were kept in the dark, > something which the federal prosecutor's report described as "exceptional > between EU states, and something that could lead to a diplomatic incident."

If this operation was ONLY meant to target a subsidiary working mostly inside the middle-east with legitimate terrorist ties, I'd imagine they would have included the Belgians.

One could speculate that GCHQ decided to go it alone, just to see "what else we can get" in terms of potentially spying within Belgian/on Belgian's citizens.

It isn't even the first time GCHQ has been caught spying on other European countries[0]. But I guess the City of London needs to get their financial "tips" somehow...

[0] [http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/gchq-and-nsa- tar...](http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/gchq-and-nsa-targeted- private-german-companies-a-961444.html)

<comment><USER3> > It isn't even the first time GCHQ has been caught spying on other European > countries

The polite open secret of espionage is that spying on your allies isn't just normal, it's part and parcel of basic modern statecraft. Being able to anticipate the moves of your allies, understand their thought processes, and watch them for compromises are all incredibly useful things, and the first two very important for working closely with an ally. This is, quite frankly, normal stuff.

What generally _doesn 't_ happen is public discussion of it. The public tends to think of espionage as something that would only ever be directed against enemies or threats. That's at odds with the information that enables diplomacy to function well. Every world leader knows their allies are spying on them, and tries to do the same in return. The only weird thing is being publicly exposed, at which point every leader postures against the thing they all rely on.

There's really no need to suspect a commercial conspiracy when normal diplomacy is sufficient to explain this kind of thing. But I guess this _is_ boring by comparison to imagining that a historical financial center only functions through ill-gotten commercial intelligence.

<comment><USER2> I was with you until:

> But I guess this is boring by comparison to imagining that a historical > financial center only functions through ill-gotten commercial intelligence.

Nobody said anything about "only functioning because..."

The entire basis for your position seems to be that an intelligence apparatus can only do exactly one thing at a time. It can either be for diplomatic reasons OR commercial spying, not both...

In reality governments extract as much value out of the intelligence networks and collected information as they can. If the collected information is going to help a domestic business interest against a foreign one (e.g. contract negotiations, mergers, sales, etc) you can bet your butt that tips will be supplied.

You really think that the US government doesn't routinely "tip" off Boeing and several European countries Airbus?

Countries look out for their own self interests beyond anything else. Expecting that they'll only do so some of the time rather than all of the time, seems like an opinion based more around how you'd wish a country to act morally, rather than the reality on the ground.

<comment><USER4> The US doesn't tip off American companies with data gathered by its intelligence agencies.

This was a decision made back during the Clinton years.

You're welcome to share your evidence to the contrary.

<comment><USER2> NSA spying on Petrobras[0].

NSA spying on EADS (Airbus)[1].

NSA spying on Eurocopter[2].

NSA spying on Siemens[3].

[0] [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-security-snowden- petr...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-security-snowden- petrobras/nsa-spying-on-petrobras-if-proven-is-industrial-espionage-rousseff- idUSBRE98817N20130909)

[1] [https://www.tagesspiegel.de/politik/bnd-und-nsa-die- chronolo...](https://www.tagesspiegel.de/politik/bnd-und-nsa-die-chronologie- des-spionageskandals/11722810.html)

[2] [https://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/geheimdienst-affaere- nsa...](https://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/geheimdienst-affaere-nsa-jubelte- bnd-deutsche-spaehziele-unter-1.2715253)

[3] [https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/edward-snowden-says-nsa- engage...](https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/edward-snowden-says-nsa-engages-in- industrial-espionage-1.2511635)

<comment><USER4> You're welcome to point out where I said "the US doesn't spy on foreign companies".

<comment><USER5> The point is that these are clear examples of the NSA engaging in economic espionage, including tipping off US corporations with intelligence. Many countries do it. China is a worse and likely a much more frequent offender than the US, but the US still does it.

<comment><USER3> It may be worth considering that the examples may not be as clear as their presenter might believe them to be. There may be a difference between spying on a given target and spying on a given target for a particular reason.

In general, there are two claims being made here. Claim one is that the US has spied on a series of corporations. Claim two is that this has been done for the purposes of economic gain. The truth of claim one makes it _possible_ for claim two to be true, but a cautious reader might note that what is possible and what is certainly true can at times be different.

Not to wax cynical, but Ms. Rousseff's claim that there's no possible other reason to spy on Petrobras is not credible. Not because she was clearly lying (I cannot begin to evaluate that), but because there's no reasonable world in which she understood all possible aspects of the decision-making process that produced that spying.

Given the type of corruption that Petrobras has been involved in, spies could have been pursuing a financial trail. This is not a certainty, of course, but it is sufficiently plausible that it's impossible to be certain that the NSA could only have been active there for purposes of industrial espionage.

<comment><USER5> Sure, that's certainly plausible. There are many reasons why an intelligence agency might want to spy on a large nation's state-owned energy conglomerate. The US government has indeed denied that the Petrobras spying was for economic gain [1]:

>"The department does not engage in economic espionage in any domain, including cyber," the agency said in an emailed response to a Washington Post story on the subject last month.

>In a statement issued on Sunday night after the latest revelations aired in Brazil, the US director of national intelligence, James Clapper, said: "It is not a secret that the intelligence community collects information about economic and financial matters, and terrorist financing.

>"We collect this information for many important reasons: for one, it could provide the United States and our allies early warning of international financial crises which could negatively impact the global economy. It also could provide insight into other countries' economic policy or behavior which could affect global markets."

>But he again denied this amounted to industrial espionage. "What we do not do, as we have said many times, is use our foreign intelligence capabilities to steal the trade secrets of foreign companies on behalf of – or give intelligence we collect to – US companies to enhance their international competitiveness or increase their bottom line."

Maybe they're right. But how can we possibly know they're actually telling the truth? Especially when the intelligence agencies' job is essentially to lie?

[1] [https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/09/nsa-spying- bra...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/09/nsa-spying-brazil-oil- petrobras)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> All the nasty/embarrassing stories for UK will be resurfaced to weight in Brexit negotiations. Russia already warned the international community that UK didn't cooperate well about all the accusations of nerve agents (not that Russia cooperates massively either).

Personal opinion : UK gov thinks they are the only people on Earth, they think they can ignore their neighbors, they overestimate themselves and I hope a bad Brexit will give them a good lesson. If UK were a passive country and actually self-sufficient, we wouldn't care much. But they actively try to influence international relations, and they want to do it without EU, which is obviously egoist and short-sighted, since they don't get to chose their geographical neighbors.

<comment><USER7> > Russia already warned the international community that UK didn't cooperate > well about all the accusations of nerve agents

Why would UK cooperate at all with the principal suspect in this case? How can this be controversial or inform us in any way on how UK cooperate with allied nations?

<comment><USER8> Well, if the competing theory (that UK is behind the nerve agents) is true, they also have good reasons not to cooperate.

<comment><USER9> The only people to whom that is a "competing theory" have an exceptionally high probability of being viewers of whatever the local equivalent to Fox News is.

<comment><USER8> You forgot there are people outside US? Outside its media bubble

<comment><USER10> Every place has its own media bubble. And, in many cases, those bubbles share the same conspiracy theories, especially when outside hostile actors deliberately stoke them. I assume that's why OP wrote "whatever the local _equivalent_ to Fox News is".

<comment><USER8> You get out of media bubble by reading news from very different sources. Otherwise you're inside it no matter what you read.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> By "sabotage" they meant "did not cooperate". Title is more click-baity then accurate.

</comment><comment><USER12> > _However the Belgian government and security services were kept in the dark, > something which the federal prosecutor's report described as "exceptional > between EU states, and something that could lead to a diplomatic incident."_

Seems a lot missing from this story. Do they usually engage their partners? If so, why not this time? We're they afraid of being tipped off? Who were the targets, terrorists or perhaps other government officials in the Middle East?

<comment><USER13> Seem to recall belgium is on a list of countries security cleared brits are not supposed to go to. Presumably the relationship between UK and Belgian inteligence is really bad for some reason.

Unreliably, there is a post with a list here, but it is famously true. [https://www.arrse.co.uk/community/threads/countries-that- req...](https://www.arrse.co.uk/community/threads/countries-that-require- permission-to-visit.167123/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> And...it's gone

</comment><comment><USER15> Here is the full story

[https://theintercept.com/2014/12/13/belgacom-hack-gchq- insid...](https://theintercept.com/2014/12/13/belgacom-hack-gchq-inside- story/)

Great article from 2014 ... Apparently todays news is a follow up on it.

<comment><USER16> "The suspicious files had been enabling a highly sophisticated hacker to circumvent automatic Microsoft software updates..."

I knew it. Those auto updates are a curse.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> 'But when the Belgian investigators approached their British counterparts with a request for help in identifying who was behind the three companies, GCHQ declined to cooperate, claiming that cooperation would "bring the sovereignty, security and public order [of the UK] into jeopardy".'

OMG we're doomed

<comment><USER18> When "the sovereignty, security and public order" is defined by people whose entire lives are based on the ability to keep secrets, use knowledge gained illegally, secretly, and ensure that nobody else has the ability to usurp their position .. yes, we are indeed doomed.

Its long since past the point where the 5-eyes nations should suffer repercussions for their heinous imperialist actions. One can only hope that Brexit will bring the UK into sufficiently subservient stance that these crimes will no longer be accepted by the EU.

<comment><USER19> Your belief that the other EU countries don't engage in similar activities against their allies within and outside the EU is naive at best.

Germany and France in particular have large intelligence organizations which are known to have been used against allies as well as enemies.

<comment><USER18> Whining that "all the other kids are doing it" is only relevant when there is actually evidence on the table that it is at the same level of magnitude as when 'your team' does it.

So far, there is nothing like the heinous 5-eyes super-surveillance state, anywhere else in the world. The 5-eyes have granted themselves mastery over the rest of the world - and this fact only serves as further justification that other states _should_ be doing it now.

This is the slippery slope: why is it okay for the UK to do it, but not Germany, Italy and France? The answer: its not okay for anyone to do it. Stop justifying it.

<comment><USER19> I didn't express any sentiment that it was ok for the UK to do it or in anyway justify it. I just pointed out the naivety of thinking the other EU states don't do it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> China at it again... No, wait.

</comment><comment><USER21> Seems like they've also hacked brusselstimes.com, the page won't open...

</comment><comment><USER22> Edward Snowdon :')

</comment><comment><USER23> In normal world this should be equal to declaring a war, right?

<comment><USER2> Na. Allies have always spied on each other. You just rarely hear about it because the Russian/Chinese/NK/etc spies go on the news/get prosecuted, and the allie's spies get quietly asked to leave and the home country gets a nasty-gram.

For example many embassies routinely batch collect all cell phone conversations within range[0], which is quite useful since they're often located in another country's capital city.

There's a reason why high level government officials have what are essentially VPN-ed cellphones now.

[0] [http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/cover-story- how-...](http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/cover-story-how-nsa- spied-on-merkel-cell-phone-from-berlin-embassy-a-930205.html)

<comment><USER24> >Allies have always spied on each other.

It's thanks to that kind of complacent commentary that we're shrugging off intelligence agencies hacking into the computers of senators investigating said agencies. What a time to be alive.

<comment><USER2> You either get called "complacent" or "naive."

This stuff is going to happen regardless of how upset people get, nation states have too much to gain by having more information and very little to lose when they're caught by an allie.

And it isn't like this is new to the information revolution either. Countries were spying on each other using the postal service and telegrams, or even eyeballs and fast horses.

As an aside your example isn't relevant, the CIA spied on their own government in that example, that is what makes it especially egregious and dangerous, since it impacts the state's own sovereignty. The actual topic at hand was nation-states spying on one another, apples and oranges.

<comment><USER24> > You either get called "complacent" or "naive."

Your original comment is certainly not naive, with the current state of affairs being undeniably ripe for spying operations.

> This stuff is going to happen regardless of how upset people get

Statists will only go as far as their people allow them to.

> The actual topic at hand was nation-states spying on one another, apples and > oranges.

Believing there is any effective distinction, on the other hand, is not merely complacent but incredibly naive indeed.

<comment><USER2> > Statists will only go as far as their people allow them to.

We're talking about inter-governmental spying, a state's own political system has nothing to do with the topic. So your point about Statists isn't relevant here.

> Believing there is any effective distinction, on the other hand, is not > merely complacent but incredibly naive indeed.

You think it is "naive" to believe there's a distinction between two states spying on each other and a state's own security services spying on their own oversight organisation? What?

<comment><USER24> > a state's own political system has nothing to do with the topic

that sounds very contradictory. unless you are implicitly admitting that intelligence agencies are above government oversight. in which case you might have a point.

naive to believe this theoretical distinction holds in practice. how many more whistleblowers' careers need to be destroyed for you to realize this? the highly sophisticated machinery developed for "international spying" in light of all evidence appears to be a convenient justification for domestic spying, sometimes outsourced to your own allies to keep it legal [1].

[1] [https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/20/us-uk- secret-d...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/20/us-uk-secret-deal- surveillance-personal-data)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Lua scripts in Redis within Node.js - <AUTHOR> http://techblog.s6.io/blog/2014/09/18/lua-scripts-in-redis-within-nodejs.html <comment> ilya-pi Author here. Would love to here any feedback on the topic if anybody is doing anything similiar

<comment><USER2> Very interesting -- it seems redis is used more and more for of its data mangling capacity.

I have 2 questions, although I don't use redis in prod I'm interested in it:

\- Why use key -> json ? There are a decode and an encode to be done on each operation. The naive way to do it would be hashes ([http://redis.io/commands#hash](http://redis.io/commands#hash)) with the likes of HSET and HMSET, and a structure like 'a' -> 'spend' -> 3\. which not only make operations faster but should also take less space thanks to memory optimization of similar keys in a hash.

\- What do you do for persistance ? Which one did you choose ? Are you okay with the slight delay ? Or do you just make it all in-memory ?

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Sounds a bit like reinventing Stored Procedures for Redis to me :|</comment>


Miguel de Icaza: "As a software developer, I find the iPad inspirational." - <AUTHOR> http://tirania.org/blog/archive/2010/Jan-29.html

<comment><USER2> Several problems with this article:

1: Critique against mouse and keyboard rings hollow. It's stuck around so far because it "just works" for a large number of apps. Touchscreens not similarly proven.

2: Limitations of the hardware is touted as a "great opportunity". Opportunity how? An opportunity to unleash gosh-darned ugly hacks to get around said limitations?

3: Written by Miguel de Icaza, known troll/closed source afficionado. Notably, nothing is mentioned about how hard it is to develop on an entirely closed platform (see iPhone troubles). Considering who the author is, not surprising in the least. Generally i try to avoid ad hominem but in this case the author's own bias gets ahead of dispassionate analysis.

<comment><USER3> I can see why this post was downvoted but you've got some good points.

<comment><USER4> Sure, but the personal attack 'known troll' bit is over the line.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I was having a hard time figuring out why I needed an iPad. Even after watching the keynote (besides the 'new, shiny' lust) I had no real reason to want one. Then I realized the 3rd party opportunities for this thing are insane. Yes, there have been tablets in the past but there has never been what basically amounts to a cheap, 10" piece of glass that can recognize all your fingers and an array of gestures. I am very excited to see what other inspired developers do with this device.

<comment><USER6> Maps and mapping technology are ones that do sharply stick out as more than a natural fit for the tablet form factor combined with touch screen compared with today's mobile devices. This space has plenty to gain in innovation with the iPad.

<comment><USER7> Watching video from online (iPlayer etc.) would be my ideal application for this - an iPhone is too small, a laptop is too clunky and uncomfortable and I hate watching video sitting at a desk.

Another thing that might be a hit is multiplayer games. I was playing an air hockey game with my son on his iPod Touch and it was surprisingly good. With a bigger screen that could really be an interesting thing to watch.

Lots of board games might work pretty well on something like the iPad as people could sit round it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> WTF?

I'm seriously confused here. Is this the same guy who thumbed his nose at Microsoft and instigated the creation Mono?

If so, isn't he at least a little conflicted about the closed nature of the platform?

<comment><USER9> Funny, I never took it to be nose-thumbing so much as fellatio. He's the Pied Piper of Hamelin who led a small army of open source programmers straight to their language and APIs just when the townsfolk were at the peak of panic that they were losing the mindshsre of developers. (...developers, developers, developers,...) That's an act of deep love, not defiance.

Well, as deep as as a quid pro quo seeker might feel, anyway. He certainly never came off as an idealist.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Funny, I just started thinking along similar lines.

I was underwhelmed initially by the iPad as well. Then I remembered this painting program I wrote back in the '90s for my Mac IIsi, and how _cool_ it was (geometrical forms with palette animation) -- and then I started thinking about a touch-based version of this program -- maybe with networking -- and then I turned to my wife, and said, "You know that new thing Apple just came out with?"

<comment><USER11> When a bunch of devs are underwhelmed at first, but then start to see possibilities in moments of calm -- this is a sign of a game changer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> So, reading that I am supposed to come to the conclusion that absence of choice is now a good thing?

No keyboard, no mouse, _only_ a multi-touch capable screen and this will somehow liberate software development?

I really don't get it. If it was in addition to the usual input suspects, then sure, that would enable lots of stuff.

But to be able to type, use the mouse for precise on-screen pointing without getting your hand in the way of what you're doing, those are things we already had.

Now you lose those and in return you get interaction with your hands on a relatively small screen.

On screen keyboards are nice, but even a lengthy email would be pretty cumbersome that way.

Choice is good, lack of choice is not 'fascinating', it is limiting. Limitations will drive creative people to come up with ways around those limitations but for now this is what you've got to work with.

Another thing I don't understand from the article is this sentence:

"but the specter of having a small user base for my experiments always discouraged me."

Why does that matter? Not everything is about how many people adopt it. If you can make a small group really happy that counts for something too.

<comment><USER13> It's not a general-purpose computer (much like an iPhone or an iPod). It's a browser and e-mail and e-book reader you can use while on the bus. For reading, it's less cumbersome than a netbook.

But there's that keyboard dock. That should make composing long-emails (or using the iWork suite) less of a painful experience. Since it doesn't allow connecting a mouse, I will wait until there is emacs ported to it ;-)

<comment><USER14> emacs is an extensible Lisp runtime, and Apple has shot down all such applications in the past. I don't think they're going to change their tune for the iPad.

<comment><USER13> I would not hold my breath.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Tighter Control Over Your Referrers - <AUTHOR> https://blog.mozilla.org/security/2015/01/21/meta-referrer/ <comment><USER2> It looks like Chrome is already supporting this as well:

> Enabled by default in desktop Chrome 21

[https://www.chromestatus.com/feature/5126747842412544](https://www.chromestatus.com/feature/5126747842412544)

<comment><USER3> Whether I use Chrome or Firefox individually, the fact that two major browsers already support it is very, very good for the internet as a whole.

It means it is likely to be supported by all the major browsers eventually. It means I can assume the implementation in the other major browsers will be fairly close to what I'm seeing right now. And most importantly, I can confidently recommend to my team that we add <meta name="referrer"> starting today.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> On the user end, this can be controlled to a fine degree with the RefControl extension

[https://addons.mozilla.org/en- US/firefox/addon/refcontrol/](https://addons.mozilla.org/en- US/firefox/addon/refcontrol/)

<comment><USER5> No need for an extension, in about:config you can toggle network.http.SendRefererHeader from the default value of '2' to '0', which will disable all referer headers.

<comment><USER6> This breaks virtually all paid webfont services, messing up referring websites and frequently making them completely unusable.

<comment><USER5> Good point, but those paid webfont services were already blocked by my NoScript extension, so I see no changes from my end.

As far as sites which require a referrer header, it has been my experience that these are very few and far between. I get one occasionally and if the content is worthy, I'll briefly disable then re-enable my setting.

Not for everyone, I know, but it works well for me.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> So this will totally break any deeplink protection. Where deeplink protection by referer checking (where an empty referer will allow the resource to be downloaded as well) was always effective enough since the web page author had no way to control the browser's or users choice of sending a Referer header or not, now the author of a web page that is deeplinking resources is simply able to prevent a Referer header being sent, circumventing the protection mechanism.

<comment><USER8> Is there a reason why deep linking protection is good? I know there are arguably reasons why a site owner might want it, but any that make it so I should care?

<comment><USER9> Not sure about deep linking, but hotlinking protection is quite important if we want to enable people to self-host their content (pictures, videos, etc) instead of centralizing everything on Youtube and such.

I run a small forum which hosts photos uploaded by its users, and some guy (not even a member) decided to use one of them as his signature on another forum (orders of magnitude larger). He killed half of our monthly traffic cap in a couple of days, until I mod-rewrited hotlinked URLs to a disturbing image :D

EDIT: That said, a better anti-hotlinking mechanism, which wouldn't violate the user's privacy, would be to have a response header whitelisting the domains in which the resource could be embedded from. If someone were to hotlink an image, the browser would simply refuse to show it.

<comment><USER10> Your solution wouldn't help: my browser would still request the image from your server, and you'd have to send me at least the headers. That in itself could kill your traffic cap. Instead, my request should send you the domain on which I want to display the image, and then you can give me a 400 error.

<comment><USER9> _Instead, my request should send you the domain on which I want to display the image, and then you can give me a 400 error._

But that tells me that a browser with a certain IP, user-agent and possibly even cookie ID is accessing a certain third-party site. I shouldn't have that information just because my image was hotlinked in that site.

And while my solution does still consume traffic, the idea would be discouraging the hotlinking in the first place. Why would anyone keep my image hotlinked if it didn't work?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Hooray! Mechanism and not policy! This is an excellent improvement for the web.

</comment><comment><USER12> I'm not sure correcting the spelling of 'referer' for the meta tag was a wise move.

</comment><comment><USER13> This seems like a backwards incompatible change to the Internet in one browser only. While data-users shouldn't rely on user submitted data's accuracy (including the refer[r]er), unless Mozilla can show support from the W3C/other browser vendors, this seems worth a discussion.

<comment><USER2> The W3 standard for the meta referrer element was linked in this post:

[http://www.w3.org/TR/referrer-policy/](http://www.w3.org/TR/referrer-policy/)

<comment><USER14> Not only that, it doesn't break anything at all. Referer is a completely optional header, and all this does is introduce a <meta> tag for controlling that. I hope more browsers pick this up soon!

And also let me enforce my own setting.

<comment><USER15> Chrome has supported this since about 2011. It is not actually new. And because it was implemented before the WebKit/blink fork even Safari supports it as well. Firefox is the 3rd browser.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


A New Venture Animal - <AUTHOR> http://paulgraham.com/ycombinator.html

<comment><USER2> _Very early stage startups are insanely risky._

I hear this almost as much as the "90% of startups fail" piece of wisdom, and I was a little surprised to see it in a PG essay. I'm not saying it's necessarily wrong, just that I don't totally understand it.

Risk is "the possibility of suffering harm or loss; danger." So what's risky about a startup? If you are paying for it yourself, maxing out credit cards, etc, then the startup _is_ indeed likely to be harmful to you.

But, if you get YC funding, and are the under 30 crowd that PG refers to with low living expenses, then it's pretty unlikely that you're taking that approach. Instead, you're simply not saving any money for awhile. So there is opportunity cost lost, since surely most of the YC founders could make a nice chunk of change working for the man. But is this really the harm that's implied by the reference to risk? Especially when you factor in the experience you gain from a failed startup, it seems pretty questionable to say that serious harm will likely befall you. It's more like, less savings and a great experience will likely befall you.

So I wonder if the sentiment is just referring to the harm that may happen to the startup itself. As in, it's quite likely -- 90% likely! ;) -- that the startup you create will die. But isn't that kind of like saying it's risky to scratch off a lotto ticket that someone gives you? It's "risky" for the lotto ticket I suppose, but not really for you.

<comment><USER2> I'll try to answer my own question. I think it's about riskiness from the point of view of investors. The thing is, I think the wisdom is oft repeated as risky for the founders (though perhaps not in this essay), which is what I'm objecting to.

<comment><USER3> It's risky in the sense that you might fail, and not get paid (enough) for your efforts. I calculated my last startup to have paid me about $3/hour (not discounting the time factor) after all was said and done.

<comment><USER4> How much did your school pay your for your efforts there?

<comment><USER5> My grad school pays $25 per hour. I paid nothing for undergrad. This isn't atypical.

<comment><USER6> Not atypical but also not the majority. I don't think it's a stretch to say most people pay for grad school.

<comment><USER7> It depends whether you're counting law school, business school, medical school, pharmacy school, nursing school, etc. as grad school. Among Hackers grad school is far more likely to be of the type "studying fractal patterns in African architecture while teaching two sections of introductory socio- cultural anthropology" Generally you pay through the nose for the first kind and they pay you (a little) to do the second kind.

It's amazing how few people know that if your PhD doesn't cost -$12,000 a year or less you really are not doing something right.

<comment><USER5> I'm not sure how many hackers could physically work in [law|business|medical|pharmacy|nursing].

My point was that because school systems are hackable, sometimes hackers will have hacked the signs of the costs involved. For example, my graduate school costs less than -$12,000 a year, but some peoples' schools may cost more than $12,000 a year (so they're not "doing something right?"). Big deal. In the long run, education wins financially and in terms of helping people accomplish their goals.

One can easily make the argument that startups are education, but obviously this consists of more than "Web 2.0" and a few other buzzwords thrown together at random. (I'm not criticizing Paul here, but I am criticizing the lunatic fringe that seems to grow around Paul.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I propose "venture catapult" as a generic term for what YC does.

<comment><USER9> startup trebuchet

<comment><USER10> startup blowdart

A few puffs of air in the right direction?

<comment><USER9> As long as we're listing weapons, the ideal choice is "startup tactical nuke".

It's the model that has been woefully overlooked for 50 years.

<comment><USER11> Possible, but that would pretty much involve funding the hell out of everyone in a several mile radius, with long-term funding for people fortunate enough to be down-wind . . .

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> pg:

 _But all it would have taken in the beginning would have been for two Google employees to focus on the wrong things for six months, and the company could have died._

Actually, it's even more interesting than that. Prior to AdWords (and, more importantly, the acquisition of Applied Semantics that gave them AdSense), Google did not have a real source of revenue. At all. Google Appliances were cute but negligible.

After AdWords and AdSense, they began to replace magazines, the yellow pages, and 411.

It is difficult to underestimate how important Ad(Words|Sense) has been to Google's success. And it was the idea of an intern.

<comment><USER4> What was the idea of an intern? Ads were part of the plan from very early on. Also, AdSense predates the Applied Semantics aquisition.

<comment><USER12> _AdSense predates the Applied Semantics acquisition_

That's not what your press release says: <http://www.google.com/press/pressrel/applied.html>

_What was the idea of an intern?_ The self-service approach to buying AdWords, IIRC. The mail-order lobster nonsense that led to the streamlining of the horribly broken logfile/MySQL system when it became popular. I may be confused -- 'intern' may be the wrong word.

But if you want an example of a 'tipping point' or a critical decision I can't think of much better than Google and their ad sales mechanism.

<comment><USER4> AdSense the product and technology (content targetting) predates the acquisition, which is why the press release is titled, "New Technologies and Engineering Team Complement Google's Content Targeted Advertising Programs". AdSense the trademark may have come from AS, but that's not very relevant.

I'm guessing that the "intern" that you are referring to is Salar: <http://www.google.com/corporate/execs.html#salar> He was maybe the 10th employee of Google.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> How about "Startup Catalyst" You don't provide the raw starting materials but you help them to combine more rapidly and more effectively. Dictionary definition: "A substance, usually used in small amounts relative to the reactants, that modifies and increases the rate of a reaction without being consumed in the process."

</comment><comment><USER14> _Really we're more of a small, furry steam catapult._

The man just has a way with words! :)

<comment><USER11> Agreed: money quote for the whole article.

It put me in mind of a fur-upholstered mousetrap for some reason. You know, the kind of thing David Bowie would put in his basement . . .

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Essays like this one make us, YC-rejects, feel like not being part of something cool, something new and exciting and much better, while we're stuck out there dealing with "old kind of animals" and the question _"why haven't they picked pikluk?"_ keeps creeping into my mind, and it's not a nice feeling.

I guess it's a natural state of mind of any hacker: to be at the edge, have the best tools, best equipment, use best operating systems, etc. It applies to your investors as well. I'd hate to take an offer from a rich farmer or an oil guy.

Well... enough of YC for today, back to work.

</comment><comment><USER16> I launched a start-up two months ago, and I can't agree more with Paul: it has become ridiculously inexpensive to do so. I considered chasing some VC funding, but then realized that all I need is a good idea and some time to focus on it; the VC's wouldn't have helped me with either one. As a matter of fact, even owning your own computing resources is unnecessary: check-out Amazon's cloud computing web services (our bill: <$100 / mth)!

<comment><USER15> How's that related to you costs? The primary expense has always been the cost of talent and "cost of sales". Employees time and marketing/advertising. Paul assumes that programmers will work for free (or for very little) because they're founders, but doesn't address the other big one. Well, he saves a ton of money on free YC-backed PR, but even his model breaks down if you need more than 2-4 programmers to deliver even a prototype, or if your idea/business depend heavily on graphics designers or rely on complex distribution channels (even within the web).

In fact if you way back, there was another time when a couple of guys in a garage could do it all. Gates and Allen did it. Jobs and Woz did it. In history of personal computing there was always one or two guys who did it first without bunch of money: nearly every piece of traditional desktop application has that guy. Equipment and infrastructure costs have never been prohibitive since the invention of a PC.

As web applications grow the history will repeat itself: instead of two guys building it you'll need 20, just like it did with desktop software and games. There are only brief windows of opportunity for a "little guy" and they only come some major breakthrough in technology comes along.

<comment><USER16> tx: "The primary expense has always been the cost of talent and "cost of sales". Employees time and marketing/advertising." The point I am making: it is not so any more! How much dev time or marketing or technology insight went into any of these, for example: digg fbook myspace flickr techcrunch? And yet they´re worth billions of $.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The shortest description of Y Combinator I can think of is a "Venture Expediter"

<comment><USER18> I don't think YC's goal is to get startups closer to VC, or even to expedite their journey anywhere.

The point is, YC is really smart money in real small amounts. If you need more money or don't need so much smarts behind it, you go elsewhere on the funding spectrum.

<comment><USER19> Our goal is definitely to get startups that could benefit from VC closer to it. 9 of 59 startups prior to this winter have raised money from VC funds so far.

More generally our goal is to get startups closer to later stage investors, whether angels or VCs. Pretty near 100% of startups are looking for at least some additional investment.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> YCombinator is a new kind of animal, in that it offers a lot less money and a lot more help. In the abstract, I have seen another local company in Ottawa (www.taraspan.com) do the similar kinds of things.

People often say that the combination of team, market opportunity, and technology is what it takes. One typical cause for failure of great teams is that they are pointed at the wrong markets. The other usual cause is that the "great team" really isn't. I believe that your model, by encouranging early alphas, and by giving guidance serves to honestly vet the team and the market.

I think you guys are doing great work because you create new deal flows with a fraction of the money. That, in turn will reduce VC's risks, and lower their rewards. I'm going to guess that if you guys feed companies into VC deal flows, VCs will start looking more like banks and less like venture investors.

</comment><comment><USER21> It seems like maybe traditional incubators are closer than VCs to competing in the same niche as YC. Is there any reason why it would be misleading to look at YC as an innovation in startup incubation -- namely to move the model a little bit closer to VC in terms of the independence of the founders?

<comment><USER19> I didn't consider old-style incubators because as far as I know there aren't any left. At least, I can't think of any startups that came out of one.

<comment><USER22> What about PlugAndPlay Tech Center? They have an office in Sunnyvale that seems successful.

<comment><USER19> I'm not sure exactly what they do, but I think it's more like office space especially tailored for startups.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> From the article: Google has such momentum now that it would be hard for anyone to stop them.

Within 48 hours of this being published, Google anounces layoffs ( <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=134967> ) and a new search engine from Sequoia is covered by TechCrunch ( <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=134291> ). In addition, the share price has fallen from US$747 to US$439 and there has been speculation by television pundits of it falling to US$350 or less ( <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=133966> ).

</comment><comment><USER24> So, here's a question:

Who's the competition? How did readers who didn't go through Y-Combinator get off of the ground? How'd you first get in contact with angel investors? Or incubators or seed funding or whatever...

As much startup rhetoric as seems to be kicking around this site and others, there seems to be a gap between "Go YC!" and "We just did our A-Round..."

We've been scrambling to get together as many contacts in the ramp up to quitting our jobs and there are some interesting leads, but before we start playing the find-funding-or-die game it seems prudent to have as many leads as possible.

</comment><comment><USER25> Startup funding is NOT easy. There are several reasons why it's so difficult: supply, demand, availability of information, fees and experience. There's a post on my blog that explains these reasons at: <http://www.AngelBlog.net/Startup_Fundings_Are_Not_Easy.html>. I hope this post and the other information on AngelBlog helps you get funded. Basil

</comment><comment><USER26> A subversive thought: as it becomes cheaper & cheaper to build start-ups, prices would fall too. Granted, start-ups are not interchangeable commodities, but given that so many are being created, that ought to impact pricing (aka valuations). Asymptotically, this could lead to a start-up being valued "at cost" (or below it in a serious downturn).

As I said, just a subversive thought. I am sure it doesn't apply to any of us here ;-)

</comment><comment><USER27> I think this sentence doesn't really make sense:

"As you work your way forward in the venture funding process, the ratio of help to money increases, because earlier stage companies have different needs."

Isn't one of the points of the essay the fact that, as a company progresses, the amount of help from a VC decreases relative to the amount of money received?

<comment><USER19> By forward I meant earlier. Several people have misunderstood this; maybe I should rephrase it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I think you are doing a great thing by writing such essays. We are a Bangalore India based startup, and I have been reading your essays for the past couple of years (from before we started our Internet company). Keep it up!

</comment><comment><USER29> When I read this I also thought about the differences in the physics of the 'very big' and the 'very small'.

Though, I prefer the cogency of your analogy. Good read.

</comment><comment><USER30> Please consider that the era of cheap energy is over (www.theoildrum.com). And the cheap energy is one of the main inputs into economy (including startups).

</comment><comment><USER31> Maybe I'm dumb. I don't understand why anyone would give up spit for such a small amount of money. That early and the money offered is so small. Forget about the % and the stock and all that. From the amounts I read about I could do contract design work for a couple months and earn that much. Yikes. I mean, even if one of, say, two founders took a 6 mo contract working somewhere, and slso pounded code late at night, and the other founder all day and night, the two could do it all. In fact, that's exactly what happened here. And it provided still other advantages. Nor do I see how you can make anything happen for such a small amount of money. You can't even buy some software tools, a fax machine, let alone a CPA to spit out one tax return or a single patent application. Even a phone line and broadband is >$100/mo. Takeout food and heat, that's all you're going to get. Who needs that kind of money? I say just work your asses off 24/7 like we did, then you're not wasting time begging people to listen to your idea, either. These days even with a demo their eyes just glaze over. Investors don't have a clue. Just make it work and start selling them. That's what we did.

<comment><USER19> Either that or you didn't read the essay. Its whole point is that money is not the important ingredient in early stage investing.

<comment><USER31> Yeah, I read the article. Maybe it said something you didn't want it to say.</comment></comment></comment>


Warren Buffett Explains How The Bailout Is Crushing Healthy Companies - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessinsider.com/warren-buffett-explains-how-the-bailout-is-crushing-healthy-companies-2009-3 <comment><USER2> This is a big extrapolation of intent from a single paragraph of a very long, carefully-crafted letter. Absent from this analysis are all the grafs where Buffett explained why the bailout was the correct course of action.

<comment><USER3> Right. I think Buffett talked about this _only_ because it explains why Clayton Homes won't be able to lend as much in the near future. Buffett obviously thinks the bailout was best for the country and for Berkshire in the long run, but he had to explain these numbers to shareholders (from the table on page 11/12 of the 2008 letter):

                                       Pre-Tax Earnings (millions)
                                         2008   2007
                                         ----   ----
        Manufactured-housing finance .... 206    526

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I have lost a lot of respect for Buffett over the past few months or so. When he invested in Sachs, then, essentially, lobbied congress for the bailout to boost up his investment: [http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/09/24/buffett- calls-b...](http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/09/24/buffett-calls- bailout-bill-the-right-thing/)

And then this article where he complains about how that very bailout is hurting one of his businesses??

It sounds very hypocritical to me and very selfish in a time when the economy is crumbling due to these /exact/ same kinds of selfish decisions on the part of financial warlocks -- not wizards -- warlocks.

Don't tell congress the bailout is the right thing, then complain that it hurts "good" businesses. If he believes what he said, he shouldn't have bought sachs and he shouldn't have been saying it's the right thing to do.

I guess that's the point. Buffett's word has lost value. What does he believe? Who is he trying to help? he bought oil at the top. His stock is at 2003 levels, half what it was at it's peak. BRK.A is worth less today than it was in 1998.

Look, I used to love Buffett. Read the Warren Buffett way, read this old yellow book he wrote in the 70's about value investing. Studied him. Modeled him.

And now... now I don't even know what he believes. His behavior of late is uncharacteristic of him and I'm disappointed in the legend.

<comment><USER5> _Look, I used to love Buffett. Read the Warren Buffett way, read this old yellow book he wrote in the 70's about value investing. Studied him. Modeled him._

What 'old yellow book' is that? As far as I know, Buffett hasn't written a book. You might be thinking of _The Intelligent Investor_ ; he's written the introduction for an edition of that one.

Regarding your larger point: I don't think anyone claims that the entire recession was due to the fact that loans were made or homes were bought. The recession was due to the prices at which these activities took place. It's not hypocritical to say that, for example, GE was overpriced at $30, but it's cheap at $10.

And I would take issue with the idea that the current crisis is due to anything 'selfish'. It's centered on a highly subsidized market, which was designed to give people homes, not make the government rich. The fact that this well-meaning behavior backfired so dramatically is only obvious in hindsight, or to anybody who reads much history at all.

<comment><USER4> You're right, I apologize. It wasn't written by him. It's called "Value Investing Made Easy" and is /about/ him, but not written by him. can't see when it was written. I checked it out from the library years ago and it was totally worn out, so my impression may not match the copyright.

here's a link: [http://www.amazon.com/Value-Investing-Made-Easy- Investment/d...](http://www.amazon.com/Value-Investing-Made-Easy- Investment/dp/0070388644/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1236093633&sr=8-1)

Google Book: [http://books.google.com/books?id=pIbGHfeURUEC&printsec=f...](http://books.google.com/books?id=pIbGHfeURUEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=value+investing+made+easy#PPR13,M1)

I would disagree with your comments though. I would say this crisis is about overvaluing assets, irrational exuberance fueled by greed, and improper lending practices by individuals and businesses that can easily pass the buck to someone in another country.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> As of yesterday, Warren Buffett is below cost basis for his investing career. Does that mean people will stop listening to Warren Buffett?</comment>


American Petroleum Institute launched a MM dollar campaign against climate facts - <AUTHOR> http://www.climatefiles.com/trade-group/american-petroleum-institute/1998-global-climate-science-communications-team-action-plan/ <comment><USER2> """

The environmental groups know they have been successful. Commenting after the Kyoto negotiations about recent media coverage of climate change, Tom Wathen, executive vice president of the National Environmental Trust, wrote:

"... As important as the extent of the coverage was the tone and tenor of it. In a change from just six months ago, most media stories no longer presented global warming as just a theory over which reasonable scientists could differ. Most stories described predictions of global warming as the position of the overwhelming number of mainstream scientists. That the environmental community had, to a great extent, settled the scientific issue with the U.S. media is the other great success that began perhaps several months earlier but became apparent during Kyoto."

"""

Those were the days. And now we are back to square one.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> see also: "Exxon Knew about Climate Change almost 40 years ago* [https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/exxon-knew- about-...](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/exxon-knew-about- climate-change-almost-40-years-ago/)</comment>


ObamaCare's death spiral, stage one: Denial - at-fates-hands http://nypost.com/2015/11/02/obamacares-death-spiral-stage-one-denial/ <comment><AUTHOR> I am going to be frank here. This issue is very close to my heart, due to harsh and difficult to overcome life experiences.

The ACA is what was possible at the time it was enacted. One party holding a blanket "no" position very seriously diluted what was actually possible. Most notably, the opposition wasn't over a better way. It was all about simply not beginning the process to improve. Today, that opposition is pointing to tepid results, and they are right about those results, while completely ignoring their reasoned and deliberate efforts to insure the results are tepid at best.

They desire failure in the hopes that we can return to ignoring this problem, not that they have a better vision, or can contribute in some other meaningful way.

Understanding that is important.

Really, the most meaningful aspect of the ACA is that it represents us getting started on health care reform long overdue. Popular support for the idea of improving health care runs consistently high. Our costs are roughly 2X above the second most expensive system in the world and are not sustainable. Most of us feel this impact, and the need to improve is obvious.

A handful of votes would have transformed the ACA from the tepid legislation is is today. One notable omission is public, "cost plus" insurance access, potentially a Medicare buy in plan. This would have done a lot to improve on price control and foster competition as well as experimentation with public, "cost plus" type delivery systems too. We could take care of a lot of people for a lot less money given just a little innovation in this space. Some nations get by on tech from the 70's and 80's and have overall outcomes comparable and, in some cases, better than our aggregate outcomes now.

Regardless of where you stand on all of that, the reality is we finally got started. 40 years overdue. And it's all a little bit better now in aggregate, and life changing for some 20 million plus Americans today.

Now that we have started, it's time to improve on the ACA, and the more we do and the sooner we do it, the better off we all will be. That's the real message.

Don't like the ACA? Great! Neither do I. We had to get started somewhere, and the ACA was that possible start, diluted only by people unwilling to actually start to do the work to improve this for everyone.

The question really isn't repeal or not. The question is how to continue to improve. Given the costs, we need to very seriously improve.

There is no death spiral. The ACA is working as intended and it's doing a lot of people real good in terms of access to health care and debt / bankruptcy related to health care. Had the ACA been law a few years before, I would have been able to avoid the choice between losing everything, or losing somebody I love.

Of course, she is still here, and that is good, but my financial life will never be the same. Just imagine all your gains, home, etc... gone at 40 something. That is what happens to people. And it still does, but the ACA puts some real options out there that really do help a lot of people avoid that scenario and doing that is really worth it. I know my life would be very different today had the ACA been law.

It's easy for people of means, or who have good insurance through their employer, etc... to rage on about the "injustice" of the ACA. Whatever. No joke there. I really am being dismissive, because the value of getting started on this problem in the USA really is as big of a deal as proponents make it out to be.

It's much harder to talk about fact based, data driven rational policy intended to improve the deplorable state of health care policy in the USA today. Quite frankly, it's not enough to repeal. The end game on that is unacceptable to the vast majority of Americans.

No, the real denial is over the great need to continue the journey we started with the ACA. A "replace" type proposal is plausible. An "improve" type proposal is likely possible and practical.

Repeal is a dead end with no meaningful end game for anyone really.</comment>


YUI 3.0 Preview Release 1 - <AUTHOR> http://yuiblog.com/blog/2008/08/13/yui3pr1/

<comment><USER2> Am I alone in thinking that YUI 3.0 as it stands is just a more verbose jQuery?

Don't get me wrong, I love YUI! I use it extensively, but mainly for its cross-browser widgets. I use jQuery to accomplish the majority of my selecting, iterating, manipulating, and the like. And as I was reading that preview, it seemed that everything that they displayed was eaiser and smaller to do and type in jQuery.

<comment><USER3> No, you're not alone. This is exactly what i said when i first say the examples.

But there's a reason for that. I use YUI all the time and think its excellent, but i think that its too verbose. And apparently a lot of people think that way too. So this is their approach to learn from jQuery's minimal syntax(which i love too)...

It definitely shows that they're listening to the community...

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> oooh, I love the new site updates too... very nice. I wonder if this includes any updates to YUI Grids? I've recently fallen in love it... not sure what else they could possibly offer tho.

I love jQuery but YUI has a reputation for cross-browser consistency that's hard to beat. A lot of the additional functionality you find with jQuery through plugins can be unreliable.</comment>


Show HN: MassMP Game: strategy, management, zombies, in browser, no register req - <AUTHOR> http://126.96.36.199/

<comment><USER2> Could you add a help section and remove the registration popup that comes every time or ask me for my password because its a little confusing with all the info on display at the start

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, I know that is missing some tutorials but you can see some videos in the meantime: [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc4XeQMV4vdLCVQ5Z7jXkAQ](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc4XeQMV4vdLCVQ5Z7jXkAQ) or the community: [https://plus.google.com/u/1/communities/10543793251523246971...](https://plus.google.com/u/1/communities/105437932515232469714)

The popup for password shows up when you are not registered and you attack another player. You can attack not owned planets while you are not registered.

What do you think about it so far?</comment></comment>


One-character domains available at Namecheap - <AUTHOR> https://blog.namecheap.com/40-one-letter-domains-available-for-under-600/ <comment><USER2> They have more single letter domains available then they list on that page. I thought about buying b.school, so clicked on it and came to a page that also listed b.rock and a few others.

I would've made the purchase and squatted on it, but it's 559 renewal a year which I can't handle.

Edit: mods should change the title of this submission to match the page.

</comment><comment><USER3> Buy one of these and see how you can't get any email of it validated. :{ (Seriously, email validation should stop.)

</comment><comment><USER4> Meh! —I think I'd rather have a 3-or-4-or-5 letter domain on a dot.com or dot.net than a one-letter one on dot.stupid-new-tld-no-one-cares-about</comment>


Inside the Chicago Police Department's secret budget - <AUTHOR> http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/chicago-police-department-civil-forfeiture-investigation/Content?oid=23728922 <comment><USER2> I've had my property stolen by the police twice. The first time was 14 years ago when I was falsely accused of stealing two cell phones. There was a video surveillance tape of the theft, two other guys clearly did it but the store employee tried to claim I knew them. He happened to be the boyfriend of an ex- girlfriend.

It took me a year to fight it and when the charges were finally dismissed, I got all my property back except my $500 cell phone. It was a basic misdemeanor charge but I was threatened with an unrelated felony if I didn't take a plea deal. I refused and the prosecutor moved to withdraw the case citing lack of evidence, preventing me from winning via acquittal.

The fact that I was falsely accused of stealing two cheap cell phones and then the police stole my phone instilled a permanent distrust in the police.

Then recently, I got involved in a dispute with a roommate and all my property was taken to a police warehouse. When I went to get it, the police officer told me there had been a robbery and all my stuff was stolen. About $6000 worth including priceless family items.

I'm a white guy who doesn't break the law, although I am a bit politically active and rebellious. What I have experienced by the police and justice system is enraging and disenfrancising. If I was surrounded by poverty and crime, and had no hope for the future, I could see myself becoming emboldened against the police and turn into a life of crime.

The way they treat people is wrong. The plea bargin system is a worse crime than most of the petty offenses people do. The way they treat you in jail is malicious and purposely antagonistic. It's a mild form of torture that doesn't rise to sensational levels but it perpetuates and sustains an atmosphere of distrust and hatred towards authority figures.

<comment><USER3> "The way they treat you in jail is malicious and purposely antagonistic. It's a mild form of torture that doesn't rise to sensational levels but it perpetuates and sustains an atmosphere of distrust and hatred towards authority figures."

I was taken into jail (a holding cell in a county prison) for failing to pay a fine for a non-moving violation, and sat next to murderers, wife beaters and cop-killers awaiting transfer.

When I asked for a method to remove my contacts which were causing me significant pain and discomfort (they are NOT over nights), I was told "deal with it, this is jail".

Purposely antagonistic and mildly torturous is definitely their intent.

But I don't blame them, based on whom I was surrounded by. I wouldn't give an inch to the guys laughing and joking about beating up their girlfriends, her kids, the cops, etc, either.

<comment><USER4> I do blame them.

You're in a cage. They are outside the cage. You ask. They have no incentive to comply. The power dynamics are not in your favor and that's why they can treat you poorly and get away with it.

Poor treatment in jails/prison helps no one. Everyone who goes to jail is not a cop-killer or wife beater. Even those people do not deserve poor treatment.

I get it. It's easier to generalize then treat each individual as a special snowflake. However, some people would rather kill themselves than go to prison. This also makes the job of police officer more dangerous if people would rather die than surrender knowing all that awaits for them is torture (sleep deprivation, disgusting food, forced labor, isolation, confined spaces, rape etc.).

We do not treat criminals as human beings. We offer them no path to be rehabilitated. They cannot vote, cannot get jobs easily and are social outcasts. You'd be surprised by the amount of people who committed non- violent, victimless crimes and had their lives ruined forever by this broken system.

I understand the police officer is not exactly a social worker. They are a cog in the system but they are not helping, not attempting to improve/change the system and are to blame (along with prosecutor, the justice system and authorities in general).

It boils down to one thing: They have POWER and you don't. They play a role in maintaining the status quo, you don't. Therefore, they are to blame.

Sorry for the rant, it boils my blood when people with no power make excuses for the poor treatment they received from people with actual power.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Civil forfeiture, plea bargains and losing the ability to vote are all great detriments to our society. They prevent those who are involved in crimes from being able to get back on their feet and show an increasing number of those in the justice system don't believe in rehabilitation. It's labelling theory in practice and it's the reason the US has the highest incarceration and repeat incarceration rate of the western world.

Plea bargains reward disloyalty and often allow some of the worst people a ticket out of their crimes by implicating someone else. It's just a game and prosecutors want their stats to go up, no matter what is good for society.

I don't even want to touch the sex offender registry. I'll just say this. Australia's registry is confidential.

<comment><USER6> > sex offender registry

If we as a society believe the person is still a danger, then we shouldn't let them out, ever. If that's not the case, then anything past their incarceration / parole is blatantly unfair.

<comment><USER7> > If we as a society believe the person is still a danger, then we shouldn't > let them out, ever.

Well, no.

After multiple DUIs, someone can have their license taken away permanently. The justice system has a long history of restricting peoples behavior who are (a) out of jail, but (b) still a danger to themselves or others.

<comment><USER8> Long history doesn't make it right

<comment><USER9> According to the courts, it makes it legal.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> "Law enforcement took more stuff from people than burglars did last year"

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/11/23/cops-...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/11/23/cops- took-more-stuff-from-people-than-burglars-did-last-year/)

Who, exactly, do we need protection from?

<comment><USER10> This is one argument that many anarchists make; the truth is that (at the very least) an order of magnitude more people were killed by their own governments in the 20th century than were killed by their fellow citizens. Hobbes was wrong.

<comment><USER11> Is it accurate to imply that the Soviets and Chinese had any sense of ownership of their governments? Especially with the forced starvation of Ukraine, it was practically a foreign occupation (this is muddy, Kyiv is a historic center of Russia).

I don't think it's a refutation of Hobbes that a dictator could seize control of a state and perpetrate mass murder.

<comment><USER10> Hobbes made the case that a totalitarian dictator was the least likely to perpetrate mass murder; according to his ideas, the democracies would be more violent.

<comment><USER7> Hobbes was wrong.

[http://popten.net/2010/05/top-ten-most-evil-dictators-of- all...](http://popten.net/2010/05/top-ten-most-evil-dictators-of-all-time-in- order-of-kill-count/)

No democratic country has killed millions of it's own citizens. Even Hitler waited until he changed the law to give himself dictatorial powers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> _" The judge said, 'I can't give you back your car, because it would be right back on the road with drugs.' " (Karkula declined to comment for this story.)_

This is why civil forfeiture should be banned. I'm still of the opinion that any ticket money should be handed over to a superfund with strict rules on spending never to return to the police or judicial coffers.

<comment><USER12> Why not all go to Charity?

Anything else is a conflict of interests. Send it to an out of state charity. I am fine with taking a car used in a crime away, but you can't give the money to the person who took the car nor the court that decides..

<comment><USER10> There are already a number of arrangements where corporations can pay penalties to 'approved' charities instead of the regulator as part or all of an agreement; these deals have been problematic, as the government officials appear to be using the arrangements to favor interest groups and potential future employers.

I am not saying your idea is a bad one, but I think it is useful to know where the potential problems lie.

<comment><USER6> Its that part of government's version of giving a contract to a company then being hired by said company after leaving government. Both should be illegal.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Hi, I'm one of the people who worked on some of the data visualization for this story. The people behind this worked very hard and did an excellent job. I would also like to point out, this is why police transparency is very important in modern society.

<comment><USER14> The outside blue field on the pie chart has no title when you hover over it (purchases under $5000).

And having the text be upside down for half of the chart is pretty bad (another way to do it: [http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2015/07/pie- chart-...](http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2015/07/pie- chart-234234234.jpg.662x0_q70_crop-scale.jpg))

This comment is meant in good faith, it's an important story and topic and visualizing the impact is very useful. I appreciate the work that went into it.

edit: I just noticed you can click on the fields, very cool!

<comment><USER13> Thanks for the suggestions, I didn't think about flipping the text for that half of the chart but that's a good idea. I'm not sure about the blank label but I'll look into that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Shown here are two good reasons for why people don't respect the police anymore. They take your assets due to a subtle association to a crime. They spend it without oversight on tools of mass surveillance. Ultimately, both of these things exacerbate crime. Quite an occupying force nowadays.

<comment><USER16> There are many police departments that should be brought up on RICO charges.

</comment></comment><comment> crooked-v I find it absurd that civil forfeiture would be "reformed" instead of recognized as blatantly unconstitutional.

<comment><USER12> If you are found with a big pile of drugs and 100k in cash.. it is not unreasonable to take the cash away. Otherwise you would be allowed to profit from an illegal activity.

Giving that money to the guy doing the arresting or the court doing the trial is the problem....

<comment><USER7> I'll upvote because you're not entirely wrong. It's entirely reasonable to require that the proceeds of criminal activity be taken from the criminals. Whether it's a stolen car, drugs, or money made from selling a stolen car and drugs. It's all (mostly) similar.

The devil is in the details, though. The rampant "theft by cop" is where you have money, and they take it. No charges, much less conviction.

It's "guilty until proven innocent", which violates one of the fundamental principles of our justice system. It's outright corruption.

<comment><USER17> > Whether it's a stolen car, drugs, or money made from selling a stolen car > and drugs. It's all (mostly) similar.

It's not that similar IMO. Stolen cars have owners to whom you can return the property, or litigants who can sue you to replace it. But selling contraband, unlike theft, doesn't have a victim that can be compensated by returning the proceeds. The government steps in and declares themselves the victims of this crime and claims the proceeds.

<comment><USER18> So far so good.

The problem is they do it before convicting you of anything.

<comment><USER19> Actually, worse: they seize your assets so that you cannot afford to mount a solid defense at your trial. It's a lot easier to convince someone to take a plea (i.e. confess falsely under duress) if they are bankrupt and destitute and can't afford proper counsel.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> "Civil forfeiture" is theft. It's also plainly unconstitutional.

<comment><USER21> Except, it's plainly not. Seriously. It's been around since the 1600's and every supreme court that has ever existed in the US has found it constitutional.

You can claim they are all wrong, it's literally not unconstitutional, because in our system, that's what the supreme court decides.

Now, there are more reasonable arguments that some of the current approaches do not comport with due process, but that's not as blanket a statement as you are making here.

<comment><USER20> It's unjust, particularly in it's current implementation, and it completely circumvents due-process.

At least in the US, which wasn't a nation in 1600, this is a prohibition-era deterrent that was reinstated by Reagan to punish drug users, and has been more currently used to fund law enforcement agencies in an astonishingly offensive manner.

<comment><USER21> Sure, i'd agree it's unjust in _some_ of the current implementation (there are something like 800+ federal statutes that have some form of asset forfeiture, so you'd need to be more specific which you think are unjust)

While i think, policy wise, it's as dumb as the next guy, I'm just pointing out this is being painted with too broad a brush from a constitutional standpoint

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Civil forfeiture must end. But until it can be ended, the least we can do is to make certain that any forfeited funds do NOT go to the police departments which hold power over deciding these cases. The funds should go to the federal government so that there is no local incentive to unjustly seize assets from citizens. That much should be obvious, in a democracy, right?

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Governor Brown signed a massive civil forfeiture reform for California today.

[https://www.aclunc.org/news/gov-brown-signs-historic-bill- re...](https://www.aclunc.org/news/gov-brown-signs-historic-bill-rein-asset- forfeiture-abuse-paving-way-other- states?utm_source=social&utm_campaign=news&utm_medium=facebook)

</comment><comment><USER23> Woah, seems crazy that the police can keep something that was technically stolen property and not return it to the original owner. How can a judge argue that it will just be used to transfer drugs again, it's not the drug offender's property and she wasn't accessory... That's not relevant to the case, the owner isn't using it to traffic drugs.

IANAL, just confused.

<comment><USER24> I'm also perplexed about this. Anyone's car could be stolen, and then used to commit any number of crimes. Maybe the woman in the article didn't report the car as stolen?

<comment><USER23> maybe, because it was her own son and she didn't want him to face more jailtime? I thought it didn't matter though, I thought the owner could choose not to prosecute, or tell them to drop the case.. or maybe that's on a state- by-state level.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I wonder if there are any statistics on race vs. forfeiture.

<comment><USER26> My interest in race here is that these practices were probably inflicted on blacks _first_, probably without white objection.

It's decades later and the laws that allowed police to terrorize blacks are gradually being extended to all races. I worry that this pattern will repeat itself.

<comment><USER9> This is how the vast majority of freedom-limiting laws have been implemented in the US.

Marriage licensing, gun control, and drug prohibition immediately spring to mind. Gun control in particular is a topic I'm invested in - see JPFO's video "No Guns for Negroes": [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RaX3EM- fsc8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RaX3EM-fsc8)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> This is why we need to stop only caring about the presidential election and focus on local politics.

</comment><comment><USER28> All the other reasons in the thread why civil asset forfeiture is bad aside, it seems to me like a cood vehicle for corruption, too.

Imagine I run a drug cartel and want to make a deal with some corrupt cops. How can I pay them without raising suspicion? Simple:

\- Open a new bank account and transfer the payment to it;

\- Given an "anonymous" hint to the cops that the bank account is connected to the cartel; (indeed it is)

\- The corrupt cops could seize the money using asset forfeiture and even make a nice PR show how it allows them to make progress in the war against drugs...

</comment><comment><USER29> $19000 for one month's use of cellphones? Sounds like corruption to me.

<comment><USER30> Nah, Chicago's a big Verizon town.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> "Routine> 18.6 million"

Holy crap.

</comment><comment><USER32> Why is this on HN? Who cares how Americans abuse their poor? Whats that to do with technology?</comment>


End-to-end encrypted email, based in Switzerland. - <AUTHOR> https://protonmail.ch/

<comment><USER2> HushMail, IIRC, proposed almost the same thing and in the end they had the keys to unlock your mailboxes.

</comment><comment><USER3> Seems interesting, have signed for Beta invite.</comment>


Project HAKMEM [Oldschool MIT] - <AUTHOR> http://www.inwap.com/pdp10/hbaker/hakmem/hakmem.html Hard problems for real nerds (like me) :-D <comment><USER2> See also: <http://www.hackersdelight.org/>

<comment><USER3> Brilliant book, picked it up not long ago. So far, my favorite thing I have learned is on page 14 - the snoob function.

Snoob stands for "same number of one bits". Essentially, if x is an integer whose binary representation contains n one-bits, snoob(x) will return the next smallest integer which is also represented using n one-bits. The obvious application here is iterating through all subsets of a certain size. The function is as follows:

unsigned int snoob(unsigned int x) {

        unsigned int smallest, ripple, ones = 0;

        smallest = x & -x;

        ripple = x + smallest;

        ones = x ^ ripple;

        ones = (ones >> 2) / smallest;

        return ripple | ones;

}

Given a set containing N elements, to generate all subsets of size K you initialize a bitmask to (1 << K) - 1 then perform a snoob N Choose K times to get all the bitmasks you need.

(Disclaimer: Although neat, I've never found a use for this outside of programming competitions)</comment></comment>


Toshiba has open-sourced GridDB, a Scalable In-Memory KVS - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/griddb/griddb_nosql <comment><USER2> Is there any piece of software that suffers more from Not Invented Here syndrome than Key-Value stores?

<comment><USER3> You could say that about programming languages, but they are so useful there end up being a lot of variants.

I searched for a shared memory key value store high and low for interprocess communication and the closest thing I found was WhiteDB. WhiteDB is pretty great, but its concurrency is done through locking and it is very unfortunately GPL licensed, which makes it very niche. (BTW a shared memory key value store for IPC is AMAZING).

There are a ton of key value stores out there though amazingly enough I'm still excited when I see announcements because I haven't found one that is what I want.

<comment><USER4> Why don't you use lmdb ?

<comment><USER3> That was the first one I tried actually. It was a complete nightmare to get to work on windows and its performance on windows was dismal, as in hundreds of writes per second instead of millions. It was a colossal waste of time.

<comment><USER5> There's your problem. You're using Windows /jk

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Toshiba's announcement in Japanese: [http://www.toshiba.co.jp/cl/news/news201602_01.htm](http://www.toshiba.co.jp/cl/news/news201602_01.htm)

Or at least Google translate makes me believe it is.

</comment><comment><USER7> From the source, this looks like a production code dump. Anybody knows the status of this ?</comment>


Math lectures online, Not video - <AUTHOR> http://inperc.com/wiki/index.php?title=Category:Courses

<comment><USER2> hey pixcavator!!i'am impressed with your cources.But what exactly is computer vision? i'am a newbie to this.i recently developed an interest in math</comment>


Review my startup: PushLayer.com - <AUTHOR> http://www.pushlayer.com

<comment><AUTHOR> The service is our attempt at making sending push notifications to iOS devices easier. The biggest complaint I've always had as an iOS developer is debugging notifications that don't go through. We've built the site to show every notification you send, along with a status and (soon) extended information from Apple.

A couple of questions:

1\. Does the per-notification pricing make sense? I always felt something like "active device tokens" was confusing, whereas this is paying for actual usage. 2\. Is the documentation clear enough to get started with?

This is our MVP. We're working on server-side libraries to make sending notifications easier along with further debugging tools. Thanks for any and all feedback!</comment>


ClassPass Is Squeezing Studios to the Point of Death - <AUTHOR> https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/xgqgaw/classpass-is-squeezing-studios-to-the-point-of-death <comment><USER2> I seen first hand a lot of free first month offers from them which might mean ClassPass _itself_ might be in a squeeze too. Or perhaps getting its numbers up for an IPO.</comment>


Massimo Vignelli, celebrated designer, dies at 83 - <AUTHOR> http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/massimo-vignelli-celebrated-designer-whose-work-included-nyc-subway-map-dies-at-83/2014/05/27/6cd685aa-e5b7-11e3-a86b-362fd5443d19_story.html

<comment><AUTHOR> "There are too many people with no education in graphic design. And because they have access to computers, there's no end to what they create — signage, newsletters and so forth," he once told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. "It's pollution! They have no idea whatsoever about the dignity of type. If they were pharmaceuticals companies, we'd all be poisoned. But we are poisoned anyhow, visually."

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> "We despise the culture of obsolescence, the culture of waste, the cult of the ephemeral," reads a sort of design manifesto titled "The Vignelli Canon." "We detest the demand of temporary solutions, the waste of energies and capital for the sake of novelty. We are for a Design that lasts, that responds to people's needs and to people's wants."

</comment><comment><USER2> Other thread here <[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7805532>](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7805532>)</comment>


Show HN: A Clojure implementation of logic programming language in SICP - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/jdormit/sicp-logic <comment><USER2> Very nice work!

Reminds me of "The Reasoned Schemer" by Daniel Friedman.

<comment><USER3> Very nice indeed! Fun to see this implementation in Clojure direct from SICP. Someday I hope somebody completes SICP in Clojure. AFAICT it's been attempted many times but none have finished.

Btw, miniKanren from Reasoned Schemer has long been available in Clojure as core.logic (with some minor differences). [https://github.com/clojure/core.logic](https://github.com/clojure/core.logic)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Nice!

The direct use of symbols makes the data set look unlike most Clojure code, but it's really pretty handy in this case. I'll have to remember that.

Btw, love the joke names from the (original) data set:

Alyssa P Hacker, Cy D Fect, Lem E Tweakit, Louis Reasoner, and Aull DeWitt

Cute. :)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! My favorite parts of the sample dataset are the Boston area names - since SICP was written and taught at MIT its authors were really familiar with the area, and as a Boston native I particularly appreciate the (still-used) joke names Slumerville and Swellesley (for Somerville and Wellesley respectively).

<comment><USER3> I enjoyed those too.. for example, Onion (Union) Square, not too far from where I live.

I talked for a while with Sussman at a Clojure conference last year, partly to let him know I enjoyed his presentation, but also to ask how his co-author was doing. I had Hal as a mentor for a short while in the 90s (less than a year) but it was a real boost to my career. Oddly, I never cracked SICP until a decade later.

<comment><AUTHOR> Are you the Mark C. who organizes the monthly Clojure meetup in Kendall square?</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Apple: iPhone SDK officially available in February - <AUTHOR> http://www.apple.com/startpage/

<comment><USER2> Interesting news -- Apple promises release of iPhone SDK, Nokia introduces S60 touch interface:

[http://www.engadget.com/2007/10/16/nokias-s60-touch- interfac...](http://www.engadget.com/2007/10/16/nokias-s60-touch-interface- demonstrated/) [http://www.allaboutsymbian.com/news/item/6089_S60_Touch_Inte...](http://www.allaboutsymbian.com/news/item/6089_S60_Touch_Interface_Launched.php)

Related?

(Don't know if S60 means anything to people in the US, but it is the major smartphone platform in Europe and Asia)

</comment><comment><USER3> Great! I've been attempting to develop iPhone applications using the unofficial toolchain, but it hasn't been easy considering the complete lack of documentation and smorgasboard of new/different frameworks. While, in some respects, it's very similar to programming on Mac OS X with Objective-C and some of the same Cocoa frameworks, the interface frameworks are completely different.

It will be nice to get an Apple supported solution.

</comment><comment><USER4> I knew it was just a matter of time before Apple opened up the phone for outside developers. I don't understand why everyone blamed Apple for trying to monopolize the phone. When a company just enters the mobile business you have to cut them some slack and give them credit for doing a few things well instead of trying to cram everything into the initial release.

<comment><AUTHOR> It remains to be seen on exactly how "open" the iPhone will be with the official SDK, however. I will give Apple the benefit of the doubt and expect that they will be hands-off and let developers distribute and monetize their iPhone applications as they choose.

But as several reports have indicated, Apple may use iTunes to maintain control over app approval, distribution, and purchases. I really hope this doesn't end up being the case.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is great. I think the capabilities of the iphone touch screen system are gonna make for some great gaming possibilities that we haven't seen before. I know I've got some ideas already at least.

</comment><comment><USER6> Just pointing out why the GPLv3 is nothing but a pointless complication: as long as your app doesn't come installed on the iPhone by default, it can be licensed GPLv3; Apple can sign the binary, and, as the iPhone is the only platform your app is made for, you bypass the whole 'tivoization' clause.

</comment><comment><USER7> Loopt is going to have to go on the offensive for the next few months if it wants to remain the top player in its space once the barriers to entry are lowered. I wonder how this will shake out.

<comment><AUTHOR> I just hope Apple is fair on whos apps they permit. Assuming anyone can build an application provided it passes certain criteria, there will be definitely be a frenzy of 3rd party app development. This could be a great opportunity for mobile software startups.

<comment><USER8> It sounded like they're just verifying identity and nothing further. My guess is that it'll be implemented by requiring an SSL certificate signed by a trusted authority.

<comment><AUTHOR> Rumors have it that Apple is looking to emulate T-Mobile's Sidekick distribution platform with iTunes. Presumably they have employed the help of some of the Sidekick developers for this.

With the Sidekick service you first have to prove that you are a developer, and they give you a key which unlocks the phone for development access. When you have developed a stable app, you submit it to through an approval process and then the application is made available on the Sidekick/T-Mobile app site.

If this is the case with Apple, then they could control app approval, distribution, and even pricing through iTunes. It will likely be tightly controlled.

<comment><USER8> I think they know better than that. You can do pretty well on Inkling just by shorting every rumor about Apple.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I had just read this on an investment board a few minutes ago. This rocks.

</comment><comment><USER10> The benevolent dictator shows more signs of goodwill towards his subjects.</comment>


The revolution of 2014's summer vacation abroad. - <AUTHOR> https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/tastyeasy/tastyeasy-for-android-and-ios With the international tourism market on their minds, two Brazilian siblings have put together a team of professionals from Brazil and the U.S. to create a mobile application to facilitate the life of any tourist while traveling abroad. With years of travel experience, Leonardo and Andrea Mascarenhas realized that with a simple mobile application, they could help tourists and business travelers to control one of the biggest difficulties visitors encounter while abroad: ordering great food. Anyone who travels abroad often faces uncomfortable and stressful situations, because they do not speak the local language, local businesses are not prepared to server foreigners, or they are unfamiliar with the local cuisine. As you can see, there are multiple sources of stress, but very few ways around it.
With the goal to improve travelers experience while abroad, they created along with designer Joshu "Tastyeasy", a mobile application that combines restaurant menu translation services with sharing capability. The goal is to translate every restaurant menu and enable travelers to control their dining and overall experience while abroad using a smartphone. Another key feature is that users will be able to review feedback provided by others, such as which are the best rated restaurants and dishes in town, etc. <comment><AUTHOR> Hey, guys! We need some feedback on our project! We are trying to get the word out! We would like to get to know how people feel about our idea! Thank you for your time! Tastyeasy Team.</comment>


Have you ever had a conversation with a banner ad? - <AUTHOR>

Like many web programmers, I spend a large portion of my day coding, thinking about, or looking at banner ads. However, I have seen very few banner ads that are as engaging as the Target Ad on top our new site, Fast Co.Labs. In fact, I think it deserves mention, so I'm writing about it. It reminds me a bit of ELIZA, if you remember that? http://www.fastcolabs.com/accelerator/ <comment><USER2> Wot?

What talking ad?</comment>


Meet The 'Assassination Market' Creator Who's Crowdfunding Murder With Bitcoins - <AUTHOR> http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/11/18/meet-the-assassination-market-creator-whos-crowdfunding-murder-with-bitcoins/

<comment><USER2> A simple solution for the feds presents itself: offer a large award for the site's founder.

</comment><comment><USER3> "Kuwabatake Sanjuro" roughly translates as "mulberry field thirty year old". The Kuwabatake Sanjuro from _Yojimbo_ could cut a kimono off of a man's back without drawing blood, and hit leaves blowing in the wind with a throwing knife.

On the other hand Ogami Itto had the ability to throw swords.

</comment><comment><USER4> "Creepy" seems like a massive understatement.

It serves to highlight the creator's priorities though. Someone who believes in the cryptoanarchic ideal to such an extent that they're willing to get in bed with murderers. I understand that they believe that the ends justify the means, but were that the case, why would you have to purchase the services of assassins to achieve it?

The line between cryptosnarchism and is getting _very_ narrow.

</comment><comment><USER5> Seems like more negative campaigns related to bit coins are getting prominence in mainstream press recently. Similar to what was observed during Wikileaks, Snowden etc time.

These articles slowly create that distrust among the public for bit coin. All they remember when thinking about bit coin would be silkroad and assassinations.

<comment><USER6> Well... the articles aren't exactly making the association between Bitcoin and illegal activity up. Bitcoin does seem tailor made to facilitate extralegal trade, and silk road was a thing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER2> The method of payment is flawed. An encrypted file with the date of murder is presented as proof that you knew the date beforehand, thus are the murderer. But anybody can submit any number of such files near the likely date of the hit; its trivial to forge them.

<comment><USER7> I am not familiar with this particular site, but the general idea of an "assassination market" is that such a market is "actually" a dead pool where all participants are guessing when somebody will die, and _anybody_ who guesses correctly gets the payoff (or a share of the payoff, if there are multiple winners).

A dead pool 'becomes' an assassination market when the dead pool participants realize that by being an assassin, they can accurately guess when somebody will die.

So, in an assassination market set up this way, the prize does not necessarily go to the assassin. It just goes to whoever correctly guessed the date of death. If the assassin puts money down on April 15th, and I do as well, then the assassin would get half the money and I would get the other half, even though I had nothing to do with the assassination _(besides in part 'funding' it. Also "half" assumes that both I and the assassin put the same amount on April 15th...)_. The problem of other people besides the assassin winning money isn't actually a problem, it is just the system working as intended.

<comment><USER2> Nope this is a so-called anarchist setting up a murder-for-hire site. The date-encrypted file is supposed to prove you did it, because you knew the date.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> What effect will near-future government quantum computers have on bitcoin's anonymity? Are all the folks that have used bitcoins for illegal transactions in for a rude surprise?

<comment><USER9> What anonymity? The transaction history is public, and doesn't need a quantum computer to analyze, any institution with available time can do stuff like that.

The only truly anonymous bitcoin way is if you mine some bitcoin and spend it right away without it ever being related to any other data about you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'm confused. What's to keep Sanjuro with absconding with everything he's holding in escrow?</comment>


Of Fruit Flies and Drones - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/13/opinion/13iht-edcohen.html

<comment><AUTHOR> "P.W. Singer, the author of an important new book called _Wired for War,_ told me that, 'We are at a breakpoint in history. The U.S. air force this year will train more unmanned system pilots than fighter and bomber pilots combined. And, as Bill Gates has noted, robotics are now where computers were back in 1980.'

"Now you might think that a 'pilot' sitting behind a computer bank in Nevada blowing away people in Afghanistan is less liable to combat stress than a soldier in a unit deployed there, but Singer said the opposite has often proved the case."</comment>


Scooter use is rising in major cities. So are trips to the emergency room - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/scooter-use-is-rising-in-major-cities-so-are-trips-to-the-emergency-room/2018/09/06/53d6a8d4-abd6-11e8-a8d7-0f63ab8b1370_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.e7f44251dd91 <comment><USER2> Victims of scooter crashes live to tell the tale.

3,613,732 victims of car crashes in the USA did not.</comment>