Walmart stumbles with its 'last mile' package delivery plan - <AUTHOR> https://www.reuters.com/article/us-walmart-lastmile-workers-insight/walmart-discovers-why-the-last-mile-is-the-hardest-idUSKBN1KK0DD <comment><USER2> Let's list what Walmart was offering the pilot program volunteers: \- Free TV or iPad for signing up (hock it* for ~$100 I guess) \- $2 per package delivery (average 3-5 deliveries per night) \- 54 cents for fuel per mile \- Extra hour of OT pay (average pay $11 per hour)

All of which the story says adds up to $15.40 for each 10 miles of five packages, not counting OT. After a week one employee said she got $100 after ~12 deliveries.

All so you can spend an extra 30 minutes at your job waiting for someone else's groceries, which you will then spend 2 hours to deliver, by hand, to their (assuming) nice looking house with their nice looking family, as you then trudge back to your apartment and sit on your Walmart couch, in your Walmart clothes, eating your Walmart food and watching your Walmart TV.

If that's not depressing I don't know what is.

*edited for typo

<comment><USER3> This is kind of a strange comment. I don't think a lot of HN folks have worked in last mile logistics, but $2/package is average to above average. Amazon typically pays around $1.50 for Prime packages and I would say it isn't just the upper middle class that is buying from Amazon at this point. If people don't pay for shipping, there will be a human cost. If people are willing to pay for some aspect of value-add (actually coming to your door, caring about retry attempts, caring about lost packages, caring about how well the people involved are treated) this would change fast. Anyone who tries to go slower than peak speed or do it ethically gets crushed by someone doing it faster or in a shadier way, because people refuse to pay for shipping.

<comment><USER4> > but $2/package is average to above average. Amazon typically pays around > $1.50 for Prime packages

That just means working for Amazon is even more abysmal. Last mile logistics is shitty to human beings period.

<comment><USER5> I know absolutely nothing about last mile logistics, but it's strange to me that (at least in the U.S.) we literally have someone going to practically every single house and business 6 days a week (postal carrier), and yet this is still a problem. I would think leveraging the human already coming to house every day would be the most efficient?

<comment><USER6> Look up FedEx SmartPost, UPS Mail Innovations, DHL eConmerce, etc. these are all companies who "work share" with USPS. They deliver the package to the post office and USPS leverages their existing network of mail carriers to do the "last mile" delivery.

The problem with these services is that they are very slow. The hand-off at the post office adds a day. Additionally these are considered economy services without a delivery guarantee by the carriers so they will wait until they have a full trucks worth of these before sending them on a leg.

Wal-Mart is trying to get to same day delivery and bringing everything to the local post office for them to deliver would add at least a day.

Furthermore those USPS economies suffer a bit once packages exceed 1 lb. it's often too big for a letter carrier to take on their route - so they'd be delivered through the priority mail network which is often a different driver than your daily mail man and does not deliver to every house every day.

<comment><USER7> Given that package delivery is where USPS can profit, I wonder why Amazon/Walmart don't lobby to modernize USPS so it can cover the use-cases - why not deliver multiple times per day? There's no greater economy of scale than "delivering everything to everyone".

I mean, that's a rhetorical question. Obviously they'd both prefer to monopolize a for-profit alternative to USPS... but it seems short-sighted

<comment><USER8> There's really no hope of modernizing USPS. The political cost of substantial investment into USPS is higher than the actual cost of capital. If they want to control the quality of their service, it can't involve USPS.

<comment><USER9> Can you provide a citation? My understanding is that the USPS is constrained by conservatives trying to break them financially by requiring pension funding requirements drastically beyond what is considered reasonable based on their workforce. Therefore, USPS could modernize when Congress is replaced with politicians not working on dismantling the institution through legislation.

"Back in 2006, Congress imposed a huge and unprecedented mandate requiring that the Postal Service pre-fund future retiree health benefits for the next 75 years and do so within a decade – something no other public agency or private company is required to do."

"As a direct result of pre-funding, USPS has reached its $15 billion debt limit. In 2005, the Postal Service was debt free. Today, it holds $15 billion in debt – all of it traceable to pre-funding. By forcing the Postal Service to use all of its borrowing capacity making these annual payments, Congress has prevented it from investing in new infrastructure, products and services to better serve American homes and businesses."

[http://www.deliveringforamerica.com/infographic-the-truth- ab...](http://www.deliveringforamerica.com/infographic-the-truth-about-postal- finances/)

<comment><USER10>
      In 2005, the Postal Service was debt free. Today, it holds
      $15 billion in debt – all of it traceable to pre-funding.

I'm curious to know more about this.

If I've promised an employee $X of retirement benefits based on years they've already worked, am I "debt free" by the definition of that article, or do I have $X of debt?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I think people forget how entrenched and relatively good the existing package delivery services are. USPS has a key to my apartment building, so they can just show up and drop off packages hassle-free. UPS does not have that key, but they successfully break in every day and leave packages for my building with no problems. (Spent some time not working and they didn't even ring my buzzer in an attempt to get in, the packages were just magically in the common area. No doubt the driver knows the friendly neighbor that is happy to let him in and do his thing, and knows that the three buildings owned by my landlord have the same key/super, so can do 3 buildings worth of deliveries with one buzzer press.)

Meanwhile, the upstarts just don't do this. Whoever Amazon contracts out to (is it still LaserShip?) just doesn't care about attempting to break into my building. They show up at 9pm and ring the buzzer, then leave if I don't go downstairs and open the door quickly enough. They are getting better, though, as I've seen some random LaserShip packages laying around in the common area. But I still think "shipped via USPS, this will arrive" and "shipped by LaserShip, better go pick it up at B&H and cancel the Amazon order".

But anyway, expecting random Walmart employees to have the skills necessary to circumvent pesky locks is kind of unreasonable. When you do it every day for years you probably develop a process that works for each building you deliver to... but when it's a one-off thing for an extra $3... the customer probably isn't going to get their package. The customer that doesn't get their package is probably going to order from Amazon. Sorry, Walmart...

<comment><USER12> I'm with you on UPS, but among "existing package delivery services" I find FedEx to be pretty shit overall. At each commercial location I've had in multiple counties, they have delivered at a giant range of times (e.g. one day 9:20 AM and the next day 5:20 PM) with a lot of different drivers and about a 20% chance that they're busy today so they won't even come around (i.e. the business was open all day and there is no tag on the door) but they'll still flip the status to "customer not present". I've bitched to Amazon about using FedEx a lot, and now it seems they don't use FedEx for me very much anymore... of course other stores haven't gotten the message.

<comment><USER13> I suspect that FedEx's delivery is so crap precisely because they get a lot of the Amazon business.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> It's amusing to me how out of touch executives are. Some executive makes a decision for this and everyone is too scared to tell them it's a stupid idea.

This happens where I work, too.

They could have had the employees deliver for 10 hours of their 40 hour shift so they aren't exhausted while driving. Have the employees do it during the shift rather than after which is likely during rush hour. Give employees consistent routes they are familiar with. If there's a package to deliver ok that route...great. if not, then do the regular associates job. Company vehicles to reduce burden on your employees who make $11 an hour. Buy some Chevy Bolt that can be charged at Walmart. It's also hatchback so store lots of stuff. Plaster Walmart ads to increase visibility of the service. A clean looking new car will increase branding.

This is the largest retailer in the world...don't act like a poor startup.

<comment><USER15> > Some executive makes a decision for this and everyone is too scared to tell > them it's a stupid idea.

Or the executive tells them I am the Big Boss and this will definitely work.

<comment><USER16> And everyone is to scared to say, "yes you're the big boss, but this idea is still dumb and won't work. Let's at least go on linkedin and try to poach at least one executive from amazon flex."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> It's ironic that Walmart has such a huge logistics problem in this area, because IMO Walmart and Sam's Club have insanely good logistics when it comes to getting product to their actual stores. They are by far in the best position to do grocery delivery, if only they could figure out 'last mile' delivery.

The vast majority of people have rapidly moved to purchasing things from Amazon, and this leaves Walmart in the dust. Yes, fakes are an issue etc. but most people don't know that. All they know is that Amazon is easy, they _think_ it is cheap, and that Amazon will resolve any issues they have when e.g. getting bad items.

Amazon historically (and still kinda does) have a problem with getting perishables logistically to last-mile delivery points, whereas Walmart and Sam's Club have already figured this out and done it for a very long time. There are TONS of places in the U.S. that do not have a Whole Foods nearby, but have a Walmart or Sam's Club just a mile or so away.

But Amazon is quickly catching up with its acquisition of Whole Foods, etc., and Walmart seems incapable of letting consumers just pay more to actually get this service like Amazon or Instacart do.

<comment><USER18> >Amazon historically (and still kinda does) have a problem with getting perishables logistically to last-mile delivery points, whereas Walmart and Sam's Club have already figured this out and done it for a very long time.

I don't think getting groceries to store shelves counts as "last mile." The entire problem with last mile is that instead of delivering a truckload singular location, one is many delivering tiny shipments to scattered, irregular locations, which is substantially more time, labor, and fuel expensive, not to mention logistically more difficult.

<comment><USER17> Totally, that was poor wording on my part. Instead of "last-mile delivery points" I should have said "warehouses (or stores) where last-mile delivery shipments originate". By purchasing Whole Foods, they solved a large portion of this, but the number of Whole Foods stores still is tiny in comparison to Walmart/Sam's Club (I think, I couldn't find numbers sadly)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> If you think last-mile logistics is interesting, come check out Picnic in the Netherlands. We're an online-only supermarket. We do milkman style deliveries, where we have a few fixed times per day that the customer can choose to have their delivery (20 minute window), allowing us to make the routing efficient and fast, enough that we can do free deliveries. This overall seems to be working better than Walmart's approach.

We've got a pretty solid tech team, and always looking for more people to join. [https://blog.picnic.nl/](https://blog.picnic.nl/)

<comment><USER20> Had the pleasure to interact with PicNic CTO in their past job and met PicNic tech team at various conferences in Europe: top talent with a great team spirit working on many interesting topics.

PicNic is a bit puzzling for traditional retailers. I interact with C-levels execs of "traditional" retailers in Europe and very few have heard about PicNic. When they realize what PicNic achieved in the NL, basically "solving" the last mile problem they all have, they usually are quite impressed.

Obviously, last-mile delivery is highly country specific: sociology and urban planning/population density in the Netherlands is very different to any other European country. Attempt to roll out the PicNic model in Scandinavia (roughly the same population size) would be a completely different story.

As an outsider, I'm wondering what PicNic next move will be. My money is on an international expansion into Germany, starting with Dusseldorf and its lander (similar population density and size).

<comment><USER19> You guessed correctly!

[https://ecommercenews.eu/dutch-online-supermarket-picnic- exp...](https://ecommercenews.eu/dutch-online-supermarket-picnic-expands- germany)

Indeed some things work great in the Netherlands which might not work well in other places. But even if we have to change some parts of the delivery model to adapt to other markets, I think the high level concept has a high chance of working.

<comment><USER20> I do agree. You're in a much better position than your competitors: easier for you to win on the delivery market in the FR than, say, for Carrefour or Auchan to solve it. (which they have attempted to solve for the last 10 years with varying degrees of success)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I don't get how this is a major issue.

Most UK supermarkets have an online delivery service (even Iceland!) You pick a delivery slot for a certain price (off peak is cheaper) and then choose what you want.

They have store assistants with specific trolleys with plastic boxes for each order and fill up as they walk around the store. Boxes get loaded to a specially designed truck and delivered in the time slot.

Works pretty well, unless you're this person [https://www.reddit.com/r/britishproblems/comments/2sxjiv/tes...](https://www.reddit.com/r/britishproblems/comments/2sxjiv/tesco_home_delivery_substituted_my_kingsmill_5050/)

<comment><USER22> Haha, that link reminds me of a substitution I got one time. Frozen garlic cubes were replaced with frozen mixed veg.

I thought it was a little odd at the time till the next time I was in the store and noticed the frozen garlic cubes were right next to the frozen mixed veg. So rather than apply logic and grab some other type of easy garlic they just grabbed the thing next to it. I actually facepalmed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Spoiler alert: They didn't pay their employees enough for the deliveries, and these employees ended up averaging about $7/hour to make deliveries. If they fixed this (seemingly) basic problem, I wonder how well this would work.

<comment><USER24> $7 per hour _using their personal vehicles and insurance_. And personal insurance might not even cover these accidents.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> "All sixteen workers who had participated in the program said delivery of five packages would generally take them more than two hours to complete. If a worker drove 10 miles to drop five packages, that would earn them $15.40 in compensation per package and fuel, before overtime pay."

They clearly just dont have the density of orders for this to work. Theres videos on youtube of the amazon flex app, a 2 hour shift with a car full of boxes is mostly within a couple of blocks.

</comment><comment><USER26> One idea would be to pay customers to deliver packages. Then you can incentivize them to come in to buy something and then take and deliver some packages for you.

<comment><USER27> It'd be much harder to keep people accountable. Who do you blame when the product arrives damaged (or not at all)?

<comment><USER26> There's probably some way to incentivize good behavior. I would do it for my neighbors within reason. That being said Amazon is still leading the way, maybe Walmart can do USPS for the last mile as well.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> I wonder if Whole Foods, Wegmans or Trader Joe's would be more successful at an experiment like this. I can't imagine anybody working at a Walmart store trusting their employer with schemes like this.

P.S. Their new website homepage doesn't show any prices. It feels kind of dishonest.

<comment><USER29> That's such a good idea that Whole Foods is already doing it. You might know it as Amazon Fresh.

<comment><USER28> Whole Foods employees pick up stuff and deliver it to homes after their shift is over at the store?

<comment><USER29> Amazon employees do. And Whole Foods has an Instacart partnership (delivery.wholefoodsmarket.com) from before they were acquired.

<comment><USER28> But that's not the same as a walmart employee finishing work, and then driving stuff to people's homes. Am I missing something?

<comment><USER29> I am admittedly abstracting a little bit, from this very particular program structure to the general problem of retail outlets doing home delivery to regular consumers.

I suspect Amazon-owned companies are unlikely experiment with the particular structure Walmart is trying. It feels like Walmart is trying to solve a very particular problem that most other companies might not have.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> If memory serves me well, a few store chains in Europe are exploring approaching this by flipping the problem on its head. Rather than delivering the goods at the customers' houses, they stick to having the local store prep the orders and then having customers show up at a glorified drive-through.

Aren't there grocery stores in North America trying that approach? For all they know it might prompt a startup to actually solve the last mile problem for them, in much the same way as there's a startup or three out there that offer restaurant deliveries for places that don't support it out of the box.

</comment><comment><USER31> Reminds me of kozmo.com [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kozmo.com](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kozmo.com)

<comment><USER32> I recall buying DVDs from kozmo in 1999 and having them delivered by bike messenger to my office.

I was on a flight with the founder in 2000 one time telling them how much I loved it and making suggestions about what is love to see, but also expressing how surprised I was that they could make a profit... They folded soon after...

I still remember the last time I bought from them: Ran on DVD

</comment></comment><comment> swagasaurus-rex TLDR:

> Walmart's associate delivery pilot program [...] started with store managers > pitching employees an unusual new way to boost pay. Those who passed > background checks could moonlight as drivers for the Walmart.com delivery > service, they said.

> Fourteen of the sixteen Walmart employees told Reuters that they were put > off by the program's poor compensation. And all of them expressed concern > over who would be responsible if they got into an accident or if merchandise > was lost.

<comment><USER33> If you can't build it without being propped up on the risk of others, then you don't really know how to build it.

<comment><USER34> "To be fair" that sounds straight out of the play book of "growth oriented" companies in general.

<comment><USER33> Well there is a time element of how long one deals with the unknowns, but this is Walmart. A fortune 500 (100? 50?) company has the resources to skip most of the bootstrapping shortcuts and make a serious go at it to do a good eval.

<comment><USER35> Walmart is the Fortune 1, FYI: [http://fortune.com/fortune500/](http://fortune.com/fortune500/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> Or people could wait a damn day.

</comment><comment><USER37> Gee, who here didn't foreseen an idea of strangers coming to your home to deliver after they can't wait to end their shift already (and go home) won't work.

The article mentions billions put into figuring out how to tackle on Amazon success. Here is the plan, free of charge:

Ask anyone why they chose Amazon over Wallmart, here is the answer: Both Amazon and Walmart has large range of goods, but Walmart lacks in reviews; offer perks and discounts (on products you have problems to sell) to those "good Wallmarters" who are willing to spend their time reviewing products online and you fix half of the problem. Make reviewing possible only to person who purchase a product from Wallmart to compete with horrible fake reviews that Amazon is plagued with.

\- Have ONE designated person (or few people) delivering per store and made it their full-time job to deliver. The reasons I hate going to Wallmart are: 1) lack of short-distance parking lots [takes me 10 minutes to find a spot, sorry I'm lazy]. 2) confusion of where a product is [take me extra time to walk and find an isle]. 3) checkout time and lines are ridiculous [being 24-hour open doesn't mean much when there is only one clerk at the night shift, so waiting time is the same at rush hour]

\- So have that ONE designated person: have their own reserved parking spot, have them handheld access to know where products are, have them skip checkout since products are paid online. Have them smart online app to deliver throughout the day, back and forth as many times as sophisticated algorithm of said app decides its the wise route possible.

You welcome, Wallmart!

<comment><USER38> It's not a service I use but my local Walmart is pushing curb side pickup of online orders. So is one of my local grocery chains. It isn't really a use case that appeals to me and I don't much like Walmart for food shopping anyway. But that addresses your specific complaints.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> What about using Uber/Lyft for deliveries? There are dedicated people already willing to drive their own cars to transport things.

<comment><USER40> The article says "Earlier this year, Reuters reported the retailer's delivery partnerships with Uber and Lyft ended after the ride-hailing services struggled to deliver people and packages together." So sounds like they tried it already and may have had logistical issues.

<comment><USER41> That sounds like they were trying to do deliveries and ride hails at the same time, and would struggle to get the deliveries done because they were getting interrupted by the hails (or had horrible hail rates because deliveries took them out of the hot zones).

It may have worked much better if they didn't comingle the jobs, and had dedicated horus for deliveries separate from giving rides.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> I know this is an extreme comparison, but Walmart reminds me a lot of Blockbuster. I remember Blockbuster thought it would be fine because of physical stores all over the place. They thought they had a plan to leverage that, but they never could. Turns out no one cared about the physical stores.

<comment><USER43> Blockbuster's failure will be an important example for Walmart just as soon as people can download groceries, clothing, toothpaste, and lawnmowers.

<comment><USER44> > _Blockbuster 's failure will be an important example for Walmart just as > soon as people can download groceries_

Was Blockbuster killed by streaming? Or Netflix swapping rental from an _ad hoc_ retail to a delivery subscription model?

<comment><USER45> The popularity of Redbox demonstrates that some people really do appreciate being able to drive to a store and rent a DVD. Blockbuster probably died because enough people switched to Netflix that the overhead of running stores outgrew the revenue. Redbox then swooped in with automated kiosks and were able to serve Blockbuster's remaining customers.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Is it required for a startup to be registered to accept payments? - <AUTHOR> Maybe a dumb question but do I have to get my company/startup registered as a business entity before I start accepting payments through my website?<p>Stripe isn't available here in Dubai/UAE and I was planning on using any of the checkout.com payfort.com or 2checkout.com but I just found out that each one of them require your startup to be a registered business entity in UAE for which you have to pay loads of money every year. Now, for some one who is not sure that either their product will take off or not, is it necessary to get his startup registered before they could integrate any payment gateway? How are you accepting payments in your products? Is there any other option apart from stripe.com? <comment><USER2> Hi

This Mehdi from Checkout.com's Dubai office

Unfortunately you are right, you need a legal entity to apply in the UAE.

While in Europe we can operate through our own acquiring licenses and support sole traders/entrepreneurs, in the UAE we need to use a local acquiring bank to process payments.

Local acquirers such as Mashreq, NI or NABD (now FAB) all make the legal entity a requirement which we have no other option but to pass on to you.

Rest assured that we are working hard to bring our services to parity across regions, so hopefully this will change one day.

In the meantime if we can be of any help, feel free to contact us !

The Checkout.com Team

</comment><comment><USER3> You should ask a lawyer, but you pretty much already have your answer.</comment>


Ssltunnel module for node.js - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/dimastopel/ssltunnel

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi guys, this is my first open-source contribution. Your comments are very welcome. Thanks!</comment>


Light Table (Kodowa) is hiring - <AUTHOR> http://kodowa.com/jobs

<comment><USER2> The idea of a reactive IDE just seemed so interesting that I downloaded Light Table last week even though I don't know Clojure. It's wonderful. I've started reading up on Clojure, which turns out to be wonderful too. And then I discovered Noir! How did I not know about this stuff before?

<comment><USER3> Same. I've been playing around with Light Table for about a month now, and I'm completely hooked on Clojure.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "Tell us a time you hacked a non-computer system to your advantage."

Sounded like YC application?

<comment><USER5> Tastefully borrowed from it :). It happens to be a pretty darn good question - it's a good place to talk about an accomplishment, and provides some insight into the intelligence, creativity, and personality of the person who answers it.

<comment><USER6> And this is why I prefer this kind of job posts: it sets up a 2 way communication. Like HN job posts used to be back in the day.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I wonder since a while what makes Light Table definitely better than emacs?

edit: better or different.

<comment><USER8> It embraces this concept: <http://vimeo.com/36579366>

<comment><USER7> Hey thanx, it's a nice talk for sure :)</comment></comment></comment>


Amazon Web Services $100,000 Startup Challenge - <AUTHOR> http://www.amazon.com/gp/browse.html?node=377634011

<comment><USER2> I wonder if they've thought this through. No really promising startup would go through all this just for a 1/n chance of $50k.

This is structurally different from raising investment. An investor tries to fund (as far as they can tell) _all_ the good startups that approach them. Here there is only one prize. Which means the better the applicants, the more likely you're wasting your time applying.

<comment><USER3> I am not sure I understand: seems to me all work you have to invest initially is to fill in a one page form? Making it among the finalists, even if you don't win the grand price, you get some exposure, get to present to VCs, and hopefully have some fun. Where is the downside, except for having to make your idea public?

<comment><USER4> Grand Prize $50,000 Cash

Prizes for 4 Second-Prize Finalists

$5,000 in AWS Credits A professionally developed video, filmed at their place of business, and posted on Amazon's website Exposure and promotion on Amazon.com and AWS websites Promotion in contest press release and other press activities Airfare and hotel accommodations in Seattle to meet and present to Amazon and Judges Panel Featured at the AWS Start-Up Challenge Awards Dinner in Seattle, WA with Amazon executives, industry leaders and VCs

<http://www.amazon.com/gp/browse.html?node=377635011>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> In addition to the $50k cash and $50k credit for AWS. The winner is also offered a business loan from Amazon described as such:

"Amazon.com, Inc. or one of its affiliates also will offer the first prize winner a loan in order to bring its Business Proposition to market (the "Investment Offer"). The Investment Offer would be in the form of a promissory note on terms to be determined by Amazon.com, Inc., in its sole discretion, including the conversion of such promissory note to equity in a future equity financing."

Now, I don't speak fluent legalese, but isn't this a lose-lose deal for the entrepreneur? It sounds like if your business flops, it's a loan and you have to pay it back, but if it succeeds, Amazon can convert the loan to equity and make out with much more then they would have by having the loan repaid.

<comment><USER2> There's nothing sinister about this. It probably just means they'd invest as convertible debt, which is very common (possibly the default) for angel investments. You wouldn't have to pay it back if the startup failed, and the conversion would be into a predetermined number of shares.

<comment><USER6> Why is it more common? One would expect angels and VCs to tend the other way (buying options and warrants, instead of making loans).

<comment><USER2> It's only nominally a loan. I think the main attraction to angels is that it protects them from VCs. They convert into the series A round alongside the VCs as the same class of investor.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Only open to people/businesses in the US.

Ah well.

</comment><comment><USER8> damn. from the official rules - First prize gets: "one-hour mentoring sessions from an AWS Technical Expert (ARV $500)"

I need to become an AWS Tech Expert.

<comment><USER9> Sounds more like they are overvaluing what they are giving away in this contest for tax deduction purposes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'd consider submitting an application, except that the deal-breaker seems to be, "The Amazon judges' panel will review all applications and choose five finalists, based on ... implementation of pay-as-you-use Amazon Web Services." We'll certainly might use AWS in the future, but in prototype building mode, it seems like AWS would be a premature optimization.

By the way, I wonder if they are looking particularly for startups that use AWS in novel ways, as opposed to promising startups that just happen to use it on the backhand for scalability.

<comment><USER10> The VirtualMin folks might be good candidates for this contest since they have what seems to be a slick integration with Amazon's Elastic Computing Cloud (<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=52916>). I know they're already YC'd, but it seems like it'd be a minimal time investment since they're already launched.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> You have to make your idea ("in whole or in part") public if you become a finalist-- you're required to make a "finalist video" to post online to be voted on.

Votes don't count towards judging, though the judges will be aware of the votes.

Incidentally, is there any data available as to the survival/success rates of startups who won these types of business plan competitions?

</comment><comment><USER12> I think this would be an awesome opportunity to build an ebay killer with the financial and management backing of Amazon.

</comment><comment><USER4> Jeff Bezos is in the game?</comment>


How the PlayStation-Powered New Horizons Probe Flew to Pluto - <AUTHOR> http://www.expertreviews.co.uk/technology/1403583/how-the-playstation-powered-new-horizons-probe-flew-to-pluto

<comment><USER2> Slightly disingenuous headline since it's not "PlayStation-Powered", it's "(rad-hardened version of the same CPU the PS1 used)-powered".

<comment><USER3> Can't do proper clickbait with a title like this! ;-)</comment></comment>


Scientists May Have Just Discovered a Parallel Universe Leaking into Ours - <AUTHOR> https://www.inverse.com/article/7403-scientists-may-have-just-discovered-a-parallel-universe-leaking-into-ours <comment><USER2> Way back, there were observations of 'giant galactic arcs', with all kinds of speculation as to their nature. Now we know it was simply an effect of gravitational lensing.

These excitable and far-flung statements about 'parallel universes' remind me of some of those early arc reports...

</comment><comment><USER3> If something can leak from one universe to other universe then they are not isolated systems and hence there are not many universes but single universe. Universe = Everything that there is.</comment>


PlaySpan, run 12-year-old founder, gets $6.5M in venture capital - <AUTHOR> http://venturebeat.com/2007/09/19/playspan-run-12-year-old-ceo-gets-65m-in-venture-capital/ <comment><USER2> From the comments, that's a pretty deceptive way for a company to start out.

</comment><comment><USER3> I finally figured out how to get my start-up on all the front pages at launch time.

I'll make my cat the CEO.

I can see it now:

\- Friskies at the launch party

\- a one hour special on Animal Planet

\- "Software so easy you don't need a mouse (she ate it)"

But no press conferences. She only uses email.

<comment><USER4> :) heh! I don't have a cat. What shall i do now?!

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Seriously: What kind of stupid journalist would swallow such BS?

Fact check, people. I wouldn't trust a 12 year old to run a lawnmower.</comment>


A Style-Based Generator Architecture for Generative Adversarial Networks [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://arxiv.org/abs/1812.04948 <comment><USER2> Video: [https://youtu.be/kSLJriaOumA?t=26](https://youtu.be/kSLJriaOumA?t=26)

The quality and diversity of these images is incredible.

<comment><USER3> The "other datasets" section starting at 5:04 is very interesting. Aside from the disruptive effects of facial recognition, this tech seems destined to become a go-to tool for automotive design.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I believe that best of these generated faces will have a 90% match in training dataset.

If you go through the generated faces you can see all of them have different background. These are not generated from scratch, only picked from memory to match the requirements.

Each face has totally different hair and hairstyle.

Have the published the training dataset?

</comment><comment><USER5> This is just phenomenal. Can see this being a a fairly disruptive force in the media industry.

Also, sock puppet factories could use this to create endless numbers of fake personas for social media astroturfing.

<comment><USER6> Watch this space..

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The improvements in GANs from 2014 are amazing. From coarse 32x32 pixel images we have gotten to 1024x1024 images that can fool most humans.</comment>


Study finds links between swearing and honesty - <AUTHOR> https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/frankly-do-we-give-a-damn-study-finds-links-between-swearing-and-honesty <comment><USER2> Previously: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13412107](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13412107)

</comment><comment><USER3> I swear...actually I swear an awful lot. Sometimes I say fuck, shit and bollocks all in one sentence. It's a big part of my vocabulary.

I find it bizarre that there are certain sounds that I can make with my mouth that ripple through the air and upon hitting the delicate ears of another human being will cause offence. I think people of the future will look back on this period of time and refer to all of us as crazy for being so sensitive when there are much, much bigger problems facing humankind.

I find it even crazier still that people write f-ck or c-cksucker and feel that by using hyphen they're protecting these same sensitive folk from the rudeness of the words. I mean come on. If I read f*ck what I actually say in my head is "fuck". Not "beep" or some other auto-censor in my head.

Just two minor caveats to all of the above:

If I'm meeting somebody new, or somebody with whom I do not already have a close relationship with (especially within the confines of business) I will tone down but not cease my swearing. It's just polite but if they then proceed to drop an f-bomb all bets are off and I'll revert to default swearing mode.

I also do not swear, for obvious reasons, in front of my three year old or any children for that matter. Again, it's just common sense.

<comment><USER4> >> I find it bizarre that there are certain sounds that I can make with my mouth that ripple through the air and upon hitting the delicate ears of another human being will cause offence. I think people of the future will look back on this period of time and refer to all of us as crazy for being so sensitive when there are much, much bigger problems facing humankind.

>> I also do not swear, for obvious reasons, in front of my three year old or any children for that matter. Again, it's just common sense.

You should think about this contradiction, before you say people are sensitive, no?

<comment><USER5> This doesn't seem all that inconsistent. Kids are impressionable, and pay a much higher social cost for swearing when young (like getting disciplined at school). By contrast, most jobs worth a damn won't be childish enough to reprimand you for something as silly as swearing.

<comment><USER6> Exactly. Other people are the main reason you have to teach your children not to swear. Whether we like it or not, we live in a society where people get butt-hurt about swearing and some people are appalled at kids swearing. I don't want to have to put up with explaining myself every time my kid swears.

<comment><USER3> Yeah definitely this. People will judge my son for swearing but my son doesn't have the vocabulary, experience or social skills to defend his words. It's therefore my job to ensure that I don't leave him in a position where he can use a word that gets him in trouble.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Link to paper: [http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/194855061668105...](http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1948550616681055)

</comment><comment><USER7> I read through the study about which this article reports.

The first two experiments are not very robust. They present a _plausible_ association between cursing and honesty, but it's not especially convincing.

There is so much potential for confounding variables and sampling defects (e.g. self-reported data from Mechanical Turk users, a group who may not represent the population at large) that you could drive a truck through it.

There are likely many other plausible explanations for the results that don't actually depend on an association between cursing and honesty.

For instance, in the first experiment, participants were asked question such as "Are all your habits good and desirable ones?" If they answered, "Yes," it was considered a lie. But it might alternatively indicate several other things, such as poor reading comprehension, paranoia about how the answers might be used, poor self-inventory skills, etc.

As for the third state-level experiment, it's just silly. It's the sort of thing you might see on Buzzfeed or my own site, Correlated.org. Don't take it seriously.

</comment><comment><USER8> Interestingly, swearing is discouraged here and in business in general.

<comment><USER9> Straight honesty isn't always a virtue. Plus cussing signals lots of other things, too.

I cuss a lot at work. But I don't cuss at people. I have a coworker that says things like "It's fucking ridiculous that X task isn't done" to the people who are doing that task. This dude is toxic to be around. I... think I'm not? We'll see how many of the people I'm managing still work here in a year, though. Hopefully all of them.

So yeah. In addition to signaling honesty, cussing can be part of aggressively damaging relationships, which is something businesses (and HN) benefit from discouraging.

<comment><USER10> > Straight honesty isn't always a virtue.

I find this an interesting statement. Would you mind providing some clear examples of a real-life situation where honesty isn't a virtue?

I often find that lying is convenient (for the person lying) in the short term but its damage can be far reaching and difficult to predict. If you want to have meaningful and effective relationships (at home or at work) straight honesty is always beneficial.

I do remember working with someone who had Alzheimer's disease. I stopped being honest with her quite quickly as I figured that repeatedly reminding her of her husband's death was wrong. But I can't think of any other examples of my life when straight honesty wasn't a virtue. What about you?

<comment><USER11> |> Straight honesty isn't always a virtue.

>I find this an interesting statement. Would you mind providing some clear examples of a real-life situation where honesty isn't a virtue?

Umm, certainly.

The canonical example goes something like this—

Someone knocks urgently at your door. You open it to find your best friend on the stoop, bent over and panting from exertion.

He says there is some madman chasing him and for his safety he needs to hide there at your place for a spell.

You welcome him in, of course, and he goes to the smallest upstairs bedroom to lie down.

Moments later there is another knock on the door.

You open it to find someone you've never met before, only slightly less out of breath than was your buddy.

"Hello, is <friend's name> here? I'm here to kill him, you see. My rationale is rather not your concern, but as I'm in a bit of a rush, please do tell so that I may finish the job or be on my way." \-- The remainder of the dialog is left as an exercise for the reader. ;-D

/* Philosophy major, with emphasis on Kantian ethics */

<comment><USER10> Yeah. This is the classic example and obviously is interesting to think about. Some people still defend telling the truth if you're hiding Anne Frank and the Nazis are at the door.

We might go down a rabbit hole here but your example (mad man, Anne Frank, whatever) doesn't clearly demonstrate that honesty isn't a virtue. It's a clear example of a real life situation, sure, but it doesn't show that telling the truth wouldn't be virtuous.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Personally, I've found the following heuristic to be very accurate: if you wouldn't do it in front of a toddler AND allow them do it themselves, then you probably shouldn't do it, ever. There's likely no value in doing it (I intentionally say likely and don't claim an absolute. There are exceptions, e.g. having sex).

1\. Drinking

2\. Smoking

3\. Drugs

4\. Stealing

5\. Cheating

6\. Cursing

(needless to say, it's a long list).

<comment><USER12> > then you probably shouldn't do it, ever.

You must be fun at parties. That's a great means of clean living but as a rule for everyone to follow I think its a touch strict. Also our culture has some curious ideas about children and what about the world to shield them from. The dastardly lie of Santa and the general premise that innocence should be preserved instead of teaching them the truth of the world is one clear example of our strange interactions with our progeny.

Often concerns about swearing especially are very redundant around children and arguably selfish. One doesn't swear around children because they might use the word with frequency and embarrass the parent not because there is any detriment in the child being exposed to swearing.

<comment><USER4> Can you explain this "you must be fun at parties" comment I see often? And I am very fun at parties. I fail to see what cursing, drinking, smoking, etc has to do with being a fun person.

<comment><USER12> The youthful idea is that parties are to be debauched to an extent. So being strictly straight laced makes people less comfortable about being debauched.

Ultimately though it comes down to your post:

> then you probably shouldn't do it, ever.

assuming (somewhat, not much but a little, the "personally" at the start saves it) that people should be like you. Conversely I feel that everyone should be everything they want to be. Drunk, smoked, high, clean, religious, atheist, etc. There is no "better" because there is no one objective context, there is just different and many.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I think this is a bit of spin being put out to make the next president's profanity seem like a good thing. Reminds me in a way of "the Emperor's New Clothes"...

</comment><comment><USER14> "If the guy next to you is swearing like a wharfie he's probably a billionaire. Or, just conceivably, a wharfie."

— Australian observation

</comment><comment><USER15> This was posted fucking yesterday

</comment><comment><USER16> And tomorrow someone will find links between depression and happiness. There are 10's of thousands of studies published a year, in which case most are completely unfounded or ridiculous.

With the right test group, right questions, and correctly controlled environment, you can create almost any conclusion.

"Scientific Studies: John Oliver" : [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Rnq1NpHdmw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Rnq1NpHdmw)

"Stanford News - research Scientists and Data": [http://news.stanford.edu/2015/11/16/fraud-science- papers-111...](http://news.stanford.edu/2015/11/16/fraud-science- papers-111615/)

"TWP - 64 Scientific Papers Restracted": [https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning- mix/wp/2015/08/1...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning- mix/wp/2015/08/18/outbreak-of-fake-peer-reviews-widens-as-major-publisher- retracts-64-scientific-papers/)

<comment><USER17> Maybe so, but please don't post generic dismissals to HN. It takes discussion in predictable directions, which is not interesting. Better comments find something specific to engage with.</comment></comment>


How Much Ads Cost  - <AUTHOR> http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1007053 <comment><USER2> Average US household viewed $87.71 of display advertising last year --- less than $10 a month. How many people would pay that much to opt out of viewing display ads?

(68,566 page views per online household * 52% of page views sold * $0.00246 (CPM/1000))

<comment><USER3> Is that not sort of cheating though? I mean sure you would be providing a service, i.e blocking all ads on the internet, but sure you are earning on the back of the people who are producing quality content and thanks to you they now make much less from it, which in turn would reduce the quality content and your profit and the producers profit.

Maybe each site could charge people what they earn from advertising in a manner of subscription, but why shut down knowledge when the profits remain the same? I mean are people still really so bothered by advertising on websites which have taken care not to make their adverts intrusive? I just read an article on new york times and am sure they have ads there, but I didn't notice them, they didn't bother me, but I hate reading stuff on the economist, that site is over saturated with ads.

<comment><USER2> If people are willing to pay more not to see ads than publishers receive for showing them ads, then it should be feasible for people to pay not to see ads and for publishers still to get paid.

And people who would rather see ads can continue to see ads.

I don't see that this is cheating or unethical in any way.

<comment><USER3> yes, that is if the publisher himself charges the visitor, in which case I said that if this is done on a subscription basis to the exclusion of those who do not subscribe then this would be shutting down knowledge unnecessarily as the profits would be the same. If however it is on voluntary basis as some forums do, namely if you wish to subscribe you do not see any adverts, but you may continue to access the content with adverts if you do not wish to subscribe that is perfectly fair.

However my objection was in relation to ad blocking software which is what I thought the analysis of the op were for.

<comment><USER2> I'm thinking in terms of a middleman who can aggregate

* people (and maybe their ISPs) who will pay to avoid adverts; and * publishers and ad networks which show paid advertising

Having to separately opt-out of seeing adverts on every ad-supported site is too much hassle and the financial overheads would be prohibitive. It needs to be aggregated.

The technical side could be implemented using ad blocking software (with block lists provided by the publishers), but the publishers would be fairly compensated.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This article is silly. There is a HUGE difference (several orders of magnitude) in CPM between slapping up some Google ads on your blog about puppies, and hiring a sales team to sell ads into your niche site full of highly qualified people who advertisers want to reach.

<comment><USER5> I found it useful. Better to get another few data points than nothing. They even mentioned themselves that the rates were quite variable.</comment></comment>


Proposed FCC regulation: mandatory DRMd firmware for devices with WiFi/Bluetooth - <AUTHOR> https://libreplanet.org/wiki/Save_WiFi

<comment><USER2> These people are crazy... Somebody must know that it costs money to develop these things and the rate at which cheap devices shipping from china and India is only going to increase, right? Or have they plugged their ears and eye sockets with money from RIAA and MPAA?</comment>


8K TVs Are Coming to Market - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/2016/01/8k-tvs-coming-to-market/?mbid=social_fb <comment><USER2> Still of relevance: the "when will 4k matter to you?" chart.

[http://s3.carltonbale.com/resolution_chart.html](http://s3.carltonbale.com/resolution_chart.html)

Short version: you might get some benefit from an 8k tv (and associated 8k media if/when it arrives) if you're routinely sitting closer than 5' from your 80" television. Otherwise, not so much.

I generally try to avoid dissing new technology/software/ideas, but really, 8k TVs appear on the face of it to be pretty pointless. You literally won't be able to tell the difference between a 4k and an 8k film if you're sitting at a reasonable distance from a normal-sized TV.

(I'm defining "normal-sized" as "55 inches or smaller" here. If in actual fact lots of people are buying 90" TVs that changes things.)

For reference, I've been a video professional for 20 years, I have a reasonably large television in a not-massive living room, and in my living room I can _just about_ tell the difference between 720p and 1080p content playing on it, if the source is high-quality and I'm concentrating. The resolution has to drop down to 480p or less before I find it starts actively interfering with my enjoyment of whatever I'm watching.

<comment><USER3> I agree that these resolution jumps aren't overly relevant for casual TV viewing.

The increased resolutions _are_ important, however, for the success of VR headsets where the display is literally inches away from your eyes.

<comment><USER2> Oh, definitely. No disagreement there. I'm very much looking forward to my CV1 Rift :)

<comment><USER3> Me too!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I love commercial videos that explain to you why this new resolution is unbelievable, but the cam used to record it is a full hd one, and it's displayed in a 640*320 window :)

<comment><USER5> And yet there's something to them. There's clearly some sort of interesting technique used. I guess they try to make the things on the screen look as real as the people watching.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Literally the only 8k content available for the foreseeable future are timelapse/hyperlapse movies stitched together from 32Mpx+ pictures, i.e. from D810, 5Ds etc. (maybe medium format as well if they weren't so slow).

We have immense problems with silly 4k RAW recording - first, only the latest M.2 PCIe SSDs are fast enough to record/play it in realtime and second, the size of RAW footage is ridiculously large. 8k cameras are just experimental prototypes.

<comment><USER7> > Literally the only 8k content available for the foreseeable future are > timelapse/hyperlapse movies stitched together from 32Mpx+ pictures

Pointless screensaver-like demo visualization apps might see an unexpected revival. Think tutanchamun mask projected onto mirrored sphere floating above infinite checkerboard, or even just the randomly swooshing hairline polygons on black, perfect to show off superior pixel density. Last time this has happened, customers were faced with a similar mismatch between theoretical multimedia capability and available content.

<comment><USER6> That would require a fanless GPU capable of 4k @ 60Hz. But we can dream ;-)

<comment><USER7> Anything capable of painting a modern channel selector UI on that screen will be generously oversized for recreating effects from the screen saver age.

But I get your point, it may take a while before those screens become must- have gaming accessories. Even if you had the GPU resources to achieve high FPS, an excessive increase in screen resolution would only expose low polygon count artifacts without a matching increase in scene complexity.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> maybe i'm old, but I can't tell the difference between 720p and 1080p on my ludicrously oversized flat screen tv

<comment><USER9> Really? I've got a 50" FullHD TV and I could definitely use an upgrade to 4K. Sitting 3-4 meters away from it some content is definitely not as sharp as it could be.

<comment><USER8> i have a 46" TV. I suspect the x.264 compression artifacts were becoming a limiting factor (and my eye sight)

<comment><USER10> I often can't tell between 720p and 1080i source material either on my 46" 1080p set. About to buy a 75" 4k set though. The size means I'll definitely notice 4k from my couch distance (~8ft) and the sheer size will come in handy when watching TV from the kitchen table (~15ft away)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> > it means digitally zooming an image without affecting picture quality will > be a reality.

Wait.. what?

<comment><USER12> The paragraph is saying that "absolutely no evidence of pixelation even if your face is an inch from the set", so my interpretation is that in normal viewing distance even zoomed in video will look perfect: "That's not a realistic viewing scenario, but on the production side of the equation, it means digitally zooming an image without affecting picture quality will be a reality."

<comment><USER6> My 55" 4k TV has pixels visible pretty much from distances under 1m. I use it for showcasing my photography portfolio, looks much better than on 1080p, as well as to review my hyperlapse movies and that's about it. 8k on a smartphone will be different though, but why? 720p on 5" is close to "good enough" for median vision of population.

8k is supposed to be the "final resolution" of TV as it should bring retina- style to people with perfect vision (not to eagles though).

<comment><USER13> 8K on a smartphone means a reasonable resolution for VR headsets, so don't discourage them. :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Cool. Now make it a touch screen with wireless connectors and sell it in racks beside the drywall at the local home improvement store.

I keep waiting for this world of ubitquitous cheap displays that we've been promised. Seems like we're getting there -- but it's been taking its sweet time.

<comment><USER15> "I keep waiting for this world of ubiquitous cheap displays that we've been promised."

What do you consider cheap? You can get a 42" screen for under $300 these days. That used to cost $1500 and weigh 5 times as much not too long ago.

<comment><USER16> I imagine he's referring to 13-21" screens, where the price has stagnated in the past, say, 5 years, especially relative to higher-end displays. Case in point: you can now get a $5 Raspi Zero, which is more powerful than my laptop from seven years ago, which cost $700. That's an absolutely insane, and amazing, reduction in price. But any meaningful display for it will cost you around $90-$120, which is roughly how much it cost seven years ago.

As much as I appreciate the stupid and pointless race towards insane resolutions for how it benefits VR, I too wish we had some progress making "normal", 1920x1080 20" (or 13" 1600x900) displays for cheap.

People talk about "Raspi Zero, the $5 computer" but for six billion people in the world who don't have a computer, a computer is a device with a screen. When _that_ whole shebang becomes $5, having a computer suddenly becomes a choice for everyone, not a privilege for the upper 15% of society. And right now, the thing that's holding us back from that dream is only the display.

A $5 Raspi, which consumes 0.6W at most, can be powered for 18 hours with a battery that costs $2 in bulk. A SD card in bulk might be an extra $3 and a Wifi dongle can be had for $2 in bulk. That's a $12 laptop. Add a display, and your $12 laptop becomes $100. The lack of progress in displays is criminal.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I believe that LG uses double resolution TV's so that they can do full res passive 3D where they alternate lines to each eye. That way they get full frame rate, reducing the flickering, and getting rid of battery powered glasses. So for them an 8k TV would really be a 4k 3d TV.

</comment><comment><USER18> I haven't even upgraded to 4K yet. Who gives a damn if there are 8K televisions, barely any Blu Rays support 4K yet, and streaming it (in the States at least)? Fuhgetabboutit.

I upgraded to a 4K on my gaming PC and that's awesome to have because it's right in front of my face, but until the content is widely available I see no reason to move up past 1080p for the living room. Just dumb, I'd rather have the content the native resolution of the TV's panel. Maybe that's just me, I dunno.

</comment><comment><USER19> And the 4K content is where?

<comment><USER20> Netflix, Youtube.

<comment><USER15> How's the quality from them? I got the sense, from articles I'd read, that it was overly compressed, but I've never seen it first-hand.

<comment><USER21> I've never seen any artifacts in the ~50hrs on content I've watched in 4K across Netflix and Amazon.

The biggest picture quality issue is possibly the cameras themselves: a lot of TV looks uncomfortably real - like it was shot on a security camera. Though I did get the same impression from Breaking Bad in 4K, even though it was shot on 35mm.

<comment><USER22> The "Soap Opera Effect" Is usually more pronounced from running at a frame rate higher than 24fps.

For some reason we've become accustomed to 24FPS as realistic, and the smooth motion on a 120hz screen is jarring.

<comment><USER23> There is a theory that a thing so smooth as 120hz falls in the "very real but not quite real" case, or the Uncanny Valley. Whereas 24fps tells our brain we're clearly watching a movie and so it's ok.

Just like those highly realistic dolls from Japan where you can tell something is wrong but you can't quite put your finger on it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I hope they keep going on this resolution kick. There is a pretty big gap between the max resolution that really makes sense for flat images and the minimum resolution for holographic displays. The higher resolution that sells to videophiles, the smaller that gap becomes and the more likely we are to eventually bridge it.

</comment><comment><USER25> I don't think pixelation from digital zoom is a cause of tv resolution (it was decades ago)...since digital zoom will produce pixelation artifacts that cover multiple tv pixels. Example just connect your tv to your computer and zoom into a picture.

</comment><comment><USER26> So where are the 128 bit addressable CPUs?

<comment><USER27> We don't even have full 64-bit currently, actually current processors (Haswell series, for example) use only 48-bit for memory.

<comment><USER28> Modern CPUs have 64-bit word and virtual address sizes, so by normal definitions they are 64-bit. The physical address range is not the metric here.

Besides, it would make no sense to have a 64-bit physical address bus. There aren't enough atoms in the universe to make memory to fill it.

<comment><USER27> Indeed it makes no sense to have a 64-bit physical bus, but the parent was asking why we don't have 128-bit yet on consumer devices.

<comment><USER29> Same answer. It's all CPUs, bus width, and address space. Consumer devices are not special.

<comment><USER27> Yes, I'm just saying: Before we look towards 128-bit devices, we should look towards 64-bit devices first.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>